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Most galling Ashes loss

Most disappointing Ashes loss from an Australian POV?


  • Total voters
    25

Cabinet96

Global Moderator
Watched the majority of the 05 series bar Trent Bridge when I was on holiday, but I would still probably put 10/11 ahead in hindsight. Arguably the best set of performances I've ever seen by an England side considering the margins of victories and the fact it was overseas.
 

Furball

Evil Scotsman
I'd still stick 2005 ahead. It really was a magical time to be a cricket fan.

I think it's slightly over-rated in hindsight, and 2010/11 runs it damned close, but I can't go beyond that series for the drama and the way it just captured the attention of the nation.
 

GIMH

Norwood's on Fire
2005 was great because the last four tests were all close (or had exciting finishes). No other Ashes series since has had that but at least 2009 actually went to the wire. That's looking at it objectively rather than as an England fan, per se.
 

wpdavid

Hall of Fame Member
2005 was great because the last four tests were all close (or had exciting finishes). No other Ashes series since has had that but at least 2009 actually went to the wire. That's looking at it objectively rather than as an England fan, per se.
Plus we played so very well against a still great Aus side, despite what the revisionists will tell you to the contrary.
 

Furball

Evil Scotsman
Plus we played so very well against a still great Aus side, despite what the revisionists will tell you to the contrary.
I don't think it's revisionist to suggest that that particular side wasn't quite as good on the field as their on paper strength suggested.

Having re-watched the DVDs again recently, there was a lot of appalling cricket played by Australia that series.
 

GIMH

Norwood's on Fire
I don't think it's revisionist to suggest that that particular side wasn't quite as good on the field as their on paper strength suggested.

Having re-watched the DVDs again recently, there was a lot of appalling cricket played by Australia that series.
Which was largely brought about due to the way England played. They were unprepared for the fast bowling (in particular the reverse swing, and Freddie going round the wicket to the left handers) and the aggressive batting. They rocked up expecting same old England, got it by and large at Lords bar Harmison and Pietersen and Ponting is even quoted as saying 'Same old Poms.' They had not accounted for the way we would play through the rest of the series and that induced a lot of the mistakes they would then make.

It is absolutely revisionist to try and underplay the quality of the side England took down in 2005, especially when you factor in that it was England and that we hadn't beaten them in eighteen years.
 

Furball

Evil Scotsman
Yeah look I'll accept that it's one of those "chicken or egg" scenarios - were the Australian bats out of form because they were up against a superb bowling unit, or was it superb bowling that led to Australia's batsmen losing form?

However, Hayden had been in wretched form coming into the series - he'd gone 12 Tests without a ton, which he continued by failing to make a 50 in the first 4 Tests.
Clarke was an unproven youngster who'd had 1 season in the Test side - and while he'd sparkled on debut in India, he'd had a pretty **** home summer. His series against New Zealand and Pakistan remain two of his worst ever.
Katich is another one who was nowhere near established.

It's telling that by the time South Africa rocked around at Christmas 2005, half of Australia's Ashes top 6 had been binned. There's no doubting it was a great series performance, particularly as past England teams would have just folded after Lord's. But Australia weren't a side without their problems.
 

Riggins

International Captain
Yeah look I'll accept that it's one of those "chicken or egg" scenarios - were the Australian bats out of form because they were up against a superb bowling unit, or was it superb bowling that led to Australia's batsmen losing form?
that's not really a chicken and egg scenario is it?
 

GIMH

Norwood's on Fire
Yeah look I'll accept that it's one of those "chicken or egg" scenarios - were the Australian bats out of form because they were up against a superb bowling unit, or was it superb bowling that led to Australia's batsmen losing form?

However, Hayden had been in wretched form coming into the series - he'd gone 12 Tests without a ton, which he continued by failing to make a 50 in the first 4 Tests.
Clarke was an unproven youngster who'd had 1 season in the Test side - and while he'd sparkled on debut in India, he'd had a pretty **** home summer. His series against New Zealand and Pakistan remain two of his worst ever.
Katich is another one who was nowhere near established.

It's telling that by the time South Africa rocked around at Christmas 2005, half of Australia's Ashes top 6 had been binned. There's no doubting it was a great series performance, particularly as past England teams would have just folded after Lord's. But Australia weren't a side without their problems.
The half the top six thing though. Katich, Martyn and Clarke all came again. Martyn's dropping was stupid anyway as he'd been guilty of bad umpiring more than anything. Clarke had showed his class at Lord's before falling prey to reverse swing and injury for the rest of the series. Part of the reason for the restructured top six was down to the Aussie desire to replicate what we had with Freddie which saw Watson tried in the supertest and then Symonds got a run.

Martyn was back in the side on merit by the next Ashes, and Clarke went away and worked on what he'd learned and never looked back.

Sure, what happened in the series led to Aussie changes in the wake of it. But that should be used to credit England's performance, not to say, ah it wasn't that good because these batsmen wound up dropped anyway.
 
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Uppercut

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The half the top six thing though. Katich, Martyn and Clarke all came again. Martyn's dropping was stupid anyway as he'd been guilty of bad umpiring more than anything. Clarke had showed his class at Lord's before falling prey to reverse swing and injury for the rest of the series. Part of the reason for the restructured top six was down to the Aussie desire to replicate what we had with Freddie which saw Watson tried in the supertest and then Symonds got a run.

Martyn was back in the side on merit by the next Ashes, and Clarke went away and worked on what he'd learned and never looked back.

Sure, what happened in the series led to Aussie changes in the wake of it. But that should be used to credit England's performance, not to say, ah it wasn't that good because these batsmen wound up dropped anyway.
It's a series that takes on a bit of a different context given what's happened since. Australia being vulnerable to bursts of excellent swing bowling in England is much less striking than it was at the time.

But as you say yourself, sometimes there's nothing wrong with using hindsight when evaluating something. The more Ashes series that get played, the more I think the 2010/11 England side was much better than all of the others.
 

GIMH

Norwood's on Fire
It's a series that takes on a bit of a different context given what's happened since. Australia being vulnerable to bursts of excellent swing bowling in England is much less striking than it was at the time.

But as you say yourself, sometimes there's nothing wrong with using hindsight when evaluating something. The more Ashes series that get played, the more I think the 2010/11 England side was much better than all of the others.
I think the 2010-11 side was better too (except for it's lack of Freddie. Always remember that disclaimer. Always). I mean that win can easily be downplayed if you're so inclined too. Ponting & Clarke were out of sorts (devil's advocate here because as with 05 we can debate the cause), conditions overhead suited us more than you'd expect in Australia, their bowlers were buffoons (again, this is devil's advocate because they got worse the more we punished them).

Ultimately, in terms of cricketing achievements, both 2005 and 2010-11 stand alongside winning in India in 2012, and getting to #1 in 2011, as the peaks of English cricket this century. You can argue which was better and come up with all sorts of valid points, but I don't believe talking down the quality of the Australian side of 2005 is one such example.
 

Furball

Evil Scotsman
The half the top six thing though. Katich, Martyn and Clarke all came again. Martyn's dropping was stupid anyway as he'd been guilty of bad umpiring more than anything. Clarke had showed his class at Lord's before falling prey to reverse swing and injury for the rest of the series. Part of the reason for the restructured top six was down to the Aussie desire to replicate what we had with Freddie which saw Watson tried in the supertest and then Symonds got a run.

Martyn was back in the side on merit by the next Ashes, and Clarke went away and worked on what he'd learned and never looked back.

Sure, what happened in the series led to Aussie changes in the wake of it. But that should be used to credit England's performance, not to say, ah it wasn't that good because these batsmen wound up dropped anyway.
Martyn batted like a tool when he wasn't getting sawn off, Clarke came into that series with question marks over his technique and temperament that he failed to answer. Like I said, his home summer of 04/05 contain 2 of his worst ever series.

In hindsight (wonderful thing etc) catching Australia when they did was perfect timing for England because there was a mini transition from Waugh's great team to their last hurrah as a truly great team between 2006 and 2008.

I agree with Uppercut's conclusion as well; I think only Flintoff and Simon Jones would get into the 2010/11 side from the 2005 vintage.

Comparing captains is interesting as well. Cook takes a lot of flak for his captaincy but while Vaughan certainly innovated with field placings the cordon wasn't particularly heavily manned during 2005.
 

GIMH

Norwood's on Fire
Martyn batted like a tool when he wasn't getting sawn off, Clarke came into that series with question marks over his technique and temperament that he failed to answer. Like I said, his home summer of 04/05 contain 2 of his worst ever series.

In hindsight (wonderful thing etc) catching Australia when they did was perfect timing for England because there was a mini transition from Waugh's great team to their last hurrah as a truly great team between 2006 and 2008.

I agree with Uppercut's conclusion as well; I think only Flintoff and Simon Jones would get into the 2010/11 side from the 2005 vintage.

Comparing captains is interesting as well. Cook takes a lot of flak for his captaincy but while Vaughan certainly innovated with field placings the cordon wasn't particularly heavily manned during 2005.
Martyn played the key innings at Lord's - Clarke's was important too as I mentioned and he scored more but it was Martyn who really took the game away from us. And sure he could have batted better aside from the dismissals, but again we were bowling brilliantly, and when it's going against a batsman in terms of umpiring, they can have a tendency to fall away anyway (see also; Strauss 06-07).

Can accept the question marks that Clarke came into the series with and that he failed to answer on the most part, but it's not as though he came into the series as a guaranteed failure., We asked the right questions after Lord's but it's unfair to ignore that he was struggling with his back for the last three Tests.

The transition point is kind of fair, but again we forced that to happen with our performance. I mean nobody would question Gilchrist's quality but he was never really the same again after the series. A great opponent can do that to you (see also: England 13-14 - not to say our quality was anywhere close to the Aussies of 05). The Oz side had been and would get better, but it was still comfortably the best team in the world and outside of Australia I'd still argue it was better than any side that's played Test Cricket since.

As for the combined XI. Straight up disagree, given that ignoring captaincy (and if we pick on captaincy Vaughan gets in ahead of Strauss) the Strauss of 2010-11 wouldn't get in ahead of either Trescothick or the Strauss of 05. Strauss performed better in the series, so picking a combined XI depends on whether you go on series output alone or overall quality. A similar question exists for Pietersen, and I would probably argue that Pietersen circa 05-09 was a better player than afterwards, but he played better innings later in his career. Anyhow, I'll give it a shot.

Trescothick
Cook
Trott
Pietersen (circa 05)
Bell (circa 10-11)
Flintoff
Prior +
Swann
Anderson
Jones
Hoggard/Harmison/Bresnan/Tremlett

Not sure on the bowlers. All well and good to point to the stats etc. No doubt that Hoggard was the best overall Test bowler of the four. I've excluded Broad because he hardly played in 10-11. Bresnan and Tremlett's stats in 10-11 are superb, but they came into the series and benefitted from a lot of what went before, whereas Harmison did the opposite in 05, superb at Lord's, decent at Egdbaston then faded away. Would probably go Hoggard tbh.

Of course, I'm now without a captain. If you're picking on captaincy, then as I say you go Vaughan. Probably for Trescothick. But you could easily stick Strauss there given he was good enough and a better opener.

All this being said, I'm not really sure why I've bothered as the quality of the England side isn't really of any consequence because that's not what I'm arguing anyway. What I will say is, the 10-11 side may have struggled to beat the 05 Aussies because it lacks Freddie, and let's not beat around the bush here, that's why we won.

In summary. Freddie.
 
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wpdavid

Hall of Fame Member
It's a series that takes on a bit of a different context given what's happened since. Australia being vulnerable to bursts of excellent swing bowling in England is much less striking than it was at the time.

But as you say yourself, sometimes there's nothing wrong with using hindsight when evaluating something. The more Ashes series that get played, the more I think the 2010/11 England side was much better than all of the others.
It makes a pleasant change to see the 2010/11 ashes win given some serious credit instead of being written off due to the state of the Australian team. Three innings victories in Australia was just extraordinary, and I don't recall anyone doing that to them even at the darkest points in their history. Whether I'd place clear daylight between it and the 2005 side is questionable, but I think that was discussed on CW even before the subsequent implosion, and it is only an opinion, so who cares really. I can only agree with those who've pointed out that Fred and Jones give the 2005 side a dimension that might just give it the edge, despite the clear superiority of Swann, Prior, Cook (in that series, anyway) and Bell over their 2005 counterparts. Choosing a composite team is hard because picking the best bowlers probably omits one of the tall brigade, so we end up with Hoggard and Anderson doing similar jobs without Tremlett or Harmison doing their thing.
 

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