Ashes 2009 series has started today with the first test being undergone at Cardiff. Both teams are gearing up to win the series with England looking to retain the title and Australia looking to defend it. Ashes is a traditional test series which was first started in 1882-83. In fact, Ashes is perhaps the most popular test series in cricket; not only because of its tradition; but also for the intensity of competitiveness that both England and Australia put together whenever they face each other. Here, I made a list of 50 things about Ashes 2009 series that you might find useful:
1. Ashes 2009 kicks off from 8 July at the SophiaGardens, Cardiff.
2. SophiaGardens, Cardiff has not hosted any test match. So, the first match of the Ashes 2009 will be the debut test match for this ground.
3. There will be five test matches in the series and the venues are: Cardiff, Lord's in London, Edgbaston in Birmingham, Headingley in Leeds and Kennington Oval in London.
4. Australia whitewashed England in the previous Ashes series in 2007 at home as they retained the Ashes titled following a 5-0 victory.
5. England emerged winner under Michael Vaughan in the last Ashes series in England in four years back in 2005.
6. Though Andrew Flintoff and Kevin Pietersen of England were initially doubtful for the Ashes 2009 due to their respective injuries, both the players are ready to take on Australia in the upcoming series.
7. Former English legend, Ian Botham, said that England would retain the Ashes title, winning the upcoming series easily.
8. However, Shane Warne, former leg spin great of Australia, thinks that Australia would repeat the success of 2007 by defeating home side 5-0 in the series.
9. Australia’s decade long dominance, which came to an end in 2005, over England was largely attributed by their spinners, especially legendary leg spinner Warne. In fact, Warne was instrumental behind Australia’s 5-0 triumph over England in 2007. However, following the retirement of Shane Warne and Stuart McGill, Australia is now left with no front line spinner who can take up the job left by Warne and McGill. In fact, Australia’s current test squad includes one spinner Nathan Hauritz who did not seem very effective in the tour match against England Lions.
10. Australian pacer Brett Lee would miss the first two tests of Ashes 2009 as he picked up a rib injury during the tour match against England Lions.
11. Ashes 2009 would be the first Ashes series for England’s new captain Andrew Strauss.
12. England will play their first Ashes series under the new permanent coach Andy Flower who was appointed as the permanent coach of England team before the home test series against West Indies. He started his reign excellently well guiding England to win the test series.
13. Inspirational former captain Michael Vaughan was left out of the England squad for the Ashes 2009 series which eventually led him to retire from international cricket recently.
14. Both England captain Andrew Strauss and Aussie captain Ricky Ponting are some worried about the nature of the wicket of Cardiff because the venue has not yet hosted any test match.
15. At 33, Paul Collingwood is the eldest member of the England squad. Australian captain Ricky Ponting is the eldest member of the Australian squad as he is now 34 years old.
16. The youngest member of the pre-Ashes English squad is Adil Rashid, at 21, but 23-year-old Stuart Broad is the youngest member of the England’s squad for the first test. Phillip Hughes, who impressed everyone in his debut test match against South Africa earlier this year, is the youngest member of the Australian squad as he is now 20.
17. The average age of England squad is 27 and half, while the average age of Australian squad is 29 and half.
18. The only uncapped player in the England side is leg spinner Adil Rashid.
19. Australia’s only uncapped player is wicketkeeper batsman Graham Manou.
20. Australia is still the no. 1 team in ICC test ranking, despite their mixed performance over the last one year followed by the retirement of a number of former stars.
21. England currently sits in the 5th position of ICC test ranking, even though they defeated West Indies in their recent home test series.
22. Star Australian all rounder Andrew Symonds is missing the series as he failed to make it to the Australian squad for Ashes 2009.
23. Alike Shane Warne, former Australian legend Glenn McGrath also thinks that Australia will win the series 5-0 against England.
24. On the other hand, former English great Tony Greig backs England to retain the series from Australia.
25. Former Australian captain and legendary batsman Ian Chappell is totally unhappy with the selection of Australian squad for Ashes 2009 series. He thinks that England would have better and balanced bowling attack, if Andrew Flintoff can remain fit and play throughout the series.
26. Australian pace attack includes Mitchell Johnson, Ben Hilfenhaus, Peter Siddle, Stuart Clark and currently injured Brett Lee, alongside two all rounders: Shane Watson and Andrew McDonald- who are capable of helping the frontline pacers with theirmedium pace bowling.
27. English pace attack involves James Anderson, Stuart Broad, Andrew Flintoff, Paul Collingwood as well as two youngsters Tim Bresnan and Graham Onions.
28. England squad has two specialist spinners Graeme Swann and Monty Panesar.
29. Australian batting line up includes experienced batsmen like Ricky Ponting, Michael Clarke, Michael Hussey and Simon Katich, besides youngsters like Phillip Hughes, Marcus North and two all rounders Shane Watson and Andrew McDonald.
30. England also has some experienced star batsmen like Andrew Strauss, Alastair Cook, Kevin Pietersen, Paul Collingwood, Andrew Flintoff as well as inexperienced, but talented batsmen like Ravi Bopara and Matt Prior.
31. As Australia’s long-standing dominance has been fading away now, England fans are now desperate to see England retaining the Ashes titles once again after four years.
32. Australia, on the other hand, is now looking to regain his lost dominance over world cricket, and to do that, winning the Ashes 2009 series is very important. Moreover, a big margin victory would make Australia’s no. 1 place in test cricket more secured.
33. Besides five test matches, Australia is scheduled to play 4 tour matches on their Ashes 2009 tour.
34. Ashes 2009 is going to be the 65th edition of prestigious Ashes series.
35. Sven out of sixteen Australian players including Ricky Ponting, Michael Hussey, Michael Clarke, Shane Watson, Stuart Clark, Mitchell Johnson and Brett Lee participated in the previous Ashes series two years back in 2007.
36. The current England squad includes eight players: James Anderson, Monty Panesar, Kevin Pietersen, Paul Collingwood, Ian Bell, Andrew Strauss, Alastair Cook and Andrew Flintoff- from previous Ashes series.
37. So, you can see only half of the players on both sides were present during the Ashes 2006-07 series.
38. From the current England squad, only Strauss, Pietersen, Flintoff, Collingwood, Bell and Anderson were part of England’s 2005 Ashes triumph in England.
39. Ponting, Stuart Clark, Michael Clarke, Brad Haddin, Katich and Lee from 2005 Ashes series are now present in the current Australian squad.
40. Out of 64 Ashes series, England won 28 and Australia won 31, besides 5 drawn being drawn.
41. Australia won 9 out of last 10 Ashes series which shows a full-dominance by Australia.
42. Ashes 2009 series will be telecast live on several television channels throughout the world. Sky Sports holds the official TV rights of England team and thus, will be broadcasting the series for the English cricket fans in England. Five television channel will bring the highlights of the matches to the England cricket fans.
43. Star Cricket will show the match in India, Bangladesh and some other South Asian countries as well as in China.
43. USA cricket fans would be able to watch the exciting matches of Ashes 2009 live on Zee Sports.
44. Super Sports are going to cover the series for the South African cricket fans.
45. Australian cricket fans will be able to enjoy Ashes 2009 series live on Fox Sports and SBS television channels.
46. New Zealand cricket fans can watch the match Ashes 2009 series live on Sky Sports.
47. Eurosport will telecast the matches live for the European cricket fans, apart from people in England. Eurosport is a pay-per-view tv channel. That means, you have to pay in order to watch the matches of Ashes series live on your television.
48. Pakistani cricket fans can enjoy the series live on GEO Super television channel.
49. Beside television channels, there are a number of radio channels who will be providing live commentary of the matches for their audience. ABC Local Radio channel will be providing commentary for the Australian cricket fans, while England fans can get the commentary through BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra and BBC Radio 4 channels.
50. Ricky Ponting and Kevin Pietersen were the highest scorers for Australia and England respectively in the previous Ashes series. Stuart Clark was the highest wicket taker for Australia in the last Ashes with 26 wickets. Matthew Hoggard, who was the highest wicket taker for England with 13 wickets two years back, has not been included in the current England squad.
Much-awaited test series Ashes 2009 kicks off from 8 July 2009. Host England is now gearing up to take revenge of their humiliating white-wash at the hands of their traditional rivals Australia in Ashes 2007 which took place in Australia. With a depleted squad, on the other hand, Australia would like to continue their dominance over the English side.
Ashes series is the most traditional bilateral rivalry in the history of cricket. Tracing back to its origin in 1876/77, you can see that how much influence Ashes series had on the development of cricket in its formative years. In fact, international test cricket started through Ashes series between England and Australia. Today, there are a number of rivalries in cricket including India-Pakistan, Australia-New Zealand and Australia-South Africa. However, Ashes was the first cricketing rivalry in Cricket, and still today, this is considered to be one of the most popular test series in world cricket.
Well, Ashes may have a century-long history and an undeniable prestige, but in terms of competitiveness, Ashes looked bleak for more than a decade since 1989 because of Australia’s one-sided dominance. However, an indication of revival of Ashes came in 2005 when England, under their inspirational captain Michael Vaughan, retained the Ashes title before the home crowed. There are many who consider 2005 Ashes as the start of demise of Australia’s decade-long dominance.
Australia lost much of its strength over the last few years mainly because of a series of retirements of some of their great players like Shane Warne, Glenn McGrath, Damien Martin, Adam Gilchrist and some others. Australian team itself is going through its formative years as a number of young players are getting used to international cricket besides gaining experience. Leg spin legend Shane Warne played a huge role behind Australia’s decade-long dominance in Ashes, but now the situation is that there is no quality established spinner in the Aussie camp. Naturally, England is looking forward to building on this disadvantage of the visitors and that is why, ECB decided to organize the first test at Cardiff where spinners generally get lots of assistance from the pitch.
Australia may take some inspiration from their success in the last Ashes tournament back in home, but they should also remember that they lost four years back in England. So, Australia has no room for complacency; otherwise it could lead Ricky Ponting boys to a devastating result in Ashes 2009. Australia’s recent form is not pretty much satisfactory and there is no doubt, Australia’s huge dominance over world cricket has been fading away now. They lost the home test series to South Africa, and even though they defeated the same opponent away few weeks later, Australia has not retained its real dominance in world cricket yet.
England stirred a seemingly-dying Ashes rivalry all the way in 2005, defeating visiting Australia. Even though England lost the title to Australia two years later, England fans are still confident England would be able to reproduce their 2005 performance this year and would once again retain the title. The intensity of the 2005 triumph was so huge that England cricketers still take inspiration from a series which took place four years back. Alike Australia, England holds a mixed performance recently.
England defeated West Indies in their recent test series at home 2-0, and thus, retaining the Wisden Trophy which they had lost just few months back in West Indies. Last year, England lost the test series 1-0 against India after suffering a humiliating 2-1 defeat in a four-match test series against South Africa at home. However, one thing is for sure that England is pretty much confident ahead of the series mainly because of two things. First of all, English cricketers are pretty much organized under the leadership of Strauss and the guidance of Andy Flower. The working relationship between the captain and coach is another positive side of England. Secondly, the decline of Australia’s invincible status in world cricket after the loss of a number of former greats must have increased the guile among the English cricketers.
Both sides have a number of match winners. Let us start with English side. In the presence of Strauss, Ravi Bopara, Kevin Pietersen, Andrew Flintoff, Paul Collingwood, Alastair Cook, Graeme Swann and James Anderson, England seems to have formed a balanced squad which is capable of challenging Australia. Specially, spinner Swann could play a big role for the home side in the series.
Australia also has some key players in Ponting, Hussey, Michael Clarke, Mitchell Johnson, Brett Lee, Simon Katich, North, who got century in the tour match against England Lions, and Shane Watson. The only specialist spinner in the squad is Nathan Hauritz who may not seem very promising yet, but could be viral for the visiting side.
Here, I am giving you the full schedule of Ashes 2009 series:
Ashes 2009 series will start next month and England is waiting for the full recovery of their star all rounder Andrew Flintoff who is currently missing the ongoing twenty20 world cup 2009 which is being taken place in England due to his knee injury. The all rounder was sent home from South Africa, where he was representing his franchise Chennai Super Kings during IPL 2009, having picked up a knee injury.
Andrew Flintoff then underwent a keyhole surgery on his knee, and thus, missed the home series against West Indies. Now, England fans are expecting that the all rounder would regain his fitness ahead of the much-awaited Ashes 2009 series. The player might play for his county team Lancashire in the ongoing CountyChampionship, but Mike Watkinson, the director of Lancashire county team, has said that Flintoff would not play for the county side until he recovers fully. However, it is expected that the all rounder would make a come back in the match against Hampshire that begins on 17 June. So, it is expected that Andrew Flintoff would regain his full fitness before Ashes 2009 kicks off.
Former Australian Adam Gilchrist has recently expressed his surprise at former team mate Andrew Symonds’ exclusion from Australia’s Ashes 2009 Series which will take place in England. Gilchrist was full of praise about Symonds while talking about talking about IPL 2009 where he captain Deccan Chargers to win the title. He said that Symonds was a key performer for Deccan this year besides stating that Symonds has the ability to turn the matches. Adam Gilchrist thinks that Symonds should have been included in Ashes squad.
Well, I also agree with Gilchrist on this regard. I admit that Symonds did not have good time over the last one year as he was suffering from injury and disciplinary problems too often. However, the all rounder retuned to Australian team with the series against Pakistan in UAE and indicated to get back his top form, and then finally in IPL 2009, he showed that he still deserved a place in Australian squad. I support Australian selectors’ youth policy, considering the long term benefit of the team. However, you can not forget the present in order to focus only on the future. Players like Hayden, Gilchrist, McGrath, Warne, McGill and many more already retired. So, there are lots of places in the squad left to bring new faces and I do not think that Symonds’ exclusion was a right decision.
