Is the 2005 Ashes series so revered because we lost?

[PhatBoy]

Perhaps a mildly interesting footnote for the fans of one of the sides playing? On a par with the Aussies choosing Tate over Stu Clarke or Clarke over Hussey

See that I find interesting

 

[beatnik]

The fact that this series is elevated shows that Aussie cricketing are credulous at best and naive and easily manipulated, at worst

By contrast, English, Indian and South African media are seasoned PR campaigners who know how to frame a narrative to their team’s best advantage…they’ll belt their teams when they’re playing poorly but make no mistake, they’re partisan af

Australian sporting culture is to be patriotic but not sneaky or sly…if they were a bit more strategic, they’d ensure the narrative would consistently be about how much better Australia have been in England than the reverse over the past 30 years

They’d also consistently call out the hypocrisy of those other sides around their sledging and spirit of cricket grandstanding nonsense in recent years and dismiss the implications Australia are the Bad Boys of cricket because Warne, Waugh and McGrath were a bit mean, verbally, two decades ago

 

[PhatBoy]

The fact that this series is elevated shows that Aussie cricketing are credulous at best and naive and easily manipulated, at worst

By contrast, English, Indian and South African media are seasoned PR campaigners who know how to frame a narrative to their team’s best advantage…they’ll belt their teams when they’re playing poorly but make no mistake, they’re partisan af

Australian sporting culture is to be patriotic but not sneaky or sly…if they were a bit more strategic, they’d ensure the narrative would consistently be about how much better Australia have been in England than the reverse over the past 30 years

They’d also consistently call out the hypocrisy of those other sides around their sledging and spirit of cricket grandstanding nonsense in recent years and dismiss the implications Australia are the Bad Boys of cricket because Warne, Waugh and McGrath were a bit mean, verbally, two decades ago

But everyone knows it. They don’t have to be. Literally anyone with even a passing knowledge of cricket knows that Australia have absolutely dominated out here aside from one series for nearly 40 years while England have had to earn their wins there, plus two draws, across 6 series.

And the media outlets that DO get on the front foot overcompensate to such a degree as to destroy any Australian media credibility anyway - see Fox Sports for example. If you were to believe their articles, Bazzball has consisted of 3, maybe 4 series: the ashes draw at home, the India draw at home, the India loss away, and maybe the Pakistan loss away. They’ve not framed a single mention of how excruciatingly bad England were for 18 months before the handover to Stokes and McCullum and how exponentially their results have changed.

they don’t let an article go by without a moral victory joke slip in there even though India literally made the same claim - without their tongue in cheek - after the draw in the fourth test. I didn’t see a single media outlet do a ‘hang on, did India just do an England after hanging on for a draw??’

England - their own fault, mind you - are the new Australia, in terms of being the media whipping boy, just for different reasons than what Australia were.

Australia have no reason to be that whipping boy anymore. They don’t sledge any more than most teams. They don’t have that same pack mentality. Yes fans of other teams still carry that residual dislike but the actual practice has disappeared. So I don’t think the media in general come at them nearly as hard.

Their biggest crime now is being part of the triumvirate of power brokers in the game and that’s hardly the players’ fault.

 

[beatnik]

See that I find interesting

I respect that, I would just consider it on a lower tier than many of the other subplots…maybe just a calibration issue

 

[beatnik]

But everyone knows it. They don’t have to be. Literally anyone with even a passing knowledge of cricket knows that Australia have absolutely dominated out here aside from one series for nearly 40 years while England have had to earn their wins there, plus two draws, across 6 series.

And the media outlets that DO get on the front foot overcompensate to such a degree as to destroy any Australian media credibility anyway - see Fox Sports for example. If you were to believe their articles, Bazzball has consisted of 3, maybe 4 series: the ashes draw at home, the India draw at home, the India loss away, and maybe the Pakistan loss away. They’ve not framed a single mention of how excruciatingly bad England were for 18 months before the handover to Stokes and McCullum and how exponentially their results have changed.

they don’t let an article go by without a moral victory joke slip in there even though India literally made the same claim - without their tongue in cheek - after the draw in the fourth test. I didn’t see a single media outlet do a ‘hang on, did India just do an England after hanging on for a draw??’

England - their own fault, mind you - are the new Australia, in terms of being the media whipping boy, just for different reasons than what Australia were.

Australia have no reason to be that whipping boy anymore. They don’t sledge any more than most teams. They don’t have that same pack mentality. Yes fans of other teams still carry that residual dislike but the actual practice has disappeared. So I don’t think the media in general come at them nearly as hard.

Their biggest crime now is being part of the triumvirate of power brokers in the game and that’s hardly the players’ fault.

Good post

 

[Freo Big Fella]

I think it stacks up in terms of generational performances - Warne all series, Pietersen's emergence, Flintoff being an absolute talisman, Simon Jones' last hurrah (I don't think he played another Test?), McGrath and Langer at Lords, Lee bending his back with McGrath injured and Gillespie and Kasper catastrophically out of form.

Can still remember pulling into a carpark at my uni job to listen to the final stages of Edgbaston and Old Trafford on the radio.

 

[katana]

If McGrath doesn't tread on a ball we win the series and no one cares

what a woeful call. mcgrath played 3 tests (and i swear this is often forgotten) in that series results were 1-1-1. if england don't lose simon jones perhaps they steamroll home even easier. the draw required one of ponting's greatest knocks, a test in which england were on top all the way.

did you watch the series? it was terrific high quality cricket. well worthy to be considered the best series of the modern era.

 

[swingdog]

The reverence of the 2005 Ashes in England is detrimental to their cricket culture.

They have a strong tendency to continually harken back to glory days, when I lived there in the 90s it was constant repeats of 1981 during the rain breaks.

Botham’s Ashes was making but it led them down endless dead ends trying to find a ‘new Botham.’

One good thing about Bazball is that the current team doesn’t seem to care about the old days (this may be McCullum’s influence as an outsider).

 

[kickazz]

Yeah had Kaspar not been given out and we won it 2-1 it may have had a lot less reverence.

But I have to disagree with your statement, because there was something special about that series. It kept me up later than previous Ashes series. Oddly enough, it was the first one in a while that Nine didn't broadcast. So we had the Sky feed via SBS with Simon Hill, Dean Jones and Greg Matthews filling in during the breaks. And that really worked!

But overall I put it down to the quality out on the pitch. It was more or less a peak Aussie side, perhaps just getting past that peak but still full of A graders. Conversely, England were up and coming, that side had some real quality - good openers, the Sherminator was finally half decent. An A-grader in Vaughan and and emerging star in Pietersen. Generational all rounder in Flintoff (Aussies wasted many years afterwards obsessing over replicating him). England's fast bowling attack was so potent - and indeed Simon Jones as second change often got the crucial breakthroughs.

Giles was meh as the spinner but that was counteracted by Warne having the best series I have ever seen from a spinner. (Not to mention some good counter attacking batting) Both keepers were meh, but I guess Gilchrist's first real failure (no 50s even from memory) in a series added to the narrative.

I just think it was a time when both sides had pretty darn good players and that gave us some pretty darn good cricket.

 

[kickazz]

The thing the Poms don't like to mention about 2005 though is the rub of the green they got with the umps.

Damien Martyn wishes snicko was around then for sure!

 

[Teen Wolf]

what a woeful call. mcgrath played 3 tests (and i swear this is often forgotten) in that series results were 1-1-1.

That's not forgotten, just wrong.

McGrath was absent for the 2 losses. Australia went 1-0 in the 3 Tests he played.