God, I really understand how English folk felt in 2005. Or rather, I don’t, but I’ve got something of an inkling.
I started watching cricket seriously in 1989.
My first Ashes memory is of a triumphant rampage the length and breadth of England, blue-and-white-helmeted batsmen finding Terry Alderman unfathomable, Steve Waugh flaying innumerable scorching backfoot drives, Mark Taylor batting for weeks at a time, and Allan Border’s indelible grin.
I then gained about a thousand more Ashes memories that, while involving different personnel, were remarkably similar.
The years 2009-2013, therefore, were a grim jolt to earth. Seeing Australia struggle against England was such a bizarre and alien sight, and everything felt out of kilter. The 2010-11 series was the most gut-shredding.
For while 2009 was a relatively close series, and 2013 demonstrated a lot of reasons to hope for the future, 2010-11 was a massacre.
One out-of-the-box win in Perth was a brief ray of sunshine amid a gloomy storm that brought three humiliating innings defeats and a draw in which Alastair Cook impaled Australia on his apparently eight-foot-wide bat.
So this time, this time of celebration and glory and hailing the ferocity of Mitchell Johnson and the dependability of Brad Haddin and the inspirational-ness of Michael Clarke and the brutal artistry of David Warner and even the Nathan Lyonishness of Nathan Lyon: this time feels like such a relief, such a release of tension and an outpouring of gratitude that the dark night of the soul is done with.
And that’s after four years of losing.
That’s less than seven years after the 2006-07 obliteration wrapped up, and when that brilliant whitewash remains fresh in the mind.
Australia only lost three Ashes series, yet it feels we’ve been wandering in the desert for centuries.
Imagine, then, how an England fan felt in 2005. A victory over an Australian team with a distinct aura of invincibility, after sixteen years of pain.
Sixteen years of not just defeats, but shellackings, merciless fustigations that generally started on day one of the first Test and rarely gave even a glimmer of hope or joy to desperate Anglophiles.
England lost eight series in a row in that time, eight soul-crushings that eventually took on the aspect of a natural law: birds fly, fish swim and Australia beats England.
So in 2005, joy was unconfined on that sceptred isle, and rightfully so.
If we Aussies can see how euphoric it is to win the urn back after four years, we can appreciate what wild heights of debauched revel we might reach if we’d been waiting sixteen.
The fact is, winning the Ashes is a big deal.
Winning them back is an even bigger deal.
In 2005, there might have been plenty of reasons for sober reflection and cautious note-sounding: the dangers of complacency, the certainty that Australia’s champions would rebound hard, the matter of future planning, the differences between winning a series at home and winning one overseas, the irritating personality of Kevin Pietersen.
But when you win the Ashes, guys, it is not the time for reflection.
It’s not the time for worrying about what tomorrow might bring.
Maybe England celebrated too hard in 2005, and maybe that didn’t help them against the vengeful firestorm that consumed them when they came down under the next year, but one thing is for sure: the history books record that England regained the Ashes in 2005, and nobody on that team can ever have that taken from them.
Far too much commentary in the wake of the triple miracle of Brisbane-Adelaide-Perth has been fretting, before the actual series is even finished, about the advanced ages of the Australian players, about whether the new dawn of Aussie cricket is a false one and Dad’s Army might retire to a nice rocking chair sooner rather than later, leaving a soft underbelly to be plundered.
And sure, perhaps by the next tour to England half this team might be retired and half the rest decrepit.
Perhaps this is not so much the last hurrah as the only one for this bunch. Perhaps next time around a hungry gang of Poms will gobble up the suddenly callow and immature greencaps.
But please. Let us enjoy this now. Let’s wait a bit before the hard-headed analysis and nail-chewing projections come into force.
Australia has just demolished a highly-credentialed England team they were thought to be vastly inferior to, three times in a row.
Scathing centuries have been smashed. Stumps have been scattered. Helmets have been pinged. Seams have been nipped off.
Marvellous wonders beyond the bounds of reasonable expectation have been seen across the land. It’s a lot like 1989, except at least in 1989, the supposed Aussie no-hopers were up against an England team that nobody thought much of either.
This is a magnificent time to be an Australian cricket fan. Don’t sully it with cool, deflationary long-term negativity.
The only reason for forward planning, after all, is to win Test series, and guess what, they just won one! And every Test, and every series, that you win, is a thing of beauty to be appreciated in itself.
Rejoice, ye who once were so downcast. For though the crocks may burn out and the three lions may devour us in a couple of years’ time, history will record that in 2013-14, England came to Australia and were blown apart.
My fellow Australians: they can’t take that away from us.
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