Burning desires

In summer 2005, cricket suddenly became cool, exciting, and sexy. England’s unbelievable victory at home over the Australians won them the Ashes, thanks to attacking and inventive tactics and rock-solid team spirit. But as they set off for Australia to defend the trophy Down Under, key players are out injured, including brilliant captain Michael Vaughan. Can his stand-in, the talismanic “Freddie” Flintoff, and his team of new boys bring back cricket’s most cherished trophy? Yes, say players and pundits—maybe. Interviews by David Woodward and Richard Cree

The workhorse: Paul Collingwood

Watching last summer’s Ashes series on TV, I was absolutely desperate to get out there. Once you’re in, it’s a real pressure situation. But after winning the series the most important thing for the team is that they built up enough momentum to take them into the next one. That hasn’t happened as well as we’d hoped. I’m not making excuses, but sometimes it’s hard to keep it going. There were moments out in Pakistan [during England’s tour at the end of 2005] when we could have made the result different, but generally it’s been a difficult preparation for Australia.

The Ashes is the ultimate challenge, physically and mentally. The Aussies want them back just as much as we want to retain them. Steve Bull [the team’s psychologist] has worked well with us, setting us personal goals and targets, but the real mental boost is knowing we can win it—that’s the main hurdle overcome. And it happened very early on last summer. They came to play us at Twenty20, and I know everyone says it’s not like the real thing, but we beat them there and the whole psychological balance swung in our favour. Now we know we can win. There’s an aura about us and the lads feel they can do it again.

The safe pair of hands: Chris Read

You need to be good all round to beat them. Our four seamers were consistent last summer and it would be ideal if we could take the full quota out to Australia. Our guys need to be hungry to beat up the Aussies. Their game is based on playing positive cricket, and I think we managed to beat them at their own game last summer. Dealing with Shane Warne will be key. His technique is something else. I’ve faced him a few times in county cricket for Nottinghamshire against Hampshire and he wants to get you out every ball. If we can learn to play him we’ll have every chance.

The absent captain: Michael Vaughan

The first thing we can take from the last Ashes series
is confidence. The fact is Australia can be beaten, and we can beat them, if we play good, positive cricket. With a lot of hard work and good team unity we can do it again. But to beat Australia you have to be mentally strong, individually and as a team. From the moment that the team gets off the plane, the pressure will be on. There will be intense media and public interest and, although we will have great support, it won’t be the same as we got from the home crowds. The intense media pressure makes it essential that you are able to deal with the odd bad day or bad session. You have to keep the mental strength high, so that you can play with freedom and without fear. That is what we did in 2005. It’s important not to be burdened by the expectation of winning. Because we won last time, there might be a higher expectation. I don’t think we’ll be favourites, but it’s down to individuals too, to be mentally strong.

There’s no chance us going out there and being cautious. You have to play positive and aggressive cricket. There’s not much weather out there and I believe there will be five results, so we’ve got to make sure we win three. I guess somewhere like Perth there’s a small chance of a draw, but you have to go out and try and win. You have to have a good strategy. Our bowlers have to have ideas on how to outwit and play against their batsmen, and our batsmen have to have ideas on how to beat their bowlers.

It is hard to find weaknesses in the Australian side, but any side can be vulnerable if you put the pressure on them at the right time and in the right places. You just have to look at us to see that. But against Australia you can’t afford to relax. You have to put in six hours of pressure, and then come in the next day and do it again. If you allow them a good day and then a better day they will kill you off. They can take you out of a test in one day.

The Ashes series is like no other. Playing against Australia is different. It’s like the Champions League of cricket. All the other series are hard, but there is an X-factor against the Aussies that is missing from the rest. Everyone wants England to beat the Aussies. I think the public would be happy if we lost all the other series but won against the Aussies. Which is why it gets the coverage it does.

I went to Australia before and had an amazing series from a personal point of view and averaged 63, but we lost the series 4-1. It doesn’t mean anything having individuals if you don’t have eight, nine or 10 contributions. We used 12 players through the whole of the last Ashes and that was only because Jones got injured. There is nothing like that stability for building a strong team. You get to know each other and you work better together as a team over time the more you play together.

We have had to bring in some younger players in the last year or so because of injuries, and they have done well. But I would like to see the 11 players who start in Brisbane being the only players we use in the series. That is good for two reasons—first it means you are winning and secondly it means you get the time to know how each other plays and get to know strengths and weaknesses.

My advice to Freddie when it comes to the captaincy is to just do the job with instinct, but also to prepare and do his homework before every game. He has to go on to the field with a clear idea of his strategy. Before the game, in the way you would visualise as a batsman, the captain has to visualise how he wants the game to work out and have plans in place to make it happen. But you need a plan A, B and C because things will change. Usually within three balls you’ve had to change your mind.

If you go out without a strategy, you will end up in trouble. The other thing is to realise that no one’s perfect and to not beat yourself up if you get it wrong from time to time. I predict there will be a result in all five tests, so I will settle for 3-2 to England.

The boy wonder: Alastair Cook

We’ve got over the hoodoo. It’s a bit like Jenson Button’s first Formula One victory. Now he’s got it, everyone will finally stop talking about him never having won a race and he can get on with the job of winning a few more. The players no longer feel the curse of the Ashes. We know we’ve got the players to do it, we just need to perform.
You see their bowlers a lot on TV; Shane Warne, Glenn McGrath—they’re exceptional bowlers, but even the best will bowl a bad ball. It’s up to you to capitalise on that when your chance eventually comes.

The key difference between the England squad now and over the last 10 years is the competition for places. Obviously if you play well then there’s every chance you’ll be in the squad next time. But I seriously think there are 20 different players with a shout of playing in the first 11. You feel the pressure to perform from within the team and that can only be a good thing when you’re up against Australia.

I don’t worry about sledging, you see it every day at county level. All they are really trying to do is put you off. But as a team, we all need to support each other. The first hour can often set the tone for the whole match, but as we saw at Lords [in the first test of the last series, which Australia won], over a five-match series the balance can swing away from one team to the other.

The tv pundit: David Gower

Everyone from Andrew Flintoff downwards knows the challenge facing England Down Under is immense. The Australian team’s hunger for revenge and their overall talents are, broadly, the two major factors.
For Flintoff, [coach] Duncan Fletcher, and whoever else is involved, it is more important to concentrate on England’s strengths. Forget the missing players, however valuable they were last year, just make the most of the ones you have with you. It is great that the likes of Cook and Bell have had good summers, and likewise Monty Panesar. It does not have to be a disadvantage that they have not experienced Ashes cricket. But they have to adapt as soon as possible to Australia and the new conditions—not that they are giving themselves much time to do so, but unfortunately, that is the way of modern cricket tours.
The one thing that will carry England through is spirit. And here Flintoff, Bothamesque as he is, will lead from the front. It is also in England’s favour that the Aussies, for all their self-confidence and ebullience, know the pressure will really be on if anything goes wrong early. This makes it more important than ever that England start strongly, right from the first session on the first day of the series at the Gabba.

David Gower is a commentator for Sky Sports. The Ashes are exclusively live on Sky Sports

The journalist: Tim de Lisle

England start this Ashes series in an unusual position: both holders and underdogs. As holders, they have only to draw the series to retain the trophy. But England are clearly the weaker side, on paper at least. They won the Ashes only by the narrowest of margins. The 2005 series was a study in “necessary and sufficient conditions”. Almost everything that happened—Flintoff’s heroics, McGrath treading on a ball, the umpire’s finger giving England a two-run win, Kevin Pietersen playing the most attacking rearguard ever—had to happen for the result to go the way it did. If they had lost more tosses, had more injuries, or faced McGrath throughout, England would probably have lost.

Australia are favourites because they are at home, where they haven’t lost a series for 13 years, but also because of changes in areas where England had the edge last time. England were superior in fast bowling, especially reverse swing; fast batting; captaincy; team spirit; hunger; and support.

This time, Simon Jones, king of the reverse swingers, is injured, and in any case, reverse swing occurs less in Australian conditions. England’s batting, while solid, has become less dashing. New recruits, Alastair Cook and Paul Collingwood, are more tortoise than hare. Michael Vaughan isn’t there to run rings round Ricky Ponting. Australia will obviously have more fans in the grounds. And hunger may well have changed sides as the Aussies smart from their Ashes failure. Only team spirit remains an English stronghold. With Shane Warne scoffing at the coach John Buchanan, the Aussies are disunited.

Flintoff will be more gung-ho and less subtle than Vaughan, but the subtlety can be supplied by Andrew Strauss, fresh from a successful stint as stand-in captain. To take Jones’s wickets, England have Monty Panesar, their most exciting spinner for a generation. He will be less explosive than Jones, but can bowl longer spells, to give Flintoff the breathers he needs and sometimes forgets to give himself.
The Ashes win was based on five bowlers, which meant Flintoff had to stay fit. Subsequently, England have worked out how to win with four bowlers, thanks to the rise of Panesar. Four bowlers would be a bigger risk in Australia, where the days can be long and hot. Vaughan thinks five bowlers are essential. But England don’t have to win every Test. Four bowlers are an option at Brisbane, Perth and Melbourne. At Adelaide and Sydney, where the ball turns more, they need five, but two can be spinners. The weakest link in England’s line-up, the fourth seamer, may hardly be needed.

Once again, nearly everything will have to go right. England can’t afford to have Steve Harmison off form, or Marcus Trescothick out of sorts. But they have one vital advantage—which is increasing fractionally all the time—youth. Six of the Aussies are over 35, whereas only one Englishman, Ashly Giles, has turned 32. The attributes that cricket requires—sharp eyes, fast hands, flexible joints—can go very suddenly. And Australia’s grounds, as they are always reminding visitors, are big and hard. The underdogs have a sniff.

Tim de Lisle is cricket columnist for The Times and a former editor of Wisden.

The tour itinerary

Preliminary matches
Nov 10	Australian Prime Minister’s XI, Canberra
Nov 12-14	New South Wales (practice match), Sydney
Nov 17-19	South Australia, Adelaide
First test
Nov 23-27	AUSTRALIA, Brisbane
Second test
Dec 1-5	AUSTRALIA, Adelaide
Dec 9-10	Western Australia, Perth
Third test
Dec 14-18	AUSTRALIA, Perth
Fourth test
Dec 26-30	AUSTRALIA, Melbourne
Fifth test
Jan 2-6	AUSTRALIA, Sydney
Jan 9	Australia (Twenty20), Sydney (day/night)
One-day series
Jan 12	Australia, Melbourne (day/night)
Jan 16	New Zealand, Hobart
Jan 19	Australia, Brisbane (day/night)
Jan 23	New Zealand, Adelaide (day/night)
Jan 26	Australia, Adelaide (day/night)
Jan 30	New Zealand, Perth (day/night tbc)
Feb 2	Australia, Sydney (day/night)
Feb 6	New Zealand, Brisbane (day/night tbc)
Feb 9	First final, Melbourne (day/night)
Feb 11	Second final, Sydney (day/night)
Feb 13	Third final (if needed), Brisbane (day/night)