So there we have it. After seven weeks during which my emotions have swung from the disappointment of the first day of the series, beginning with Strauss’ dismissal in the first over at Brisbane, to resignation after Hussey and Haddin’s epic 307 run partnership, to amazement at England’s recovery and then through almost every conceivable shade of joy at Adelaide, the MCG and Sydney as well as humble despair at Perth, I am now simply exhausted.
God knows how Anderson, Cook, Strauss and co. must be feeling, but I reckon, what with being ultra fit athletes performing during daylight hours, they’ll probably be in better shape than me and the rest of the broken but ecstatic Sofa commentary team.
It is perhaps too soon to reflect on the series as a whole but I’m going to give it a whirl anyway, so apologies if today’s witterings turn out to be as cock-eyed and ludicrous as just about every article written by my more illustrious colleagues prior to the 1st test in Brisbane. For you may recall that this series was billed as a tight contest between two evenly matched teams. England’s bowlers would struggle with the conditions, and for that reason alone, Australia were slight favourites.
But first, the housekeeping. The final day at Sydney was always going to be short, and were it not for rain (or Bradman’s tears as one tweeter to the programme suggested) it would have been even shorter. In the end, some lusty hitting from Smith and Siddle simply allowed us to savour the extraordinary feeling of prolonged and inevitable victory.
It couldn’t last, and Siddle holed out to Pietersen off Swann, Hilfenhaus got a peach from Anderson that Prior snaffled to take him to a record breaking 23 catches, and finally Tremlett had Beer playing on to spark the pandemonium. No doubt Aussie fans will cling to Smith’s unbeaten half century as proof that there is a future for Australian cricket much as I used to when Chris Lewis would occasionally smite a futile 35 not out. And there is a future; but a grim one, with little sign of it getting any better any time soon.
So what can we learn from this most one sided Ashes series since the last one in Australia? Here are my ten revelations in no particular order of importance.
1. Australia is a very hard place to bowl. The pitches don’t break up, the overhead conditions rarely help the swing bowlers, and in some cases (notably Brisbane and the MCG) the surfaces actually improve as the match goes on. Your bowlers need to be supremely fit. They must bowl tight lines and lengths. They must have the patience to bore out the batsmen. England scored 500+ four times in the series. If you’re a batsman, you’d rather carry an Aussie pitch around with you than an Indian one.
2. Australia had no coherent plan for how they would bowl England out. If a wicket didn’t come in half an hour, they’d adopt a bouncer strategy. If that didn’t work they’d shift to wide filth outside the off stump. They had no patience, and seemed genuinely shocked to discover that English batsmen relished the opportunity for once to play on hard, true surfaces. After an English summer spent groping elusively at brilliant swing bowling from Asif and Amir, who can blame them? That the Aussies hadn’t expected this is testament to their complacency or stupidity or both.
3. Planning actually works. A lot of rot is talked about how unnecessary it is to have all these coaches. “Who needs a sports psychologist?” is a lazy jibe you often hear from antiquated has-beens and prodigiously gifted ex-superstars. Well, maybe a sportsman may benefit from a dedicated advisor, paid specifically to prepare you mentally for a game that is largely played in the head. I don’t know for sure of course, but call it a hunch. England’s back room staff did wonders. They identified the bowlers who would be dangerous on different pitches (Tremlett at Perth, Bresnan at the MCG). They used a bowling machine to replicate the bowling actions of Johnson, Siddle, Hilfenhaus and co., and the results spoke for themselves. Apart from that amazing spell by Johnson at Perth, the batsmen never looked surprised, and the bowlers were consistent throughout.
4. Australia, you may recall, lampooned England’s planning prior to the series, convinced that no machine could replicate the idiosyncracies of their unique bowlers and no amount of talking could prepare bowlers for the very special mental torture of bowling to Aussie batsmen under an Aussie sun. They were wrong. Massively, humiliatingly, wrong. As wrong as the English FA who believed for decades there was nothing to learn from other footballing nations. As wrong as Hitler who thought conquering Russia would be a breeze. As wrong as Glenn Mcgrath’s 5-0 pre series prediction.
5. It can sometimes be easier playing away than at home. England had a limited pool of players from which to pick so when everything went pear shaped after Perth, the selectors may have panicked but in practice could only choose the players in the squad. Australia, on the other hand, reacted like England of old, calling up random nobodies like Doherty, unfit journeymen like Bollinger, all rounders who neither batted well enough nor bowled well enough like Smith, and relied on openers who aren’t openers like Watson and Hughes. And I haven’t even started on Beer. Muddled thinking characterized every aspect of Australian selection. No spinner at the MCG. Smith batting at 7 at the SCG but not bowling until the 102nd over of England’s innings (why not just pick a specialist batsman in that case and leave Haddin at 7?). Johnson “rested” at Adelaide. Rested? He was dropped. Disingenuous self-justification used to be the stock in trade of England’s selectors. May, Dexter and co. could with a straight face extol the virtues of one Oxbridge mediocrity after another (Chris Cowdrey? Derek Pringle?) and then drop them within a fortnight. We didn’t expect this idiocy from Australians, but we got it. If anyone should be dropped without further ado it is surely Hilditch for calling up two spinners with no experience or pedigree. It is the selectors who select. When they drop players they are admitting they got it wrong. They must go.
6. At a time of very few good bowling attacks, England’s is strong. Not only their first choice four (Swann, Finn, Anderson and Broad) but also the reserves. It was Shahzad, Bresnan, Tremlett and Panesar that routed Australia A in Hobart while the main men put their feet up. And Onions still waits in the wings. Bowling attacks win you test matches and England’s bowled Australia out 9 times out of a possible ten. Australia only managed it 5 times and on two of those occasions England had passed 500 before they lost their 10th wicket. Australia by contrast passed 300 only twice.
7. Trott is the real deal. He’s Boycott with shots. He could become England’s Rahul Dravid; a reliable, technically excellent number 3 who loves to bat all day. We may speculate as to why Trott is so keen to stay away from the dressing room. Rumour has it that he has sweaty palms and is banished to the outfield to avoid softening up the ball. Perhaps he isn’t too keen on being constantly kissed by Swann, made to wear an apron and prance around with a spatula for a video diary. Whatever the reason, it works for England. He in tandem with Cook has driven Australia’s seamers to abandon patience and search for the killer ball. They don’t have the killer ball. England have cashed in as Prior, Bell and Pietersen have been given the freedom to play their own games.
8. England had team spirit; Australia didn’t. I’ve spoken about this before. It’s an elusive quality, but comes from the confidence the players have in their own security within the team. England’s batting line up was settled despite Collingwood’s travails. They all knew they would be stuck with come what may, so were able to revel in each other’s success. Australian batsmen had no idea who was going to be in the side from one week to the next. Success for a team mate could mean you were out of the next match. That is never going to engender team spirit.
9. The Australians handled defeat disappointingly well. I would love to report that Watson, Clarke and Ponting raged ungraciously at perceived poor fortune and remain in denial about England’s superiority, but the fact is the series was played in a good spirit. Many of you will be pleased about that, but a small part of me wanted the Aussies to go down whining, kicking and screaming. Apart from a couple of flashpoints at Perth and Ponting’s legendary hissy fit over Pieterson’s non edge at the MCG, their was nothing bad to report. I guess only Aussies could be worse winners than losers.
10. Finally, I love test cricket. I think I’ve spent nearly all my 41 years on this earth in fear of its demise. First it was Packer, then rebel tours. The explosion of one day cricket and latterly T20 has seen scribes rushing to write its obituary, but nothing on the planet can match it. I will remember every one of these matches. Perhaps every day of the series and every session. It is the ultimate expression of cricket’s capacity to thrill, infuriate and delight. But don’t let anyone tell you it’s boring. Ask yourself what you remember of 95% of the ODIs you’ve seen. You will draw a blank. Think back to Mohali, however. Gaze into Laxman’s intense eyes. Recall his primal roar on achieving an incredible victory. See the sense of unmatched fulfillment that coursed through the veins of England’s players as they collected the replica urn and know more than anything else that however much fun the World Cup will be, it is the arrival in England of India to fight out a four match test series that really quickens the pulse and unites us in a passion for this greatest of games.
That said we’re back on air for the ODIs next week. Join us. They will be fun. But if England lose, it won’t bother me one jot.