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1997 Ashes

Craig

World Traveller
Should of England won this Ashes series, did they have a geniune chance and blew it or where they completely outplayed to the 6th Test or did a few umpiring decisions coast them dearly (IIRC the first of Waugh's twin centuries at Trent Bridge?).

After winning at Edgbatson, and getting lucky at Lords (if it didn't rain it was likely Australia would have won?), what went arong. Traditionally Australia (not in 2001 mind you) play well at Headingly, so were they just outplayed at OT and Trent Bridge or did they choke?
 

Swervy

International Captain
Craig said:
Should of England won this Ashes series, did they have a geniune chance and blew it or where they completely outplayed to the 6th Test or did a few umpiring decisions coast them dearly (IIRC the first of Waugh's twin centuries at Trent Bridge?).

After winning at Edgbatson, and getting lucky at Lords (if it didn't rain it was likely Australia would have won?), what went arong. Traditionally Australia (not in 2001 mind you) play well at Headingly, so were they just outplayed at OT and Trent Bridge or did they choke?
australia were the far superior team in that series,so no, England shouldnt have won the Ashes then!!!!!
 

aussie

Hall of Fame Member
Australia started badly, its until the OT trafford where Waugh's twin centuries revived the Australia and from there, they outplayed England and won the series pretty convincingly.
 

Tom Halsey

International Coach
England weren't particularly good in the 1st Test from what I can gather, Australia were just bad. They then dominated us for the reast of the series and it would have been 4-1 but for Caddick, Tufnell, and Warne being injured and having to bowl off a couple paced run-up (didn't take advantage of the pitch as he otherwise probably would have done).
 

BoyBrumby

Englishman
Tom Halsey said:
England weren't particularly good in the 1st Test from what I can gather, Australia were just bad. They then dominated us for the reast of the series and it would have been 4-1 but for Caddick, Tufnell, and Warne being injured and having to bowl off a couple paced run-up (didn't take advantage of the pitch as he otherwise probably would have done).
We were actually pretty decent in the first test. Australia were a bit underdone & (IIRC) there was a lot of noise from their media about Tubby being given the Spanish archer as captain because he was in a nightmare run of form, but we bowled really well first up & then Thorpey & Nasser put on a mammoth stand after or top order was blown away fairly cheaply to give us a pretty sizeable lead.

Oz then put on 400-odd in the 2nd innings (with a ton from Taylor to partly silence his critics) to leave us with a potentially tricky little chase which we managed a lot easier than we did in the 4th test last year.

It was a false dawn, but credit where it's due.
 

archie mac

International Coach
I thought England clearly the better side in the first Test, but never really thought Aust would lose the Ashes even when they were one nil down.
 

BoyBrumby

Englishman
archie mac said:
I thought England clearly the better side in the first Test, but never really thought Aust would lose the Ashes even when they were one nil down.
Typical bloody Aussie hubris! :p

Fair point tho, all the same. I was hopeful after the first test but we never really looked like winning another til the dead rubber at the end.
 

howardj

International Coach
At the risk of sounding like an arrogant Aussie (not that there's any shame in that) Australia were under-done when they arrived in England, after taking a break following the South African tour. The further the series progressed, the more dominant we became.
 

wpdavid

Hall of Fame Member
howardj said:
At the risk of sounding like an arrogant Aussie (not that there's any shame in that) Australia were under-done when they arrived in England, after taking a break following the South African tour. The further the series progressed, the more dominant we became.
True, but England did have their chances. I thought Steve Waugh's performance at Old Trafford was as significant as anything seen in this country since I started watching the game and, without his twin tons, England would have been well placed to go 2 up. Obviously it didn't help that Caddick didn't turn up for that test, but dropping him for the next one at Leeds was still madness. Then there was that dropped catch by Thorpe, of course, without which the Leeds test looked like being a very close affair.

From an English perspective, it was more disappointing than the 3 series that had preceded it. For once, the side was reasonably settled until things got silly at Trent Bridge, and the Aus batting was relatively inexperienced. In the end, your bowlers were far too good for us, but we were in a position where we should have made you work much harder for it.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
I find it perfectly conceivable we'd have won the series if George Sharp had given Waugh lbw in the first-innings at Old Trafford when Caddick pinned him with a Full-Toss and if Thorpe had taken that catch off Elliott on 1 in the first-innings at Headingley.
Australia certainly weren't overwhelmingly the better side. The Oval was aught but dead-rubber consolation, but as I say - England could quite easily have won the Third and Fourth Tests had just a single incident in each gone differently.
1997 was certainly the closest-matched Ashes between 1981 and 2005. On the balance, Australia were - just - the better side, but it was no way as convincing as the scoreline made it look.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
Tom Halsey said:
England weren't particularly good in the 1st Test from what I can gather, Australia were just bad.
Not true at all - the bowling in that first passage of play (Australia 65-8) was some of the best bowling I've ever seen from an England side. Equally, the Hussain-Thorpe stand was a superb one.
 

Goughy

Hall of Fame Member
Were England capable of winning this series? Sure. but was it likely? No.

Again and as so often happens the best team won and the losers look at what could have been.

Australia were a far better team but England actually performed better than I expected. Man for man it should not have been close but I guess that is why they play the games.
 

Richard

Cricket Web Staff Member
Clearly Australia had a better team...
Taylor was a fine batsman, however poor his form was before that series.
Elliott, too, was and still is a very good player, who in another age (ie one lacking Taylor, Slater, Langer, Hayden and many others) would almost certainly have forged a long and successful Test career.
The same can be said about Blewett, really.
Mark Waugh was pretty much at the peak of his powers.
Stephen Waugh certainly was.
Healy was a fine wicketkeeper-batsman at the time.
Warne was at the peak of his powers.
All of McGrath, Reiffel, Gillespie and Kasprowicz were good bowlers who were either at the peak of their powers or just coming to it.
Ponting, too, was emerging.
Only Bevan and the oh-so-well-known Shaun Young were nondescripts - who played 3 and 1 Tests respectively.
Contrasted with...
Debut-making Butcher who was nothing like the batsman of a year later.
Atherton was entering a horror trot.
Stewart wasn't in the best nick and ended-up doing little.
Crawley was still far from looking Test-class.
All-in-all, the batting was pretty nothing-ish - Hussain played one matchwinning knock and one other in vain, but only Thorpe really played well throughout.
England's strength lay in the bowling, but even there (Caddick, Headley, Gough, Malcolm, Ealham, Croft-Tufnell) they were some way behind Australia.
Nonetheless, at Edgbaston everything came right and, but for that bad decision at Old Trafford, it might've continued.
 

FaaipDeOiad

Hall of Fame Member
I'd have to dispute your suggestion about Blewett. Do you realise he played almost 50 test matches? He didn't suffer from a lack of opportunities, he suffered from a lengthy test career in which he underperformed, and was justifiably dropped for better players at the end of it.

46 tests averaging 34 wouldn't have been that bad in England in an era with Ramprakash, Hick, Atherton, Hussein, Butcher and so on, but it's a long way below what Australia could accept at a time of such domestic batting strength. Blewett made 2 centuries in his debut series, and 2 more in 44 further tests.

Blewett was (and indeed, still is) a lovely batsman to watch with one of the best techniques of his era, but he was a poor test match batsman.
 

vic_orthdox

Global Moderator
Richard said:
Elliott, too, was and still is a very good player, who in another age (ie one lacking Taylor, Slater, Langer, Hayden and many others) would almost certainly have forged a long and successful Test career.
I was thinking that another age (ie one lacking Ambrose, Walsh, Steve Waugh and two dodgy knees) ...
 

howardj

International Coach
FaaipDeOiad said:
I'd have to dispute your suggestion about Blewett. Do you realise he played almost 50 test matches? He didn't suffer from a lack of opportunities, he suffered from a lengthy test career in which he underperformed, and was justifiably dropped for better players at the end of it.

46 tests averaging 34 wouldn't have been that bad in England in an era with Ramprakash, Hick, Atherton, Hussein, Butcher and so on, but it's a long way below what Australia could accept at a time of such domestic batting strength. Blewett made 2 centuries in his debut series, and 2 more in 44 further tests.

Blewett was (and indeed, still is) a lovely batsman to watch with one of the best techniques of his era, but he was a poor test match batsman.
Blewett never had the capacity to make runs except when he was in form. He was either in form (and really turning it on) or making very low scores. Very little in between. Definitely a favourite of mine - seems like such a good bloke.
 

archie mac

International Coach
Craig said:
Wasn't it Mark Waugh he ran into?
Yes, he came off second best. Was fast becoming my favourite player in the Aussie side (behind ME Waugh) I really thought him and Slater would be the future Aussie openers, as it turned out I was way off.
 

Craig

World Traveller
vic_orthdox said:
He never got on with Steve Waugh...
Wouldn't be the only one.

Yeah apparently he had a grump everytime he got out and would be like that for the whole day or for the whole innings, so that made him unpopular within the Australian team according to what Kyle wrote a few years back.
 

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