The Ashes - unofficial review

There will be plenty of reviews written on this series, by journalists, ex players ("has beens") so i thought i would give my thoughts as an average cricket supporter. I think, being a Crystal Palace supporter, that i have quite a balanced approach to watching sport. I dont expect victory every time, i dont throw cushions at the telly or shout abuse at players on either side. I don't demand that England apologies to the fans when we don't win. 

Agnew (who i personally think has come across as a bitter "never was" during the series, says they should be embarassed as the fans he speaks to have spent their life savings coming over. Two points, i expect he has actually mostly spent his time speaking to fairly well off middle age people like me at evening do's with the various tour companies and secondly, if you have spent your life savings coming here then you should really blame your financial advisor not England cricket.

So my thoughts:

- Six months ago there was some hope that England would do well but that had to be caveated. They do have a lot of talented players but they were playing one of the best team in the world (including the best bowling attack and one of the best batsman of all time), on their home turf.

- In the weeks before, more hope was seen. Archer and Wood were considered fit enough to tour, Australia had injury problems and a number of their batting places were in doubt.

- As it happened, only one of their bowling attack played much, Smith was ok but not dominant (and matched by Root). England had 2 of the three top run scorers in the series,  four of Australia's batsmen averaged less than 30 - so how did England lose so easily?

- Well Australia had the three best performers.

-  Starc was amazing throughout the tour, mostly with the ball but also with the bat.

-Head was the only batsman that dominated the bowling and played a number of crucial "bazball" innings. The whole series could have been different if he had knicked off early in Perth (and he did play and miss a number of times). That innings gave him and his team confidence and with England never likely to win the pink ball test the whole series was probably lost in that one session.

- Carey was outstanding with bat and with gloves. Standing up to all the quick bowlers other than Starc overcame one of England's key tactics of trying to avoid Boland and others being able to dominate through just bowling consistently. Ahead of the series, many combined XI had Smith ahead of Carey (partly England bias) but he completely outplayed Smith

- Australia's depth in bowling (other than spin) was showed to be stronger than many expected.

- Most England players had not toured Australia before, and it showed. You cant do anything about that, but many of the current team are likey to be here next time and will understand the pitches, occassion and pressure a lot better.

- England got a lot of the basics wrong. Catches went down, bowiing (other than the amazing first innings at Perth) was generally poor, although Stokes, Tongue and Archer can probably be happy with their contribution. The batting did not score enought runs. Yes everyone will highlight a number of "dumb shots" and the fine line between controlled and uncontrolled aggression was missed on a number of occassions, but there were instances where the pitches and the strength of australia probably pushed them over the edge.

- It did show up how much of an evolving team this is. It needed the more experienced batsmen like Duckett (who at first looked unlucky and then appeared to lose all confidence), Pope (who its easy to say should not have been playing) and Crawley (who as always flattered to deceive) to help Root and Stokes. And it soon became clear that the England attack - had no natural leader as had been evident since Anderson/Broad. They all have talent - Archer in particular, but are still a very inexperienced unit

- Mistakes were obviously made. 

- I dont buy all the talk from Agnew/Vaughan in particular that there were major failings but they did not get things right. I did get very bored listening to the two of them say England should have prepared at the Waca - you never know what happened , did England ask too late or did Australia cricket board not want to let them? Those being interviewed were never going to be able to answer that question during the tour, but there were constant jibes that this reflected a lack of interest in preparing

- The coaching set up seems a bit unbalanced. Talk of not being able to get a fielding coach, having to find a bowling coach last minute, all have implications for an inexperienced team. Whether this was due to ambivalance or lack on budget once again will remain unclear.

So where do England go? i am writing this sitting overlooking Bondi beach. The last time i was here was 2003 ahead of the RWC final. That England team benefited from a much more experienced team - had a "warrior" captain in Johnson (not unlike Stokes) a talisman in Wilkinson (not unlike Root), once in a generation player in Robinson (perhaps Brook) and a coach with a different approach. Woodward took over in 1997 asking to be judged on the 1999 world cup - failed there but was perserved with. He then developed his and the squads ability and experience and was rewarded in 2003. I expect the RFU was full of similar charachters to the current ECB, it will be interesting if they take the same approach and are rewarded. There is certainly the talent there.

Canberra - "the Cumbernauld of the southern hemisphere?"

Canberra was a bit of a fill in to my itinerary,dealing with the gap between the Melbourne and Sydney tests. I could have spent a few days more in Sydney but thought I would check out somewhere not often on a non Australians holiday plans.

It's a 20th century city, so i was not sure if it would similarities to Milton Keynes or Cumbernauld. It does have wide boulevards, plenty of concrete and a a variation on a grid style arrangement. There are lots of open spaces and as national capital plenty of government buildings, museums and memorials. It has a bit of a Washington feel to it with a government/ museums area.

I was staying close to the Australian War Memorial/Museum and found myself going there a couple of times to see the various areas. It's very respectfully done and a fitting tribute to those that fell primarily during WW1, WW2 and subsequent conflicts such as Korea and Vietnam. 

Most of the museums were open and I spent some time in the National Portait Gallery and the Old Parliament House where you can see previous chambers used and various exhibitions on political/society issues. This included an exhibition of the best political cartoons from 2025 which seemed to suggest that this "art form" is probably more vibrant than currently in UK. Not surprisingly there were a lot of coverage of global issues but the domestic issues highlighted were uncannily similar to those in UK.

Overall I could probably have spent a bit longer here - which is a good sign that its worth a visit.

Travel to Sydney is by train - well actually one train and one rail replacement coach - something also uncannily simialr to UK.

Melbourne ..........finally a victory

So the fourth test would take place in Melbourne.

I was travelling from Adelaide by the Overland which is one of the four tourist trains run by Journey Beyond. The others are longer and are sleeper trains, whilst this was just a full day. I had previously had an enjoyable trip between Perth and Adelaide in 2010.

These are prestige trains, looking to represent the glamour of historic train travel. The Overland was enjoyable but felt a little less classy than my previous trip – Journey Beyond is now owned by a US private equity firm so you fear slightly they are cutting back on investment and certainly the train carriages could do with some TLC.

The test match started on Boxing Day. I had been to MCG before but it was not at full capacity then as it was being redeveloped for the commonwealth games. It’s a mighty impressive stadium and had a great atmosphere with over 93,000 in attendance ( a record for a cricket match). The cricket itself was similar to the rest of the series – mental and manic. Over in two days, and whilst the Curator (or Groundsmen as we would call it) probably did not quite get it right both sides batsmen did not really cover themselves with glory. It was almost a replica of Perth with this time England ending on top and getting their first victory in Australia since 2011.

So once again this provided more time for sightseeing! This is not a burden in a city like Melbourne, which is easy for a tourist to get around, has lots of interesting areas and places to visit. So during my stay I managed to fit in visits to a few museums, visit the beach at St Kilda,  take a river cruise and take a guided tour of the MCG. All very enjoyable.

New years eve not surprisingly saw an impressive fireworks display against the city skyline.

My trip now takes me to Canberra for a couple of nights before final stop for the last test in Sydney.

Adelaide and Kangaroo Island

So the third test was in Adelaide. Despite the two matches played, i still had some hope - at least for a better performance - at best the start of a proper comeback. In the end it was not to be. The match was better, both teams had periods of good play but overall australia continued to have the edge. But five days in one of the most iconic cricket grounds in the world, in good weather (thankfully cooling down as the match went on) has to be enjoyable regardless of the outcome. Given the match went to the full, i did not see a lot of Adelaide, but per my previous trip it appeared a relaxed city, with a good vibe albeit a bit quieter than other venues on the tour.

In between Adelaide and Melbourne tests, i had decided to spend a couple of days on Kangaroo Island. So this meant picking up a hire car, around a 90min drive and then a 45 min ferry journey to the island. Good decision. The island is quite small, you can drive to most places in an hour or so, and there are a lot of sites with either great scenery, great wildlife or both. So that includes Kangaroos, Wallabies, Dolphins, Penguins, Seals and lots of different birds. I managed to book onto a number of guided tours, all of which were well organised with guides that both had excellent knowledge of the particular wildlife, but also an obvious love and pride in the area in which they live. Kangaroo Island, like Tasmania, was booked on the back of a general feel that it would be interesting rather than a detailed knowledge/recommendation of what it offered. In both cases it has turned out to be a great decision.

Melbourne test starts Boxing Day. I have done the reverse journey from Kangaroo Island to Adelaide and Xmas day consists of a train journey to Melbourne. I took its "sister" train from Perth to Adelaide back in 2010 and that was very enjoyable. This trip is shorter - just a fairly full day - with no organised stops - but hopefully will be a good experience.