Which series/tournament got you most pumped up?

[Xuhaib]

My Top 3 picks would be:

1: WC 99- After great 6-9 months Pakistan developed a strong unit and looked like favorite's along with SA for the tournament and they justified their favorite billing with the way they played till the final which turned out to be a damp fart

2: Pak tour to Aus in 99- WC champs vs WC runners up, two evenly matched teams with exciting talents. The first two tests were competitive cricket but still the series failed to live the hype.

3: Ind tour to Pak 06- After a gap of 4- years Bob Woolmer and Inzi were able to turn Pakistan exciting and competitive again (albeit very briefly ). The first two tests were a snore fest but the final test at Karachi made up for the poor first two tests and the series ended with one of my favorite test matches of all time

 

[Richard]

Ashes 2005 - obvious reasons, the hype was extreme. And what's more, for once it was lived-up to.

Ashes 2006/07 - obvious reasons again.

Ashes 2001 - pretty much the same thing.

In both the latter, things just didn't go England's way, basic errors (ie, dropped catches and in some cases selectorial misdemeneours) compounding ill-fortune.

 

[Uppercut]

In both the latter, things just didn't go England's way, basic errors (ie, dropped catches and in some cases selectorial misdemeneours) compounding ill-fortune, compounding being a distinctly inferior team to Australia.

Fixed.

Ashes '06-07 was the most looked-forward-to for me, probably as a result of how great '05 was.

 

[Bouncer]

After refusing to tour Pak for test series and cancelling Pak tour to india in almost all 90's by staying behind plitical doors, boycotting cricket in sharjah, stating its a ground for fixers, but when Pak is not playing and India won two tournaments and Labelling it as Operation desert storm, India saw Aus beat Pak, then Zimb beat Pak in one test match.....India thought that is the best time to play Pakistan and out of blue invited for a test series and ODI series. ( They tried to pull off same thing in 77-78, when PCB had banned 8 Pakistani player for playing in world series, and India wanted to resume the cricketing ties after 16 years of gap) ...what happen in both the series was amazing. 1999, Pak beat india in 5 out of 6 international games, 2 tests, 3 ODI's.

Thats the kind of stuff that can anyone up.

 

[NUFAN]

I would have to say Windies in 1995. Remember hearing that they were going to be showing the matches on TV and I almost wet myself with excitment.I remember staying up alot for that.

Ashes's '06-07' was up there too.

 

[Richard]

Fixed.

Australia were clearly the superior team, but had both sides been at full-strength and had catches been held there'd not have been a particularly massive amount in it. Either series could've been a hard-fought 2005-esque battle (probably with roles reversed - ie Australia being notably the better side but ending with a slender victory margin) had said happenings happened, IMO.

2001, especially. I couldn't ever have seen us winning in 2006/07. But 2001, I honestly believed we had a perfectly good chance, but dropped catches by the amount that went down in the first 2 Tests and injuries by the amount that afflicted all series are an impossible lay-low to overcome.

 

[Uppercut]

Australia were clearly the superior team, but had both sides been at full-strength and had catches been held there'd not have been a particularly massive amount in it. Either series could've been a hard-fought 2005-esque battle (probably with roles reversed - ie Australia being notably the better side but ending with a slender victory margin) had said happenings happened, IMO.

Don't think you could say that for 2006/07. Easy to say in hindsight, but Australia really did have a quite significantly better team for that series considering who was fit for England.

EDIT: I'm guessing you included injury problems in "things that went wrong for England", so not a lot more to say.

 

[Richard]

Oh, once Simon Jones, Giles, Vaughan and Trescothick were injured\ill\no-longer-the-same-due-to-injury England had no prayer. Anyone who seriously believed on the whatever-it-was of November that England were getting something other than a thrashing was living in cloud-****oo-land. But had injuries not struck, I think they'd have had a chance.

 

[Uppercut]

Oh, once Simon Jones, Giles, Vaughan and Trescothick were injured\ill\no-longer-the-same-due-to-injury England had no prayer. Anyone who seriously believed on the whatever-it-was of November that England were getting something other than a thrashing was living in cloud-****oo-land. But had injuries not struck, I think they'd have had a chance.

Although given all of their injury histories (and Trescothick has gotten horribly homesick all his life, he's said lately), to have all of them fit would have been a huge slice of good fortune. Apart from Giles, who would have made very little difference in any case IMO.

 

[GIMH]

Oh, once Simon Jones, Giles, Vaughan and Trescothick were injured\ill\no-longer-the-same-due-to-injury England had no prayer. Anyone who seriously believed on the whatever-it-was of November that England were getting something other than a thrashing was living in cloud-****oo-land. But had injuries not struck, I think they'd have had a chance.

It's a nice place to live itbt.

For me, the Ashes 05 obviously tops it as it was the first chance I felt we had a realistic chance in the time I'd been watching cricket. And then the 174 ODIs meant I was gagging for it when the first Test started.

The most pumped up I've ever got aside from that was on the Thursday night of the Edgbaston test earlier this summer I reckon. I got home from work and Flintoff was bowling the best spell in the history of cricket (). I couldn't sit still all night I was so excited about it, and I had the next day off work so I had a load of beers and stuck cricket DVDs on, think I posted a million times in the tour thread before play the next morning. It might just seem like it because it was so recent, but Flintoff's return and then return to form just got me going like nothing else.

edit - obviously the last Ashes I was super-pumped as well, though to be brutally honest I think in the back of my mind I wished they weren't happening as I didn't want us to relinquish the urn.

 

[Richard]

Although given all of their injury histories (and Trescothick has gotten horribly homesick all his life, he's said lately), to have all of them fit would have been a huge slice of good fortune. Apart from Giles, who would have made very little difference in any case IMO.

Well, you can look at it that way but TBH I don't think Trescothick's 2006/07 problems could've been anticipated as such, because he'd lasted until 2005/06 and we mostly presumed it was a one-off problem.

Giles? Well as a bowler of course he'd have been highly unlikely to have made a difference, and I've long wished he wasn't picked in the opening 2 Tests, for a multitude of reasons. But his lack of fitness then apparent return to fitness on the eve of the series was undeniably an unsettling matter.

Many English players are injury-prone, it's true - if you pick players who have chronic injuries (which Jones and Vaughan both of course did, though perhaps not at the time of their debuts) it's always a risk. But equally, general unpredictable accidents seem to happen disproportionately often and that can be described as nought but misfortune.

 

[ret]

Most India vs Australia series be it the 1999 series where Tendulkar smashed Warne, 2001 series where Laxman got that 281 and Bhajji a hattrick, the series which India lost at home .... Steve Waugh's farewell series in Australia .... the series ithe 2007/8 series in Australia where India won at Perth

Followed by the series against Pakistan in Pakistan which India won and where Sehwag scored that triple, Dravid a double, Tendulkar 191 not out

 

[Shaggy Alfresco]

2001, especially. I couldn't ever have seen us winning in 2006/07. But 2001, I honestly believed we had a perfectly good chance, but dropped catches by the amount that went down in the first 2 Tests and injuries by the amount that afflicted all series are an impossible lay-low to overcome.

England were crippled by injuries in 2001, 2002/3 and 2006/7. In fact the only time we had a full strength team contest the Ashes this decade we won!

 

[howardj]

Probably showing my age here, but West Indies 1995 v Australia (especially after what happened in 1992/1993). Man, I was frothin for that 1995 Series.

Also, the last Test in India in 2001 - I confess to some fist pumping and ranting.

 

[Richard]

England were crippled by injuries in 2001, 2002/3 and 2006/7. In fact the only time we had a full strength team contest the Ashes this decade we won!

2002/03 was notably different from the others though. Most of those who didn't play were rubbish ITFP and their fitness wouldn't have made any difference.

England's first-choice team that series would probably have been along the lines of:
Trescothick
Vaughan
Butcher
Hussain
Thorpe
Stewart
Flintoff
Giles
Caddick
Gough
Hoggard \ S Jones \ Harmison (it'd probably have changed through the series as each's ineffectiveness got more apparent)
Of those who missed-out only Thorpe would likely have strengthened the team for mine, and even that almost certainly not enough to make any difference to the series outcome. I suppose Giles would probably have offered a threat at The SCG but England won there anyway thanks to winning the toss, the Aussies' own butter-fingers and Caddick. Many of the other injuries were to backup or replacement players (Crawley, White, Tudor, Silverwood).

And even 2002/03 the injuries weren't quite as ridiculous as the proportions reached on the 1994/95 tour. Though they outdid 1990/91 and 1998/99, which were also bad.

 

[FaaipDeOiad]

I think the most excited I've been for a series would probably be either India in 2004 or the 2005 Ashes, both which lived up pretty well. Generally speaking I'm always excited about the Ashes, and about Australia playing whichever country seems the most likely to offer a tight contest at that particular time. In my time watching cricket that's been the West Indies, then South Africa, then for a brief period England, and now probably India.

 

[Jakester1288]

2005 Ashes, my first Ashes series, and I can still remember sitting up watching Lee and Kasper resisting the English bowlers, to lose in the end, by a mere margin of 2 runs. I was heartbroken!

2006/07 Ashes, to get revenge, and get revenge we did, in great style!

2008 Australia to India - hasn't happened yet, but am pumped for it

2009 Ashes - To prove we can win in England, in English conditions, without big name players like Gilchrist, Hayden (maybe), McGrath, Warne etc.

 

[GIMH]

I think the most excited I've been for a series would probably be either India in 2004 or the 2005 Ashes, both which lived up pretty well. Generally speaking I'm always excited about the Ashes, and about Australia playing whichever country seems the most likely to offer a tight contest at that particular time. In my time watching cricket that's been the West Indies, then South Africa, then for a brief period England, and now probably India.

Not South Africa again?

 

[Richard]

I guess the only answer to that is we'll soon find-out. It could easily be either IMO.

 

[Raghav]

Its Nz tour of Australia in 2002/03 IIRC