The Ashes Thread

If you've clicked on this without knowing what the heck it was about, congratulations.

In 1882, England was defeated by tourist Australia in the only test match of the tour. Legend has it, in memoriam of the colony, as it still then was, of beating England, two bails were burnt, and the ashes were cased in an urn.



The mock obituary for the death of English cricket was published in 'The Sporting Times".

------------------------------------------------------

In Affectionate Remembrance
of
ENGLISH CRICKET,
which died at the Oval
on
29th AUGUST, 1882,
Deeply lamented by a large circle of sorrowing
friends and acquaintances
----
R.I.P.
----
N.B.—The body will be cremated and the
ashes taken to Australia.

--------------------------------------------------

On the eighth of July (tomorrow) the battle resumes. Australia, while still considered the foremost cricket team in the world, has come back to the pack in recent years, and the last time England hosted the series they won 2-1. All-time, Australia leads the series 31-28, with five series having been drawn.

This is one of the most heated rivalries in all of sports. Follow it, won't you?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/cricket/8138022.stm

 

I know there's at least a couple other fans out there.

I've been wussing out on getting at 4 a.m. to watch each morning, but imagine my shock when I got up this morning and the headline on cricinfo said "Strauss and Cook dominate Australia."

Then when I saw that it said Cook had reached his 50 in something like 80 balls and was setting the pace, I was sure I was still asleep.

Watching now and feeling hopeful for England, although until we see how they bowl, there's no way to tell if they are in good shape or not.

 

I've heard of the Ashes - my father is a huge cricket fan - but I had no idea why it was called that
I love that kind of stuff

 

I have no idea what any of this means.

 

Take a few minutes on wikipedia and learn. You won't be sorry

It's like baseball, but more strategic.

The rules and strategy aren't hard to understand at all, really. It's pretty straightforward: Runs (similar to baseball, but you get one per base), wickets (like an out in baseball) and time (or overs, which are just sets of six balls thrown) are all that matter.

The hardest part is learning the fielding positions. I've been watching faithfully for about two years now, and I still don't get them all without having to reference a chart like this one:



In the match, England have reached 300/3. It's a very crucial time now, they need to push on to a declaration, but there's still a chance they fall apart and have a very similar first innings to the first test, which to be fair seemed decent at the time.

 

Proving that jinxes cross oceans, not 30 seconds after I posted the score update, Collingwood throws away his wicket. 302/4 and looking wobbly now.

 

I thought this was about Frank McCourt being on death's door.

 

With the way things are going, Strauss may end up with a double-century, and run out of batting partners.

Mini-collapse to 364-6 after Flintoff and Broad go cheaply.

 

I'm really learning to feel the angst that is being a fan of an English athletic team.

At 170-0, I was thinking "Man, they are going to put up a massive score, refuse to declare, then refuse to enforce the follow-on and blow it all in a stupid draw."

It never occurred to me that a few hours later I'd be worried about their total. What a waste of a fantastic opening partnership.

Not that it was all bad. They played nice and positive, four runs per over on the first day is nothing to sneeze at.

 

Not quite ready to give up on this yet. Got to be a few other fans out there.

England with a fan-freaking-tastic day today. More wickets in less than a full day's bowling than they got in the entire first test.

As long as they aren't idiots and refuse to enforce the follow-on, they'll break their 75-year streak of not beating Australia at Lord's.

 

The follow-on can be dangerous, because your bowlers will typically be tired, but England's have only been on for two sessions, and it was raining for part of the first one.

Unless Australia's tail-enders can pull something out of the hat tomorrow, I'd expect they will enforce it. If they can get them bowled out by tea on day four, they should be in good position to pick up the win.

And I'm sure if it gets to day 5 and England need, say, 50 to win that Ricky Ponting won't be rearranging his fielders every over.

 

I just wish Setanta would air this. I know it's available on DirecTV's CricketTicket. But I'm not paying to watch it.