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There is one glaringly obvious theme that is being showcased in the Ashes series that every man and his dog who has watched the first six days of the series can attest to.
The pitches delivered for the showpiece of Test cricket have deliberately been as dull, if not more so, as a Bill Shorten interview.
It is 2013, England landed in Australia as favourites to defend the Ashes which they had convincingly won earlier that year. They were eager to replicate their 2011 Ashes series win in Australia. Australia were to be blown off the pitch by the superior pace attack that England boasted, and the patient and exquisite top order batting that they claimed to possess.
No one would have predicted what actually transpired – the annihilation of English cricket.
There is one figure that the annihilation could be put down to. One man who brought the downfall of everything English cricket had built in the space of three years, and he did it in two months.
The seriously angry face of Mitchell Johnson streaming in to throw a 150km/h bomb with his disgustingly beautiful Chopper Read-esque ‘tache was etched into the psyche of every single English mind.
It was so bad that one player retired, one took a sabbatical (for reasons that he and the ECB could not agree on), the coach lost his job and their greatest batsmen in the modern era was frozen out of the team over personal grievances.
Out of the five Test matches, five one day International matches and three T20 matches – England only managed one solitary one day win. That’s one win in 13 matches.
Why am I reminding every Aussie of the greatest summer for any Australian who has any connection to cricket? Because the seriously angry face of Mitchell Johnson streaming in to throw a 150km/h speed bomb with his disgustingly beautiful Chopper Read-esque ‘tache is still etched into the psyche of every single English mind.
It has gotten so bad that we’re playing on slow and low-bouncing wickets to combat the Australian pace attack.
British journalist Sam Peters has stated that every journalist was denied any request to conduct a series of questions with the ground staff who were preparing the grounds for this series.
The secrecy of the ECB and its refusal to allow the ground staff to answer any question is obvious now – they were planning on providing dull pitches and the interviews would have been as dull as the current deck in Lord’s. If you’re a betting man then I suggest taking a punt on the next three matches being based on pitches of the same calibre.
If this is a deliberate attempt to slow the pitches it makes you wonder a few things:
1) What does it show of the confidence the ECB has on the English pace attack?
2) Are the English that worried about the Australian pace attack and that void of confidence of their own batting line-up?
3) What about us fans who want to watch exciting cricket and the poor fans who pay good money to go watch the games in the stadium only to see every edge fall short of the slips?
4) How much more advantage do we want to give to the batsmen? Fans want to see equal cricket, not an overworked bowler finding it difficult to gain any assistance from a pitch that gives everything to a batter.
The counties who own the grounds would be more than happy to oblige to the requests as it increases the chance of a full five day match occurring. This increases their gate receipts and ability to generate more money for themselves.
Considering the counties bid good money to host an Ashes match, they would want to get as much back as they can. Requesting mind-blowingly boring pitches would have been exciting times for them.
A factor that has now increased in importance is winning of the toss. Batting first will give that team the edge in the match – provided that they execute well in the first innings.
Winning the toss is always important, however with a pitch as void for pace and bounce as the ones served up by the ECB in this series the importance has greatly risen.
We can thank the summer of 2013 for the dullness of winter 2015.
If beautifully awful moustache of Mitchell Johnson rattled you that badly, why wouldn’t you try everything you can to stop him and his mates doing what they do best?
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