I woke up this quite early this morning but when I checked the cricket scores I discovered that the Fifth Ashes Test between Australia and England at Sydney had already finished. Australia wobbled a bit chasing a modest target, but won in the end by 5 wickets and thereby won the series 4-1. I think that result is a fair reflection of the performance of the two teams and Australia thoroughly deserved to retain the Ashes. England’s victory in Melbourne, on a difficult batting surface, prevented a whitewash and gave them a Test win for the first time since 2010, but none of the other matches were particularly close run. In terms of attendances it was a very successful series – the five days at Sydney broke the record – but the quality of the cricket was very variable, and Australia taking a 3-0 lead after three games made the last two Tests feel rather irrelevant.
It was a particularly disappointing series for England, who must have thought they had a better chance of winning than for a long time. Australia were without key players, especially Josh Hazlewood and captain Pat Cummins (the latter only played one Test). On top of that, England captain Ben Stokes won four of the five tosses. Winning the toss at Sydney, as Stoke did, could have set up an interesting contest had England scored enough runs when they batted first (although they lacked a world-class spinner who could have won the match). Call me old-fashioned, but one of the things I enjoy best about cricket is seeing a high-quality spinner in action. Australia didn’t have one at Sydney either, Lyons having been injured.
England of course had their own injury difficulties during the tour, losing two fast bowlers in Mark Wood and Jofra Archer early in the tour. Of the replacement bowlers, Josh Tongue looked the best – and most likely to take wickets in Australian conditions – but Stokes seemed reluctant to let him open the bowling.
As it turned out, Mitchell Starc (Man of the Series) led the second-string of Austalian bowlers extremely well. It is also worth mentioning Michael Neser, a bowling all-rounder who has played for Glamorgan, who stepped into the breach and doing well with the ball. Other Glamorgan Australians Marnus Labuschagne and Usman Khawaja did not have such a successful series; the latter has now retired from Test cricket.
I didn’t see much of the cricket – only highlights – but it seems to me there was a crucial difference in the fielding. England dropped far too many catches, including easy ones, while Australia held onto some stunners. England’s batters also had a tendency to play stupid shots at important times. I’m thinking primarly of Jamie Smith’s dismissal off the innocuous bowling of Marnus Labuschagne, which was calamitous, but there were others. Above all, though, I think the first few matches revealed England’s preparation to have been completely inadequate. Questions should be asked not only of the squad selection but also of the management of the tour, especially the lack of practice matches.
On the bright side (for England), Joe Root scored his first Test century in Australia and then scored his second. Jacob Bethell who is only 22, scored a fine century in the final Test at Sydney. I’ve read articles praising him, but didn’t see much evidence in the stats to justify their opinion. Now he’s shown what he can do in the Test arena, I wonder if he will turn out to be a successor to Root?
Anyway, that’s the Ashes done and dusted (so to speak). By the time of the next Ashes series Australia (2029/2030) I will have retired. Although I’ve been to Sydney, I’ve never visited Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide or Melbourne. Now there’s an idea…
P.S. I was slightly surprised that Mitchell Starc was Man of the Series. Travis Head scored 629 runs, which was to my mind even more impressive. Still, this award is ample compensation:
In the Dark 