This summer’s Ashes series is only three days old but already the same question that vexed England when they last met Australia in Test cricket has resurfaced: How do they get Steve Smith out?

The former captain’s barn-door of a bat produced 687 runs at an average of 137 during their doomed 2017-18 tour, drawing talk of a modern-day Don Bradman by way of numbers and not just backlift. Seven short of 200 in this first Test alone, Smith is looking ominous once more.

With the right-hander set to resume on 46 not out in the morning – Australia, three down, lead by 34 runs – it does not take a genius to work out where the game will likely be won and lost. Get Smith early, fire up the Hollies Stand and confidence will course through England’s veins again.

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But with their one success to date this match when Smith was bowled trying to slog late runs on day one, Chris Woakes admitted it will be a case of the think-tank reconvening to discuss plans for the most prized of Australian wickets.

Woakes said: “He’s obviously a world-class player and we’ve got to find a way to get him out. I think on this surface, it’s hard to force the issue as a bowler.

“The pace has gone out of it, so you almost have to build pressure, maybe attack at the other end and hold the other. But Steve doesn’t make many mistakes. We’ll look at a few plans overnight and see what we can come up with.”

England’s cause is not helped by Jimmy Anderson’s absence. Despite a spot of gunboat diplomacy on day three, involving two spells bowling on the outfield and in the nets, the 37-year-old did not take the field for Australia’s second innings and looked laboured between the wickets when briefly batting at No11.

And so it is down to the four-man attack of Woakes, Stuart Broad, Ben Stokes and Moeen Ali to pick the lock. The part-time spin of Joe Root and Joe Denly may ease the burden but on a pitch that is getting slower and lower, with turn for the spinners, England can ill-afford leaked runs with a chase to come.

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Moeen should, in theory, be able to monopolise one end but Root appeared to lose a touch of faith in his off-spinner. Figures of one for 47 from nine overs, across two spells, displayed both his threat and some profligacy (even if the captain’s fields offered a few too many release points).

It could have been different. Clearly still in a horrendous funk with the bat – Moeen was bowled by Nathan Lyon for a five-ball duck, shouldering arms to one that pitched on off stump – his bowling started brightly when tossed the ball early.

Cameron Bancroft had been dismissed by Moeen’s seventh delivery when dancing down the pitch and meekly dabbing to Jos Buttler at short-leg. But in the very same over Buttler grassed a low edge off Usman Khawaja at gully; had he been on his knees like his old Somerset hero, Marcus Trescothick, the chance would have been simple.

Moeen’s two disciplines rarely come together at once, with the home series against South Africa in 2017 the only time he has averaged above 30 with the bat and below 30 with the ball. But even if his batting is not bleeding into the rest of his game, drops like this can sap the confidence.

And so as well as pondering the Smith conundrum, England’s players must get around their man before day four. After all, when Ed Smith and Co considered the best spinner for this Test, they decided, not unreasonably, to plump for the world’s leading wicket-taker in the last year.

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But while Moeen has never needed a number on his back to be spotted on a cricket field, some 45 victims at 23 since his return to the side last summer appeared lost on a gaggle of supporters if much of the response to his inclusion – admittedly in the binary world of social media – was anything to go by.

With Smith looking ominous and Root down on resources, day four would be a handy time for Moeen to remind onlookers that, while the runs may have disappeared, his selection as the foremost spinner was fully merited.