2009 Ashes Tour Dates Announced
 

The dates are as follows:
June

Wed 24 - Sat 27: Four-day game v Sussex (Hove)

July

Wed 1 - Sat 4: Four-day game v England Lions (Worcester)

Wed 8 - Sun 12: 1st npower Test (Cardiff)

Thu 16 - Mon 20: 2nd npower Test (Lord's)

Fri 24 - Sun 26: Three-day game v Northants (Northampton)

Thu 30 - Mon 3 Aug: 3rd npower Test (Edgbaston)

August

Fri 7 - Tue 11: 4th npower Test (Headingley)

Sat 15 - Sun 16: Two-day game v Kent (Canterbury)

Thu 20 - Mon 24: 5th npower Test (Oval)

Fri 28: ODI v Scotland (Edinburgh)

Sun 30: 1st NatWest International Twenty20 (Old Trafford)

September

Tue 1: 2nd NatWest International Twenty20 (Old Trafford, floodlit)

Fri 4: 1st NatWest Series day/night (Brit Oval)

Sun 6: 2nd NatWest Series (Lord's)

Wed 9: 3rd NatWest Series day/night (Rose Bowl)

Sat 12: 4th NatWest Series (Lord's)

Tue 15: 5th NatWest Series day/night (Trent Bridge)

Thu 17: 6th NatWest Series day/night (Trent Bridge)

Sun 20: 7th NatWest Series (Durham)

Mon 21: Australia depart




Any one got any thoughts on these dates?

I don't really like Cardiff being the opening test I think it should be at Lords.

2 first class warm up games = good

7 game ODI series at the end = **** off!

Awesome! Long tours FTW! Can't wait for this.

ODIs before the tests is clearly the way to go IMHO. Whets the appetite for the main event. As nice as winning the Commonwealth Bank gubbins in 06/07 was it was hard to get too aroused by it after we had our arses handed to us in the tests.

Disappointing to see ODIs after Tests, very much so. Not sure that's ever been done on an Ashes tour to this country - in fact I'd be very surprised if it has.

Also would have to say I'd prefer more than 3 tour-games (the two-dayer is virtually pointless), but I was hardly expecting anything better.

Oh, yeah - 2 Twenty20s - bugger that. What a waste of time.

Also, looking at the Test series, that's a very odd schedule. Sophia Gardens, Lord's, Edgbaston, Headingley. I can't remember the last time the first two Tests of a "big" (ie, more than merely two) Test series weren't at Lord's and Edgbaston, in whatever order. Apart, obviously, from last year where Edgbaston was omitted.

2006, Sri Lanka: Lord's, Edgbaston
2005, Australia: Lord's, Edgbaston
2004, West Indies: Lord's, Edgbaston
2003, South Africa: Edgbaston, Lord's
2002, Sri Lanka: Lord's, Edgbaston
2001, Australia: Edgbaston, Lord's
2000, West Indies: Edgbaston, Lord's
1999, New Zealand: Edgbaston, Lord's
1998, South Africa: Edgbaston, Lord's
1997, Australia: Edgbaston, Lord's
1996, India: Edgbaston, Lord's
1995 was the last time - West Indies played at Headingley and Lord's IIRR.

That's a fair while - well over a decade - that the fixture-list has been fixed.

Wasn't entirely keen on Trent Bridge being excluded either TBH. Can't recall if I've ever mentioned that before on CW. Only the second time the ground's been omitted from the Test schedule since 1993, and it was terribly poor form when they did it in 1999 too.

so how many of these tests wont be called off due to weather?

1? 2?

I'm glad to see we don't open at Lords... we don't seem to do well there. Mind you... no McGrath this time. I'd rather we opened at Edgbaston tbh, I think that's where our best record is.

Playing an ODI tour in September like that seems to be asking for trouble with the weather.

Playing international cricket more than a few days into September is and always has been asking for trouble, and it's utterly ridiclous that for 7 seasons now (since 2003) we've been doing it at international level. The international season would ideally be wound-up by the end of August, and it shoud certainly never still be in action by my birthday (8th September).

May Tests are bad enough; mid-September Tests and ODIs are just stupid.

7 ODIs Why!?!? :ranting:

Nothing wrong with 7 ODIs, just
a) there shouldn't be any Twenty20 games and
b) they should play the blasted things BEFORE the Tests.

They run a huge risk of the series going stale I mean is not 5 ODI's enough for an enthralling series? Maybe they could invite some other tam over and make it a triangular series

And yeas they should happen before the test matches

Yeah, disagree with test before ODIs, but I guess playing ODIs before tests does give the opposition a chance to get used to conditions and playing as a team, even if it is a different format. I guess without Warne & McGrath England are banking on less experience and maybe trying to get a test or two early.

If you play the ODI's first you end up with the Final Test being played in mid September like it was last time, which is........less than ideal.

I'm extremely disappointed that the tri-series has been scrapped, but it was scrapped 3 years ago now. I never feel it got a fair chance - it was disadvantaged in 2003 and 2005 by the presence of a substandard side, by weather in 2004, and by the sheer hopelessness of one team twice more (West Indies in 2000, England in 2001). Only in 2002 did things even come close to going as you'd hope, and even this was far from ideal in the aforementioned 2 respects (Sri Lanka were not great and as a result the final round of matches was dead, and there were 3 games where the weather interfered).

But the decision has been firmly made and there won't be random, occasional tri-series in amongst the bilaterals. And there was one unavertable damning factor: with the exception of those involving Pakistan and India, neutral games were woefully attended throughout.

The cloest to a perfect Ashes schedule we've had since 7-Tests-per-summer (started in 2000), for my money, was 2001. Only trouble there was, to only give Pakistan 2 Tests was more than a little wasteful. But even that was as good as it could get, and everything else (tri-series, at the right time, a reasonable number of warm-up games, and an August finish) was just about perfect.