It was the final session, on the final day of the Ashes, the series still up for grabs. England led the series 2-1 and were hanging on desperately for the draw. In order to retain the urn Australia needed a win.
The series had been a fine display of attacking cricket, at Edgbaston the bowlers had even taken to exclusively bowling full-tosses in order to encourage high run-rates. Both teams had been fully dedicated to hindering their own prospects, in the name of cricket.
Lady Luck had perhaps favoured the English, Australia’s appeal to the ICC to have Joe Root made to bat left-handed had been rejected. Furthermore the pitches had constantly foiled the Australian pace bowlers, in Lord’s four of the five days were played with the covers left on the pitch.
But all that was now irrelevant as Alastair Cook and James Anderson stood in the centre, their team nine down, desperately playing for a draw. Anderson had fallen for a duck in the first innings, perhaps due to him unknowingly batting with two left-hand gloves, but was admirably hanging on with his captain.
Over by over went by, England edged closer and closer to an incredible draw, but Michael Clarke had one last trick up his sleeve. With five minutes of play left the Australian skipper tossed the bowl to Nathan Lyon and moved himself into slip.
Cook tapped his bat on the turf, Lyon commenced his run up, the crowd watched on in silent anticipation.
As Lyon reached his delivery stride it became apparent he had finally reached the decision to produce his mystery ball “Jeff.” Lyon diverted his run up, circling the umpire twice in a clockwise direction, before leaping over the stumps and delivering what appeared to be a standard off-break.
What went through the English captain’s mind only he can say, but as “Jeff” travelled through the air Cook went down on one knee and twisted his bottom hand around the handle. The crowd could hardly believe it, he was going the reverse sweep.
Before anyone could scream “Mike Gatting, 1987,” the ball popped up off the top edge of Cook’s bat to Michael Clarke at first slip. Clarke took the chance with ease, the Ashes were Australia’s, but the drama was far from over.
Director of Cricket, Andrew Strauss, was first to lose his job, making the surprise decision to fire himself.
Cook was next, stepping down as captain to focus on the shorter forms where the cricket is more attacking.
Trevor Bayliss kept his job slightly longer, but when he announced Kevin Pietersen would succeed Alastair Cook as captain Strauss briefly returned to his job as Director of Cricket to fire the pair, before stepping down once again.
The ICC watched on as all this transpired and soon came to the decision that the ECB were in no state to host the 2019 World Cup. This is why, after much discussion, the 2019 Cricket World Cup will be held in Qatar.
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