The Ashes Tour 2009

Fair point. Given the way he was treated and completely ignored once he had been dropped, I would imagine he knew he was never going to be getting back, which can't do wonders for the motivation.

I was going to make a new thread about this, but since this one is here now I will just use it to talk about MEMORIES OF 2005. It's almost a cliche now to talk about the greatest series etc, but this one truly was up there.

I've posted these photos before but what the heck. The first big day of the tour for me was June 11, when the Australian machine rolled into Grace Road Leicester for a one day warm up. Determined not to miss out I arrived at the ground a couple of hours before play to find it was already busy. And there, on the field were these players, THE players, the mighty Australia.

The first ones I picked out were Lee and McGrath, and gazing across the field I hadn't noticed a player suddenly using the fence right in front of me to perform some stretching. I grabbed my camera.

"Give us a smile Matt"

I could tell right away that he desperately wanted to ignore me, taking just that little bit too long to acknowledge my presence, but his manners got the best of him - yes even Matthew Hayden has some, and he offered me the tightest lipped of smiles and a muttered "cheers mate" when I thanked him.



I strolled across to the other side of the ground in time for Ricky Ponting to stroll past offering a cheery "How ya going folks?", and watched with great interest the various different groups observing their practices. I couldn't help but laugh at the sight of Hayden, Ponting and Damien Martyn  going through a drill whilst Shane Watson stood in the background looking like they'd told him he wasn't allowed to join in.



As the players went back to the dressing room a big crowd gathered and all the Australians - with the notable exceptions of Gilchrist and Lee - made a great effort to sign as many as possible. McGrath and Gillespie were especially hospitable and went out of their way to greet everyone.







Poor Michael Hussey didn't fare so well when having signed an autograph for an old bloke, the guy looked at the signature then asked loudly "Are you Matthew Elliott?". Hussey's mood and ego were quickly repaired when a slightly more knowledgeable punter reminded him of the 250+ he'd scored here for Durham a few weeks earlier.

After the toss a big cheer went up with the news that Australia would bat - the last thing we all wanted was to see our lads rolled over for 75 and the Aussies knock them off in 10 overs.

Sadly Gilchrist and Ponting both failed, but Hayden looked imposing making a century, whilst Martyn was a joy to watch, all off which set up a Symonds onlsaught as he made 92* off 59 balls, the last 60 or so coming in about 20 deliveries.

As the innings went on it was nice to see that the 12th Man, Katich chose not to hide away in the dressing room, but stood out among the spectators, chatting away happily with anyone who wanted a word.



Come the Leics innings, Lee opened up with a seriously rapid spell and gave poor old Darren Maddy a real working over, whilst Gillespie - and this is really not with the benefit of hindsight - looked horrible. Only Paul Nixon and Otis Gibson offered any kind of resistance, but as the day wore on plenty of fun was still to be had as the banter went on between the crowd and the Aussies - Lee and McGrath were fielding closest to me and gave as good as they got, all in good spirit of course.

A couple of other things that impressed me were even long after the game was dead as a contest, Hayden found himself fielding long off at both ends, and was sprinting into position between overs, while Michael Clarke made a point of going 20 yards beyond the rope between overs to sign autographs, forcing himself to also have to sprint across the field to get back into position.



Those Aussies did look awfully good, surely England had no chance against them?



Edited by Clobber - 20 May 2009 at 9:36pm

Wow , that's amazing stuff Clobs!! One time I was at the MCG and I was in the front row and Michael Hussey was training in front of me and he was more than happy to say G'day. Seems like a hospitible bloke. Matthew Hayden is surprisingly friendly, but he seems like a very focused guy, so maybe he was just focusing on his training. Simon Katich surprises me, didn't think he was the type to go around having a chat to the crowd.
Looks like some great memories. 2005 Ashes was the best ever series, but nonetheless it was heart breaking being an Aussie supporter at the time. Also lost be a few bucks to my English mates

Sounds great.

I also have the autographs of the Australian team that visited Pakistan back in 194-95. I was doing the ball picker duty during that famous Karachi test and I remember I had god times with Tim May.

It has a nice beer garden matey - no kids in the pub !

May gave it a rip and in tandem with a young Warne, gave cricket a nice boost after enduring 11 overs an hour of Windies bombardment.

Yep , apparently he didn't get it to go until his spinning finger was really sore!

   As for the upcoming series , I think England will be competitive and Anderson will come of age - it'll be the making of the lad.

I'm fairly sure that Harmison and Hoggard averaged under 30 just prior to the last Ashes. Flintoff and Jones would have been close.

Originally posted by -JP- I'm fairly sure that Harmison and Hoggard averaged under 30 just prior to the last Ashes. Flintoff and Jones would have been close.

You are right about Harmison JP. But Hoggard and Jones averaged 31 and 32. Flintoff was averaging 35 then.

If the conditions suit bowling, I'd definitely put my money on Australia.  It's not like the Windies bowlers who can't swing the ball or know where to land it plus the Aussies can bat, except when it comes to finger spinners it seems.

Another 2005 MEMORY for you all :)

A few weeks after that last encounter, Leicestershire's reward for being abjectly dumped out of the one day cup was a 3 day fixture against the Australians as a warm-up for the forthcoming 1st Test at Lords.

Having been at work on Day 1, I rolled up for the evening session. Strolling across the car park I all but walked into a stocky blonde fellow trying to get away from a crowd of pursuers. "Aww look, I have to go somewhere, I'll be back in a bit" he said somewhat exasperated. "But Warnie, you're my hero" whined a teenage boy. The blonde mans shoulders slumped as he realised there was no way out of this without looking bad and he was quickly surrounded.

Leics had already been bowled out, and the Aussies were just starting their innings. Hayden's form was already showing creaks during the one dayers against England, and of course would only get worse during the Tests that followed, but here he played absolutely beautifully until he passed 50, at which point he started trying to smash everything and perished sooner after.

For Australia the prime aim for the match was to get time in the middle for Justin Langer who had just joined the squad, and Michael Clarke who hadn't done much in the ODI's. The latter looked in horrible nick though, and it just wasn't to be - these 2 photos were taken only a few minutes apart;





Langer went through to the close untroubled though, and would have been pleased with his start, though you would never have thought so are he strode off, looking like he was about to hit me



The next morning I arrived bright and breezy, bringing my sons along so they could say they had seen the great Australians in the flesh. Immediately it was apparent that the mood around the squad was nothing like as outgoing as their previous visit. Their warmups were conducted out of sight in the private practice area and there was a marked reluctance to sign any autographs at this stage of the day, though Ponting clearly understood his ambassadorial role sufficiently to do the bare minimum - and I do mean bare minimum; one of my boys was a bit slow to offer up his autograph book and was duly ignored by Ponting.

I got chatting to an old guy next to me who revealed he was a Warwickshire member up for the day. He had a list of Leics players he wanted autographs from - basically any that had played international cricket, and he asked me to point out those players to him, which I did, and also insisting that he get the signature of an 18 year old bowler who had only played a couple of games at that stage, as I was convinced he would be playing for England before too many years had passed. His name was Stuart Broad, and even back then was a very impressive young man to chat to.

Aftab Habib fared less well when the Warks member told him to have a good innings that day. He looked at me incredulously, muttered something about not batting today then shuffled off. I didn't have the heart to tell the old boy that Aftab wasn't even in the team!

The cricket passed serenely as Langer, Ponting and Martyn all made centuries, all very effortlessly, and they were ruthlessly professional as they went about it. Leics had a young Australian on trial for this match, but with figures of 25-0-136-0, it's fair to say that Jason Krejza looked anything but a Test prospect at that stage of his career.

Hayden had brusquely brushed off the Warks member when asked for an autograph before play, but on his way back from a net he showed a different side to his character by sitting on the outfield and signing everything for a large group that gathered, whilst insisting they all kept down so as not to obstruct the view of the people behind and pointing queue jumpers towards the back of the line. I got him to sign the photo I had taken of him the previous time and was surprised how humble he came across this time. (Contrastingly, Katich had earlier just given me a dirty look and turned away when I proferred my photo of him for signing!).

Leics kept chipping away through the day, a big highlight being Broad showing that though inexperience he was already a thinking bowler by going round the wicket and promptly cleaning up Adam Gilchrist, Freddie Flintoff style.

Taking a stroll around the ground mid-afternoon - possibly to get away from ex-Chancellor Kenneth Clarke, who had plonked himself down next to me for a while - I once again managed to practically bump into Shane Warne, this time emerging from a practice session, which had clearly worked him hard judging from the sweat pouring from his head. He declined to stop for a couple of people approaching him as I carried on around the boundary. As I got back to my seat I noticed he had taken station in front of the pavilion, where a very English queue had formed. I grabbed my lads and told them this was the one they wanted to get above all others and the great man also indulged me with a photo.



With hindsight I should really had got someone else to take it and got myself in the photo too, but never mind. He seemed happy enough to have joined the squad, as did Stuart MacGill who looked quietly amused at my then 5 year old thrusting an autograph book in his direction. Less approachable were Tait and Haddin, both of whom came across as insufferably arrogant. The saddest sight of the day though was Jason Gillespie. Having been the friendliest of the lot the last time, this time he spent the entire day sitting alone on the balcony looking extremely unhappy with life and ignoring all greetings from below. His tour, of course, was only going to get worse.

I missed the final day due to playing myself, but the match petered out into a draw, on the back of a very brisk double hundred from Leics' short term signing, Chris Rogers, who no doubt enjoyed showing what he could do.


Edited by Clobber - 21 May 2009 at 7:10pm

I'm very cheap too!

That's plain fantastic. I guess some of the Aussie players, and at times all of them are very arrogant. But like all of us, they have mood swings or are trying to focus and are less approachable. Certainly some blokes are always humble, guys like Lee and Gilchrist are among the most laid back guys in Aussie cricket, that's for sure.

Where, in the commentary box?

I enjoyed his commentary too, always kept me listening to the tele!  Is it he who used the quote "going, going, GONE! Geez, that's a big hit!"