The Ashes 2009

[EnglishGent]

Far from a 13 year old school girl. I'll admit that I only have the joy of test match special to keep me going and didn't see any video footage, but certain people on here are acting like this is the first time in a game of cricket that not every wicket is clear cut.

Did England play better? yes, Did they deserve to win? yes. Did they get some luckly breaks? yes

Not getting to list out the Aussie faults, but your captain deserves a bit of stick. Fantastic batsman, bit of a disappointment as a captain, but not completely fair given who has come before, miserable bastard. Although to be fair he was very gracious in defeat, which apparently many of the Aussie on here are not.

I knew when I started this thread that it would get controversial, things often do during the Ashes and that's half the fun.

 

[Toddy]

If you want to complain about how England (or Strauss) act, I've never heard of such hyprocrisy. Maybe it would be good to have a look at how Ponting acts himself, 20 times under his captaincy Aus have been fined for slow play, 8 times since 2008.

Even in the first Test of this series when he was demanding and snarling whilst almost nose to nose with the umpire for a catch against Collingwood at Cardiff.

He is a good batsman, but more than that,

He's a ******* ****.

 

[edinatlanta]

Originally Posted by EnglishGent

Nice stabber. Glad the Aussie's are so special and have never "cheated" before. Hell your guys appealed for catches that weren't and the English certainly have no control over the umpire. Bitter much?

Difference is as m@t said, Aussies (and Aussie fans) will call out Australia for bad form. I think much like baseball, part of the game is figuring out how to get just up to that line where cheating begins and not cross it. What truly separates Australian cricket from English cricket however, is that when England and Australia play each other, the English habitually go to that line, whereas Australia can and does win on talent, not gamesmanship. I wish I could say the same about English cricket but we all know if I said that, I'd be lying.

Under the Southern Cross I Stand
A sprig of wattle in my hand,
A native of my native land,
Australia you little beauty.

 

[flashkobalt]

Another interesting difference is that when Australia loses, it automatically becomes someone else's fault...
When England does, it seems that their press is only too happy to roast them alive...

 

[Toddy]

Originally Posted by edinatlanta

Under the Southern Cross I Stand
A sprig of wattle in my hand,
A native of my native land,
Australia you little beauty.

We are English, we brew beer - Aussies serve it.
We have beer in our veins - You have lemon juice on your hair.
We are English, we have history - You have previous.

 

[edinatlanta]

Originally Posted by flashkobalt

Another interesting difference is that when Australia loses, it automatically becomes someone else's fault...
When England does, it seems that their press is only too happy to roast them alive...

Wrong.

And I'll say it now, you'll see a lot more losses from Australia in the next few years. These players are nowhere near the caliber of Australian teams from even four or five years ago.

 

[flashkobalt]

I suppose your final statement is true...hopefully, those players will learn to lose with some grace and dignity...

 

[edinatlanta]

And one hopes the English, at some point, learn to play with something resembling grace or dignity.

For the record: Australians do take their losses on the chin when warranted.

 

[edinatlanta]

Apropos of nothing...

Heard what seemed to be a good idea yesterday--dissolve the West Indian Cricket Board. It makes sense, I mean, in every other sport they countries compete individually, Jamaica, Barbados, TnT could easily form top flight teams, and then maybe have leeward and windward islands squads for the rest (some of the sporting infrastructure in those countries is abysmal and they add less than nothing to the Windies).

Most importantly however, is that the impasse with the WICB is certainly harming cricket in the region and the damage may be irreparable. Without Alan Stanford in the picture anymore, I think it may be, and it seems that dissolving the WICB would lead to boards that want to manage players properly and develop the game.

I don't know...your thoughts?

 

[jaypee]

Originally Posted by Toddy

We are English, we brew beer - Aussies serve it.
We have beer in our veins - You have lemon juice on your hair.
We are English, we have history - You have previous.

We are English, we can not rhyme.
We brew beer but still smash Fosters more than anything else.
We might use lemon juice too.... if we ever caught sight of the sun.
We all move to Australia - when they let us in
Our only good players are South Africans, umpires and a ailing Flintoss who thinks he's a great but he has patchy **** figures but still gets down on his knees and raises his arms up like a god amongst men when he gets his first five-fa in god knows how many years.
Our only good places are colonies..

Boom

 

[EnglishGent]

Originally Posted by edinatlanta

Apropos of nothing...

Heard what seemed to be a good idea yesterday--dissolve the West Indian Cricket Board. It makes sense, I mean, in every other sport they countries compete individually, Jamaica, Barbados, TnT could easily form top flight teams, and then maybe have leeward and windward islands squads for the rest (some of the sporting infrastructure in those countries is abysmal and they add less than nothing to the Windies).

Most importantly however, is that the impasse with the WICB is certainly harming cricket in the region and the damage may be irreparable. Without Alan Stanford in the picture anymore, I think it may be, and it seems that dissolving the WICB would lead to boards that want to manage players properly and develop the game.

I don't know...your thoughts?

Not sure how to get past the impasse and it's a disgrace that West Indies cannot field a decent side. Without knowing the full details it would seem that the players were spoilt under the Stanford era and the WICB just doesn't have the ability to come even close to matching the wages.

My concern with dissolving the WICB is that I fear we would lose all the players from test cricket, I don't see any of the islands being able to field a test level side and would only manage to match the likes of Ireland, Kenya and the Netherlands in level of cricket. Like you say Jamaica and Barbados have a chance, but I don't even see them making it.

 

[EnglishGent]

KP is out for the series, but to be honest it's not like I seems to know how to keep his wicket intact anyhow.

 

[hendrix]

As a Kiwi, I personally hate to see either England or Australia winning, so i'm neutral here.

I did think it was poor what Strauss did in sending on the physio and 2 new sets of gloves. I also think Ponting's reaction was perfectly acceptable; he wasn't making any excuses for the draw, he was just saying that it was quite blatant time wasting and not in the spirit of the game.

Also he was quite within his rights to call back Hughes to check out that catch. There's no way Strauss could have been "100% certain" he took that catch. Any catch you take in which you can feel your fingers on the grass will at least raise an insecurity. However, you still appeal if you think it might be out, it's up to the umpires to go upstairs. It's debatable whether it affected the outcome in conjunction with the no-ball, and Collingwood's catch off Swann. In the end they were chasing a target 100 runs above the record.

Australia were unlucky. England were lucky, with some dubious tactics. However, they did bat and bowl far better than Australia in the second test, with the exception of the Clarke-Haddin partnership.

 

[streetminimal]

edinatlanta has a point, I can see Australia's wins:loss ratio getting worse over time as the current team is no match for the ones of past. We lack a genuine class spin bowler, a decent wicket-keeper/batsmen and Andrew Symonds. I don't like Marcus North.

But I must admit, Swann did a good job of bowling out Clarke, deceived by flight and dip.

 

[Tangfastic]

No mention of the last test...
It was a disappointing end - I think everyone would have liked to see a bit of a run chase at the end.

I can see another draw coming unless we're lucky with the conditions and get the ball swinging at Headingley.