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Pick The Roar's greatest Ashes XI of all time: Matthew Hayden vs Len Hutton

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8th April, 2020
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Last week, we started off our selection process for picking The Roar’s greatest Ashes XI. With about 1000 votes lodged on the initial poll, it’s now time to finalise the team.

Over the next ten days, we’ll be pitting a pair of players against each other for a spot in the final XI. The two players who received the most votes for each position will go head-to-head in a poll both here on The Roar and on the Roar Cricket Facebook page, with he who gets the most votes confirmed in the final line-up.

In the case of positions which require more than one player to fill (we’re not just going to take one paceman, are we?) we’ll take twice as many as required and have the player with the most votes against the one with the least, and the one with the second-most against the second-least so on and so forth.

Starting at the top of the order, today sees arguably Australia’s best modern-day opener facing off against one of England’s pre- and post-WWII greats.

Matthew Hayden received more votes than any other opener in our poll, the big left-hander selected in 46 per cent of teams, and so comes in as the no.1 seed. Len Hutton was a good deal less popular, picked by 19 per cent of the crowd and scraping into this round a mere six votes ahead of Alastair Cook.

Of the two, though, it’s Hutton with the better numbers in Ashes cricket. In 27 Tests against Australia, he scored 2428 runs at an average of 56.46, with five centuries and 14 half-tons to his name.

Hayden’s record is less impressive, although still far from shabby. The Queenslander made 1461 runs at 45.65 in 20 his Tests against the Old Enemy, and scored five fifties and two centuries.

So, who gets the nod to open the batting for our Ashes XI: Hayden or Hutton? Have your say in the form below.

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Tomorrow, it’s the other opening batsman as the men who combined for one of Test cricket’s most storied partnerships are set against each other.

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