By Jonathan Agnew BBC cricket correspondent, Sydney

There are moments in the life of a sports commentator when events unfurl before your eyes that are so full of drama and passion that you can scarcely believe them.

I was lucky enough to be in Antigua to watch Brian Lara break Gary Sobers' record for the highest Test score ever achieved.

But those wonderful scenes eight years ago were not a patch on the raw emotion and celebration that erupted at the Sydney Cricket Ground.

England urgently need to finish off this innings as swiftly as possible

It is true, perhaps, that you needed to have been in Australia for the past fortnight, or so, truly to appreciate the scale of Steve Waugh's triumph.

His future has been endlessly debated all over the media, as well as pubs and clubs with, it seems, barely a thought given about the man himself.

It is increasingly clear that the selectors had decided this Test match would be his last: it was time to move on, and that could still be the correct decision.

But to see a man who has dedicated his life to a sport so utterly determined to prove against all odds that he still has a contribution to make was a moving experience.

To see him ram the point home in such dramatic fashion in front of his own adoring fans was a privilege.

Dawson fails to stop an off-drive by Waugh

With three overs to go before the close, not to mention another three days, he had scored 88 and even some of his most loyal supporters were starting to drift home.

At the start of the final over, he was on 95 and when he blocked the first three balls from Richard Dawson, it seemed that he had decided to take the sensible option.

Then he scored a three, and found himself at the non-striker's end with only two balls remaining.

Surely that was it: we would all have to wait until the morning.

But Adam Gilchrist, who also batted splendidly, worked the ball into a gap on the leg side for a single leaving Waugh with the prospect of scoring two runs off the last ball of the day.

Nasser Hussain prolonged the agony by minutely altering his field. It took an age.

Gilchrist says well done to his captain

Perhaps it was this that was the final straw for Waugh who slammed the final delivery through the covers for four, and the emotion of the moment overwhelmed us all.

Waugh will continue in the morning, surely relieved of the burden of uncertainty and this will work one of two ways.

Either he will get himself out, or he and Gilchrist will continue to dismember the England attack as emphatically as they did late in the day, a partnership of 87 digging Australia out of a hole.

England urgently need to finish off this innings as swiftly as possible.

And if they can establish a healthy lead which puts Australia under pressure, they might be in a position to pull off the victory they narrowly missed in Melbourne.