The Ashes

[Jhutch]

For local teams - i.e. Aussie Rules - we certainly seek blood when they are not performing. However, I believe that for National teams we leave criticism to the coaches. After all, if I had to place blame, a board selects the players (thus players are there because they were deemed suitable), coaches and trainers get them ready for the games (so players' fitness, skills, tactics were tuned to what the coach/trainers asked of them), and then a captain is appointed as he/she is seen, by coaches and board members, as the right man/woman to lead the team. So, if it doesn't work out ..... "well done" to the players for giving their best (cause they already earned it before walking on the ground), and "best you go back to the drawing board" to the coaches/trainers (cause we were outplayed), and "you should have called up to play A, B, C, D" to the board

I do agree with you to some extent although the players do still have their own responsibility.

On a similar theme.. one thing that has often surprised me is how much stick Tim Henman has received. When you look back at his record he has done quite well over the years - lots of semi-finals at Wimbledon. His one problem has been that he has never been quite good enough and he has lacked a real killer instinct. However, if it hadn't been for the delay in his match against Ivanesivic he may have won that year (wasn't in the country when this happened but it is what i have been told). I personally think that his achievements were close to the best he could achieve. What does he get for it? Lots of criticism - most of it from people who probably play no competitive sport at all. What i have always thought is a better question is 'why has he been the only domestically produced player to trouble the later stages of championships in the last decades (Rusedski doesnt count as he is Canadian ) ??? With the amount of money that the tennis authorities must have this must show a real failing of their policies over the years. Ok, so tennis isn't played by that many children but there should have been more people coming through

I think there are so many places that they lost it - lack of preparation, wrong captain, team selection for the First test to name but three.

However to my mind the biggest blow was not being able to take Simon Jones with them because of injury. He was by far the most effective bowler during the 2005 series.

I agree with what you say. To link this in with the previous point, i feel a bit sorry for Flintoff and Fletcher -they seem to have copped most of the stick for the poor performances.

However, consider the situation at the start of the series. From the previous Ashes series, Australia had strengthened their squad by bringing in Hussey (who averages very highly). In the previous series Australia had had problems with their third pace bowler. In this series they had Stuart Clark who did well in south Africa (i think) and turned in the best stats at the end of this series.

For their part, England's batting had lost Trescothick and Vaughan (although he hasn't played as well since being captain). Flintoff was coming back from injury. On the wicketkeeping side we had Geraint Jones out of form and Chris Read who played well in the summer but wasn't thought to be up to the task of an Ashes series. The bowling had Flintoff coming back from injury, Giles coming back from injury, Harmison all over the place (although i don't know if anyone knew how bad he would be at first), Anderson had hardly played any games and Simon Jones was out altogether.

With this background it was always going to be very difficult for England to win. I think that the selectors' idea was that they had to try and recreate the same spirit as in the previous series. Therefore, with so many players out, they decided to bring back Giles and Jones to try to recapture the spirit - i also think they decided on four pace bowlers as this had worked before. However, as Stuart said above, reverse swing was effective in the previous series, especially with the ball in Simon Jones' hand. With this way of getting players out reduced by the personnel change (and a different make of ball apparently ) it meant that once the new ball had faded there was not much chance of getting the batsmen out - and the batsmen australia have will make runs quickly in this period. Therefore, i don't understand why Panesar was not in there from the start. He did well against Pakistan in the summer (5 out of the first 6 in one innings ) so i don't know why they thought he couldn't handle the pressure of an Ashes test - Pakistan are good at playing spin so there would have been pressure!!! Given the weakness of the tail i think that playing both Giles and Panesar could have been justified. People look to Giles' 0 in the second innings debacle of the second test. However, even after this he had the fourth best England batting average of the series at that time. Ok, so his bowling was below even his standards but given what came afterwards i can understand him being chosen.

Geraint Jones always looked a suspicious choice given his really poor form. I think that they thought that he was the only wicketkeeper with the potential for big performances with the bat. This may be true but he had shown no reason to select him on grounds of form so i think this was a poor decision.

The lack of match preparation could not have helped the team reach the first test at their best - the schedule was cramped by the ICC Trophy and the World Cup after this series but even so the people who decided the schedule will have to have questions asked of them.

Another problem that the selectors had was that the bowlers were too inconsistent - it seemed for much of the time that England were selecting five bowlers expecting that only four would bowl well enough to bowl a lot of overs. Here, questions have to be asked as to why players were not ready properly and why our reserve bowlers are not up to the standard - are the top players being prioritised at the expense of the rest so there is not a good fallback??? Certainly, during the series people came in but they hadn't had a game for ages and so were not in ideal condition. This is always a problem on tours but again maybe the people who agreed the schedule are to blame.

Flintoff got some stick for being captain and losing. Asking an all-rounder to captain is always a tough ask and i would have kept Strauss as captain. I still think England would have lost and it is possible that he would be being blamed now if he had been captain though. One point where i felt a bit sorry for Freddie was how he was being condemned for being negative - when the bowlers are being hit for a lot of runs it is hard not to put people in run-saving positions!!! It reminds me a bit of how when Atherton put a man back on the cover point boundary he was being negative - when Vaughan was captain and did the same it was seen as a shrewd move to keep the boundaries down and build up pressure....

There is also the issue of there apparently being a divided dressing room - we can speculate as to why this was but only the people involved really know what went on. Some of it seems to stem from supposed favouritism from the captain and unofficial selection committees. If this is true then the captain really has to cop it, along with the people in authority who went along with this not seeing how it would affect the team...
Anyway, i've gone on for long enough now and besides, we won today

[SteveK]

Why is it that there is so much lack of support for your international teams?

You do have great cricket players. However, I feel that because seemingly as a nation you do not believe in them, then they have a challenging time in believing in themselves. The cricket team was getting a battering by the British media and public even before they left your shores.

You'll find that in Australia we always support our teams. Even when they do poorly, we praise them for their efforts and look for the positives in the experience. We tend to always believe that, even when not playing well, as the underdogs we can play better. And when our team is not playing, we then tend to go and support the underdogs of the day.

The impression I'm getting from my colleagues in the office at the moment is that the current Australian team isn't actually that well liked. They are viewed as arrogant and lacking in humility. A good example of this is the shameful behaviour at the end of the Champions Trophy in India, where the Australian team pushed the Indian official off the stage after the prizegiving so that he didn't appear in the photos.

Most people here seem to be far more interested in the cricket than back home in the UK, but aren't that keen on the personalities involved currently.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_IC...ny_controversy

[adss]

The impression I'm getting from my colleagues in the office at the moment is that the current Australian team isn't actually that well liked. They are viewed as arrogant and lacking in humility. A good example of this is the shameful behaviour at the end of the Champions Trophy in India, where the Australian team pushed the Indian official off the stage after the prizegiving so that he didn't appear in the photos.

Most people here seem to be far more interested in the cricket than back home in the UK, but aren't that keen on the personalities involved currently.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_IC...ny_controversy

Interesting: first time I hear about it. Certainly shameful if that is the truth and not a variation of it. i.e I could ask if you could please step aside as we take a team photo, and the media burns me for shaving you aside.

I have to say that all my friends and I are certainly quite supportive of our team and think highly of most of the players. I say 'most' as there is disagreement amongst us about Shane Warne. Some friends differentiate him on and off the field. Whilst others, myself included, admire his achievements on the field but feel that his antics off-field are appalling. Therefore, as great sportsmen are often idolised, I/we feel that rating poorly (understatement) off field does matter. In fact McGrath, Pointing, Ghilchrist, Hodge, Flintoff are all examples of better sportsmen then Shane.

[TheTramp]

Well. I guess that it will be somewhat different reading the newspapers tomorrow....

They'll be gods again!

[Seahorse]

So it's 2-0 and England have won the Commonwealth Bank Series.

...has no one been watching the Rugby over the past two weeks? (I'm speaking as fan of French rather than English rugby and think Italy should have won at the weekend).

[FoxyFunkster]

The impression I'm getting from my colleagues in the office at the moment is that the current Australian team isn't actually that well liked. They are viewed as arrogant and lacking in humility. A good example of this is the shameful behaviour at the end of the Champions Trophy in India, where the Australian team pushed the Indian official off the stage after the prizegiving so that he didn't appear in the photos.

Most people here seem to be far more interested in the cricket than back home in the UK, but aren't that keen on the personalities involved currently.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_IC...ny_controversy

Part of the problem in this country is that we just love to build our sporting heros up and put them on a pedestal only to want to knock them off it shorty afterwards.

With regard to the recent test series it`s been generally accepted that the Aussies had the luxury of a settled side as we did in 2005 as well as having all players in good form, England on the other hand were disrupted by injuries to key players and losses of form to key players which was only going to mean one thing which was a sound beating, other things to consider are the current Aussie test team had the great spin bowler of all time,the greatest seamer in Mcgrath, the best batsman of the modern era in Ponting, the best Keeper batsman in Gilly and numerous other players who average 50 with the bat(Langer,Hayden,Hussey) and you can also throw into the mix the best bowler in the series on either side in Clarke, and i i also forgot the little factor of also having the fastest bowler on earth playing also....the truth of the matter is they would have beaten any test playing side for the last 50 years by the same scoeline methinks.

however the one day series is a different matter all together, not having a fit and firing warne and Mcgrath in your team is a huge blow that coupled with the silly comments about no team providing a test of any kind was only ever going to motivate england and the Kiwis to a certain degree, not withstanding all of this it`s only a minor one day series and i`m sure the Ausssies are still the team to beat in the west indies.

[TheTramp]

other things to consider are the current Aussie test team had the great spin bowler of all time,the greatest seamer in Mcgrath, the best batsman of the modern era in Ponting, the best Keeper batsman in Gilly and numerous other players who average 50 with the bat(Langer,Hayden,Hussey) and you can also throw into the mix the best bowler in the series on either side in Clarke, and i i also forgot the little factor of also having the fastest bowler on earth playing also....the truth of the matter is they would have beaten any test playing side for the last 50 years by the same scoeline methinks.

It's going to be interesting to see how Australia do now, with Langer, Warne & McGrath all retired. And Gilchrist & Hayden probably not that far behind them. I wonder if Ponting will be able to hold the team together with the new boys coming in....

[FoxyFunkster]

It's going to be interesting to see how Australia do now, with Langer, Warne & McGrath all retired. And Gilchrist & Hayden probably not that far behind them. I wonder if Ponting will be able to hold the team together with the new boys coming in....

They will never be as strong as that ever again IMHO, Clarke is 33, McGill is 35 and i`m not impressed with Watson,Nicholson,Tait,Jaques etc etc, i would have to make us favourites for the next ashes series, the end of an era for sure......