Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust
Note Offensive Comments Below
The Ashes (since 1989) has followed a similar trajectory to the Rugby League State of Origin since the mid 1990's. Partly built on the long-term domination of one side who simply have better players (at present Australia and NSW), the series can often get written off as a fait-acompli.
Sure it is nice to give the Queenslanders a token series win here or there, or to give the Poms a dead rubber near the end of the series, but the dominance of one side has always led to a questioning of whether the games mean anything anymore.
The absolute dominance of Australia's cricketers since Mark Taylor began opening the batting and the classy batsman simply unable to get selected for Australia because of the men above them, has created a degree of complacency over the whole contest.
I can feel the mood coming again now (just read the sports papers from the weekend). But it is important to realise just one thing... the last time we lost the Ashes, we didn't expect to either.
In 2005 we won the first test by 239 Runs... The poms were absolutely belted, and couldnt manage to score more than 200. We all thought that it was just another ordinary Ashes series (like after State of Origin 1 this year), and the comments were about how big Australia would win by.
But then we lost the second test, despite the valiant batting effort of Brett Lee, and the brash and ill thought choices of Shane Warne in the second innings.
The third test we scraped a draw, and the fourth test saw us smashed.
Just keep those victory celebrations on ice for a little while. The english may have lost to our Prime Minister's team (which is no shame), may be getting carted around the SCG by the blues, and may look like a bunch of amateurs. But we need to win at least twice before we can go nuts, otherwise we might just have another 2005.
The Ashes (since 1989) has followed a similar trajectory to the Rugby League State of Origin since the mid 1990's. Partly built on the long-term domination of one side who simply have better players (at present Australia and NSW), the series can often get written off as a fait-acompli.
Sure it is nice to give the Queenslanders a token series win here or there, or to give the Poms a dead rubber near the end of the series, but the dominance of one side has always led to a questioning of whether the games mean anything anymore.
The absolute dominance of Australia's cricketers since Mark Taylor began opening the batting and the classy batsman simply unable to get selected for Australia because of the men above them, has created a degree of complacency over the whole contest.
I can feel the mood coming again now (just read the sports papers from the weekend). But it is important to realise just one thing... the last time we lost the Ashes, we didn't expect to either.
In 2005 we won the first test by 239 Runs... The poms were absolutely belted, and couldnt manage to score more than 200. We all thought that it was just another ordinary Ashes series (like after State of Origin 1 this year), and the comments were about how big Australia would win by.
But then we lost the second test, despite the valiant batting effort of Brett Lee, and the brash and ill thought choices of Shane Warne in the second innings.
The third test we scraped a draw, and the fourth test saw us smashed.
Just keep those victory celebrations on ice for a little while. The english may have lost to our Prime Minister's team (which is no shame), may be getting carted around the SCG by the blues, and may look like a bunch of amateurs. But we need to win at least twice before we can go nuts, otherwise we might just have another 2005.
posted by Pete at 7:00 PM
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