Our relationship with the Australians in general is interesting. They say that love and hate are pretty close together, don’t they? And we sort of love them, and sort of hate them at the same time, don’t we?
Australians tell us how much they adore being Australian, and of a devotion to their beautiful country; glad that they haven’t had to grow up around whingeing Poms, who don’t wash and drink warm beer. The lack of gratitude as they badmouth us always gets me here. Have they forgotten? It was us kind lot that sent them there in the first place.
The rivalry between the nations has always been best expressed through cricket, I believe, and on the field there is without doubt a begrudging admiration on both sides for the other. Yes, we’ve heard all the jokes before:
What do you call an Englishman with a hundred to his name? A bowler.
What would Glenn McGrath be called if he was English? An all-rounder.
What’s the definition of optimism? An England batsman who applies sunscreen.
Of course, we give plenty back too, and I think most Australians understand that when the Barmy Army remind them of their ancestry – how Great Uncle Jack arrived kitted out in clads – it is done so in good spirit. Furthermore, despite their mercilessly cruel song about Mitchell Johnson – altogether now ‘He bowls to the left, He bowls to the right, That Mitchell Johnson, His bowling is you-know-what’ – a good percentage of the throng will have admired his match-winning performance at Perth during the 2010–11 series. Because secretly we like them, and secretly they like us. It just doesn’t pay to admit it too often.
In a work capacity I have spent a hell of a lot of time in the Sky Sports commentary box with Botham, and there is no greater verbal jouster than he when it comes to the Aussies. He is digging at them all the time – and that’s just his friends. He cannot help but get stuck into them. I think he earnestly believes it is the primary duty he was put on this earth for. No wonder he used to treat them with such disdain as a player.
For Sir Beefykins – or His Royal Beefyness or Sir Osis (of the liver) to give him his other nicknames – getting stuck into the Aussies is the be all and end all. Some of his very best friends are Australians and he just damn right insults them the whole time he is in their company. His words are pretty choice towards them even when he is not. You should see some of the foul-fingered texts he sends to them. It’s like his phone’s got Tourette’s. To give them their due, his pals don’t hold back either. If you read some of these insults being batted this way and that you would think there was nothing but pure hatred between them. Yet dig beneath the expletives and you find there are keen friendships formed in his playing days that have stood the test of time. He is even in business with one of them, the winemaker Geoff Merrill, exporting bottles of Botham Merrill Willis Shiraz around the globe.
During the modern era of Ashes skirmishes, around the time I was England coach, there was some mischief hanging around regarding the value of the series in Cricket Australia’s international scheduling. During two decades of Australian dominance, it was occasionally suggested that five matches against England was too many, that Ashes campaigns should be downgraded to three matches and that Australia would be better off playing four and five match series against other leading nations.
Not sure that would go down well with the public on either side these days, particularly given that the boot has been shifted firmly to the other foot. Prior to this double Ashes year of 2013, there is no doubt that England have been the dominant force over recent meetings between the countries, and Australia are now the ones trying to rebuild under a new chairman of selectors in John Inverarity and a new captain in Michael Clarke. They will have felt under pressure to get that little urn back, and the focus of their player management over the past few months will undoubtedly have been to get their best possible XI on the park for Trent Bridge in July.
It is a rather historic time for cricket’s greatest competition, with 10 back-to-back Tests over six months split between home and away. These two series on the horizon could prove to be defining moments in the careers of many of the players involved. The challenge for England is to show that they are among the best if not the best Ashes team in history, that they can now be favourably compared to Australia from the late 1980s and 1990s.
Okay, this England team was defeated by South Africa, and relinquished their world number one status as a result, but this is the series that matters most to the fans, the one they demand is won. In the English cricket psyche it is okay to lose to almost anyone but not Australia. That’s tradition for you. No matter where the two teams stand within world cricket’s rankings, this is the big one, the one that means the most, and the passing of time has not diluted that.
For these England players, to win three Ashes series in a row would be something special – two generations of cricketers before them failed to win one, so imagine a treble on your CV. Without getting too far ahead of ourselves, an England side last won four series in a row in the 1880s.
What a challenge sits on the horizon. These players can go down in history as the most successful we’ve ever produced in Ashes terms. And as things stood, they entered the 2013 summer in good fettle. Sure, New Zealand provided an unexpected jolt or two and came close to winning the series, but overall the winter was positive. England had previously struggled in India, but having conquered the subcontinent at long last under Alastair Cook’s leadership, I feel they are on the verge of something very special.
People talk about the demise of Test cricket around the world but you only need to see what is happening around this country’s Test grounds in the summer of 2013, and how the Australian public will reciprocate that enthusiasm by turning out in their thousands over the winter, to show the appetite for the traditional form of the game is as healthy as it has ever been between the two most traditional foes. Recession or no recession, there will be a mass exodus from these shores to Australia in the 2013–14 winter, too.
We can only hope that this most ferociously contested cricket is played in the kind of spirit shown in the recent past. One Ashes moment that people will never forget is when Freddie Flintoff consoled Brett Lee, who was down on his haunches on the edge of the pitch in the immediate aftermath of the agonising 2005 defeat at Edgbaston. Fred obviously just felt it was the natural thing to do. Two great blokes, two great competitors, going at it hammer and tongs; it summed up the essence of England v Australia matches in a snapshot. You can call each other whatever you want, and within the spirit of the game do or say pretty much anything you like to your opponent between the hours of 11am and six o’clock in the evening, but this is a series that promotes unbelievable friendships and ultimate respect.
Can there be anything in sport so small that creates such a big fuss? After all, when you break it all down, us English and those Australians have spent one and a quarter centuries skirmishing over a six-inch terracotta urn. If it’s in your possession – metaphorically speaking, of course, because it never leaves its safehouse at Lord’s – then everything is fine and dandy in the world. But if the opposition have their mucky paws on it, then start drawing up the battle plans because we want it back.
It is the primary rivalry in cricket and dates back to 1882, when England’s sorry chase of 85 to beat Australia at the Oval fell short, leaving star man WG Grace embarrassed and The Sporting Times bemoaning the death of English cricket in a mock obituary.
‘In Affectionate Remembrance of English cricket, which died at the Oval on 29 August 1882, Deeply lamented by a large circle of sorrowing friends and acquaintances – R.I.P. – N.B. The body will be cremated and the ashes taken to Australia,’ wrote Reginald Shirley Brooks. I am unsure he can have imagined what his words would lead to.
Players from both countries have made their