Posts Tagged: Mitchell Johnson

0Ashes to Ashes, England to Dust

For what I am about to say may I be struck down from above…but I am glad that this Ashes series is at an end. Quite simply Aus­tralia have played far bet­ter than the sum of their indi­vidu­al parts and Eng­land have been, for the large part, abso­lutely diabolical.

As sure as night fol­lows day the Aus­sies wrapped up a dev­ast­at­ing 5–0 series win, yet again bowl­ing Eng­land out for a piti­ful total not worthy of an inter­na­tion­al line up. The vis­it­ors now need to go back, re-group and pick up the pieces from this poten­tially dis­astrous tour down-under.… Read Full Article

0Australia Boxing Clever

Eng­lish win­ters are a ter­rible thing. Cold and wet, the sea­son also means no home crick­et whatsoever.

Christ­mas is one shin­ing light in the fog of the cold and to add to this the thought of an annu­al test match that starts on Box­ing Day and usu­ally held under blue skies and warm tem­per­at­ures is one that stirs the ima­gin­a­tion and one that I will raise a cold beer to.

Box­ing Day tests have been held every year since 1980 (except 1989 when a one day match vs Sri Lanka was played instead (boo – ed) and at the Mel­bourne Crick­et Club in Aus­tralia – aka the MCG). They have also been dom­in­ated by some massive crowds (which have approached six fig­ures on occa­sion).… Read Full Article

0Australia urn their easy Ashes victory

With a ruth­less determ­in­a­tion and a killer instinct worthy of a wolf chas­ing a wounded deer, Aus­tralia duly com­pleted the rout of a demor­al­ised Eng­land this morning.

Eng­land simply haven’t turned up this series and a reju­ven­ated Aus­tralia have preyed on every weak­ness and every fail­ing to humi­li­ate what is still a pretty good side.

Win­ning a fourth con­sec­ut­ive Ashes series was a pretty tall order and it was one that was bey­ond Eng­land. The urn now returns to Aus­tralia (fig­ur­at­ively speak­ing, any­way!) and we no doubt won’t hear the end of it from our cous­ins on the oth­er side of the planet.

As Cook admit­ted in his post-match press con­fer­ence, Eng­land have been out­played in all areas and will, I sus­pect, claim a 5–0 tri­umph. It’s simply not their style to take their foot off the gas. The wolf has caught the prey, now he wants to fin­ish every last tasty morsel.… Read Full Article

1England — just what is up??

What has happened to Eng­land? In the last two tests they have been appalling. I can’t think of any pos­it­ives to take out of either game.

The bat­ting line up has been short of runs for some time now. The bowl­ers won the Ashes for Eng­land last time round, des­pite the best efforts of the much her­al­ded bat­ting line up to snatch defeat from the jaws of vic­tory (the won­der­ful Bell aside) and now, in Aus­trali­an con­di­tions, Eng­land are really up against it. The bats­men are con­tinu­ing to struggle but what is most wor­ry­ing is the way they are get­ting out – care­less and lazy shots and a lack of applic­a­tion. You expect fire­works from Kev­in Pieterson early on in an innings but not the oth­ers.… Read Full Article