What part is luck playing in this Ashes series? When two teams are as closely matched as the current England and Australia sides, apparently random events can take on a higher significance. Two nervous teams, full of inexperienced players will tend to look for signs or omens that fate is favouring either them or their opponents.

Coaches and captains might prefer to repeat Thomas Jefferson's oft-recycled (and rather smug) statement that the harder he worked, the more luck he had. Yet it is human nature to seek supra-rational explanations for every day occurrences and the tendency to brood on luck is particularly strong amongst cricketers, many of whom are already quite prepared to believe that the number of runs they score is in some mystical way related to the order in which they put on their pads or the colour of their underwear.

But what exactly do we mean by luck? And if we can identify what it is, can we say for sure whether one team or the other has been particularly favoured by it in this series so far? If luck is defined as events that are widely perceived to be outside of the control of the participants, then perhaps the ultimate example was the delivery that Stuart Broad bowled to Michael Clarke late on Monday. The ball made contact with Clarke's off-stump but failed to dislodge a bail; an event so unusual and so out of Broad's control that he might legitimately complain that this was bad luck of the purest kind.

Yet most of the random ill-fortune on a cricket field is not due to the complex operation of the laws of physics but is instead dispensed by those well-meaning middle-aged chaps in white coats. And it is hard to argue against the complaint that Australia have been on the sharp end of some genuine, twenty-four carat umpiring howlers. In their crucial second innings at Lord's, as they battled to save the match, Philip Hughes was dismissed by a catch from Andrew Strauss that was at the very least deserving of further television study. Simon Katich was then given out off an Andrew Flintoff no-ball and finally Michael Hussey was sent on his way because the noise of his bat hitting the ground sounded a bit like an edge.

Aggrieved Australians might also point out that, in addition to these umpiring calamities, they have suffered from injuries to key players, most notably Brett Lee and Brad Haddin. Haddin's broken digit was genuine bad luck of the traditional kind, to which Glen McGrath famously succumbed at Edgbaston four years ago. But Haddin's replacement, Graham Manou, performed perfectly adequately, so it cannot be said to have had a significant impact on the series so far.

And as for Lee, although Australia's attack has been threadbare in his absence, his very selection was considered a gamble in some quarters, given that he has spent most of the last six months on the treatment table. England's claims to feel slighted by Dame Fortune over Kevin Pietersen's injury are even more tenuous. His Achilles tendon injury was picked up weeks ago on an entirely different continent and it was a miracle of sorts that he had managed to feature in as many as two Tests.

It is often said that luck tends to even itself out. This is nonsense of course. It is perfectly possible to be on the wrong end of three or four career-wrecking bad umpiring decisions in a row without a single one in your favour. An individual can come to terms with this, given time and sufficient therapy. But from the team perspective, it is harder to live with because your bad luck is invariably a great big dollop of the good stuff for the opposition.

Still, Australia cannot afford to sulk, nor rely on the luck balancing itself out. They will instead look to the rehabilitated Brett Lee to spark their bowling attack into life. Three gone, two to play and England are [1.87] to regain the Ashes with Australia slight outsiders to retain the urn on [2.06] .The tension is becoming unbearable, for players and fans alike. If you've got a lucky rabbit's foot, now's the time to rub it.

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