Ashes 2010-11 Diary: Fourth Test at Melbourne

Fourth Test: England won by an innings and 171 runs (Australia 98 & 258, England 513). England retain the Ashes.

When I was a kid, playing out my sporting dreams in the backyard, the wins I invented for my teams fell almost entirely into two categories: either the improbable comeback or the utter, crushing dominant victory. Usually in the former, I'd miss out on the first half of the game through some contrived circumstances - a bullheaded coach or a crippling but not incapacitating injury, say, which would make my second-half return even more impressive to the imaginary crowd. In the latter, I'd take over the game from the beginning, as virtually everything went right; I'd hit two grand slams in the first inning, or pour in thirty-four points in the first half, going ten-for-ten from behind the arc and turning two steals into thundering breakaway dunks.

In real life, of course, such dominance seldom happens. That said, England's performance in the fourth Ashes test, the traditional Boxing Day test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground that was referred to by some as the "jewel of the Australian sporting calendar" - well, for the English, that had to come close.

It's the first time ever that Australia have lost two Tests in the same series by an innings. It's Australia's biggest Ashes loss since 1956. 98 was their lowest-ever score in a Test innings at Melbourne, and innings-plus-171 their worst defeat at Melbourne since 1912. By the time that Chris Tremlett bowled Ben Hilfenhaus to complete Australia's first innings - just before bedtime on Christmas Day in America, just after teatime on Boxing Day in Australia - it already had to go down as one of the worst days for the Aussies ever.

By the time the first day ended, Andrew Strauss and Alastair Cook had already gone past Australia's total, putting on 157 without losing a wicket. On day two, Jonathan Trott put together the beginnings of what would become his match-best 168, batting until the end of England's innings early on day three. By the time Australia got back in to bat for their second innings, they trailed by 415 runs and had no chance of winning the match and virtually no chance of drawing, either. In the end, only Shane Watson and Brad Haddin made it past 50 in either Australian innings, something Strauss, Cook, Trott, Kevin Pietersen, and Matt Prior all accomplished for England.

So that's the Ashes retained for England - a feat they hadn't accomplished Down Under since 1986. Since that series, England had been going south for the summer every four years and regularly getting comprehensively annihilated, so this marks a serious accomplishment for the "Poms," as the Australian media calls the English. They'll now head to the fifth test in Sydney, looking to win the series with a win or a draw there.

I'm no analyst, but here's what I know: if England and Australia got together and chose up sides, based entirely on performances this series, almost all of the first-string players would be English. Let's say you're picking the teams as follows: two opening batsmen, four middle-order batsmen, a wicketkeeper, three fast bowlers, and a spin bowler.

Your opening batsmen would probably be Cook, and either Watson or Strauss. The former averaged more runs than Strauss and made two more half-centuries, but also factored in a couple of silly run-outs suffered by the Aussies. Plus if the team needs a captain, Strauss is your choice by far.

Your middle-order batsmen would be Trott, Australian Michael Hussey (probably the lone bright spot for Australia so far), then Pietersen and Ian Bell, who batted at number 6 for England, occasionally too late to have much impact.

You could make an argument for either wicketkeeper, and I won't try to distinguish between them. The Australian announcers could not stop raving about Matt Prior's keeping for England, and he did seem to get to absolutely everything; when he screwed up on the final day of the Melbourne test, dropping an easy opportunity, it seemed unbelievable. On the other hand, Brad Haddin was Australia's second-best batsman, and scored far more runs than Prior.

Your spin bowler would be Graeme Swann from England, and there's no argument at all for even a minute, mostly because Australia's Xavier Doherty was so bad in the first two Tests that Australia gave up on spin bowling entirely in the next two and just picked four fast bowlers.

And your fast bowlers would be James Anderson from England, and then probably one of Chris Tremlett or Tim Bresnan or Steven Finn from England, and then you can argue about whether you want one of the other two or Australia's Peter Siddle.

So that's what, four Aussies out of eleven, if we're very generous? And a serious argument that the only way England could have improved the team would be by trading Paul Collingwood for Hussey?

When I type it out this way, the only surprising thing is really that Australia won a Test at all. Of course, they'll probably win by 350 runs at Sydney, draw the series but lose the Ashes, and make all of this look silly.

Really? A Larry King Joke? [Twinkie Town]

I'm on vacation and it was Christmas weekend. That's my excuse for why my Twinkie Town column this week was, of all things, a Larry King column parody, which makes no sense on any level. It did, however, allow me to type things like, "Either these suspenders are on too tight, or this shirt's on inside out...", so I guess that's something.

Scott Ullger's Life Lessons [Twinkie Town]

Continuing a string of offseason silliness at Twinkie Town, today's post was written from the theoretical point of view of Scott Ullger, talking about some of the things he's learned as the third base coach.

Weekend Links [RandBall]

This week's edition of the weekend links was, for whatever reason, heavy on sports media commentary and light on actual content. I also proved that I can spell Tsuyoshi Nishioka at the drop of a hat, which when you think about it, is actually harder than spelling "Doug Mientkiewicz" because with him, you basically got the Doug spotted to you, and you just had to remember where the 'i' and the 'e' went in his last name.

Ashes 2010-11 Diary: Third Test at Perth

Third Test: Australia won by 267 runs (Australia 268 & 309, England 187 & 123)

There is an anecdote in one of George Will's baseball books about the 1988 World Series, which the first of the outstanding La Russa-Canseco-McGwire Oakland A's teams lost to the Los Angeles Dodgers, four games to one. In the first game of that series, the Dodgers took a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the first, but the A's answered back in the second inning with a Jose Canseco grand slam to go ahead 4-2. Oakland had absolutely ripped through the American League, that year - they finished 104-58 in the regular season, thirteen games ahead of the next best AL team, and had gone on to bomb Boston in the ALCS four games to none.

As the anecdote goes, Canseco's grand slam was the worst thing that could have happened to Oakland, because the entire team relaxed - the nerves of the World Series were taken over by the supreme confidence that they'd get anything they needed, whenever they wanted. Later that night, Kirk Gibson hit his miraculous home run to steal Game One. Oakland wouldn't score another run after Canseco's homer until the third inning of Game Three. And the Dodgers would take the Series and the trophy.

I couldn't help but be reminded of that story, early in this match. England was absolutely dominant in the second Test, but they'd lost fast bowler Stuart Broad to an abdominal injury. He'd been replaced by Chris Tremlett, who hadn't played a Test in a good three years. The media coverage in the run-up to the match focused entirely on how badly Australia was playing, with only the uncertainty of Tremlett thrown in on the England side.

So in the second over, when Tremlett charged in and clean bowled Australian batsman Phillip Hughes, you could have forgiven England for thinking they'd get anything they needed, whenever they needed it.

It wasn't just Hughes falling early, though - the rest of the Australian order spent the first morning capitulating. When Tremlett took Steve Smith's wicket right after lunch, the Aussies were on 69 runs for 5 wickets - much, much worse than at Adelaide, when they were famously on two runs for three wickets, but didn't lose their fourth wicket until 96.

I suppose Smith's wicket was the apex for England in this test; for the rest of the first day, they couldn't find that same fire. Michael Hussey, Brad Haddin, and Mitchell Johnson all made half-centuries to rescue the Aussies, who cobbled together nearly 200 runs for their last five wickets, getting to a reasonable first-innings total of 268. Given that England's prior two innings had been 620/5 (at Adelaide) and 517/1 (at Brisbane), though, I suspect England still felt they'd get what they needed.

That didn't happen, of course. Mitchell Johnson - who didn't play in Adelaide after bowling like a blind man at Brisbane - tore through England in the first innings, taking six wickets, including three in the space of three overs early on the second day. In the second innings, it was Australia's Ryan Harris taking six, including four in six overs near the end of the innings. For the match, Johnson took nine wickets and Harris took nine - combined, more wickets than Australia took as a team in the first two matches. Whether tremendously good bowling by Australia or tremendously bad batting from England, the result was just 310 runs for the match for the English, an ugly total no matter how you look at it.

So a series that England could have won at Perth now teeters precariously at 1-1. The teams head back across Australia, to Melbourne, where the fourth test begins on Christmas Day, here in the USA (apparently a Boxing Day Test is traditional, which would make it a Christmas evening event in America.) I spent the first three Tests gloating about how convenient the series was for me to watch, given that each day's play began in the evening and ran until bedtime, but this one doesn't exactly fit the schedule, not over the Christmas break. I suspect I won't see any of it, except perhaps to sneak in highlights, here and there.

One final note, to praise Australia for their great talent in nicknaming cricket grounds. The first test was played at the Brisbane Cricket Ground, the third in Perth at the Western Australia Cricket Association Ground. Naturally, the Aussies call the Perth stadium "The WACA" and the Brisbane one, which is in the suburb of Woolloongabba, "The Gabba." I think we can all agree that this is wonderful.

Happy Birthday, RandBall!

It's the fourth anniversary of the beginning of the RandBall blog on startribune.com, as written by Star Tribune high school sports editor and Page 2 editor Michael Rand. I've written tributes to him for each of the past three RandBall birthdays, so this year, I decided to just interview him - and get out of the way.

The Twinkie Town Disaster Recovery Plan

Sunday, the Metrodome roof collapsed - which hadn't happened due to snow since 1983. With this in mind, I wrote about what Twinkie Town might do in the unlikely event of a disaster. (We have a Nick Punto Strategic Joke Reserve, so never fear.)

Weekend Links [RandBall]

I got stuck in the house last Saturday, like much of Minnesota. I briefly considered going outside and shoveling on Saturday morning - but instead I stayed inside and wrote the weekend links, with an expected amount of weather-related grousing. Besides the complaining, there's links that are (at least tangentially) related to college hockey, the MLB Hot Stove League, and the NBA lockout - so please enjoy.

MLB Winter Meetings, Day 1 [Twinkie Town]

It's one of the biggest weeks of the MLB offseason: baseball's winter meetings in Florida. This is the week when general managers, agents, and assorted hangers-on gather in warmer climates, and start hashing out deals and shaping teams for 2011. Naturally, then, Twinkie Town is focused on actual news instead of silly jokes; I provided the first-day wrap-up last night. There's news of Tsuyoshi Nishioka, plus a few other random tidbits.

Ashes 2010-11 Diary: Second Test at Adelaide

Yep, cricket again. I did warn you. The one person who read my last Ashes diary said, "I only understood about 75% of what you wrote." I'm hoping to drop that to 50% or so, this time around.

Second Test: England won by an innings and 71 runs. (Australia 245 & 304, England 620/5d.)

I haven't watched a whole lot of cricket, of course, so naturally I'm going to see an awful lot of things and think, "Boy, I've never seen that before." But I'm starting to wonder if I'm not seeing an awful lot of things that I won't see again, not for a long time.

Prior to the match, the talk was all about how the team that won the coin toss would have the advantage, because they could bat first and (presumably) score a thousand runs. History seems to favor high scores at Adelaide, where the pitch is apparently made from a particularly true-bouncing mix of concrete. All of the commentators predicted a draw.

Australia won the coin toss and went out the first day with murder in its hearts. And after about ten minutes, well, the match was pretty much over. Shane Watson opened the batting for the Aussies, with Simon Katich down at the other end waiting for his turn. On the fourth ball of the match, Watson took one off the leg, then tried to run a quick single. Katich, who must have been staring at somebody in the stands, was late setting off, and England fired the ball off the stumps to run out Katich. He hadn't even faced a ball yet. It is perhaps the most ignominious way to be out, in cricket - a "diamond duck," they call it.

Katich also partially tore an Achilles tendon during the match, and will miss the rest of the series. I can only assume that his car broke down and his house was overrun by termites and his daughter was knocked up this week, as well.

It wasn't over for Australia. Captain Ricky Ponting, batting about four hours earlier than he expected, walked out to the middle and was gone first ball, edging one to a fielder behind. Five balls in, the Aussies were two wickets down.

When Michael Clarke edged one to an English fielder in the third over, then, it was just insult to injury. Australia had expected to score about 500 in its first innings; instead, they had two runs for three wickets, their worst Test start in about 800 years (or something similarly embarrassing.)

They went on to score 245, which looked like nothing, especially compared to the 517 for 1 performance the English had put on in their second innings in Brisbane. And it turned out that England - who usually fall apart in Australia - had no intention of doing so this time around.

Andrew Strauss, opening the batting, continued his new streak of ugly early dismissals, falling in the second over after leaving a strike right down the heart of the plate (to mix my sports metaphors). But after him came Alastair Cook and Jonathan Trott, and after Trott departed there was Kevin Pietersen, and that was truly all the English needed. Cook made 148, Trott 78, and then Pietersen put on a show, racing to 227, his highest-ever score. Ian Bell's late 68 looked piddling in comparison, despite being better than all but one Australian batsman in each innings.

England finally decided they'd had enough early on the fourth day, leading by 375 runs, which led to the silliest part of cricket: watching one team, which has been getting beat like it stole something, try to delay for a couple of days an earn an undeserved draw. Occasional rainstorms didn't help. Imagine if a baseball game had a four-hour time limit, no matter how much time Freddy Garcia takes between pitches, or how long it might rain for, and you'll get the idea - frustration at the pace of play.

To give Australia credit, they fought well all day, getting to 238 for 3, but - on the very last ball of the day - the match took its one final big turn. Pietersen, bowling for England despite being a terrible bowler ("I'm the original pie-chucker," he said afterward, which sounds great despite me being unfamiliar with the term), picked up a from-nowhere wicket to turn the tide. To go back to baseball, this is like bringing in your rightfielder to pitch, and having him somehow strike a guy out on three pitches.

England got a couple of wickets early on the fifth day, as well - those coming earlier this evening - and from there it was one long laugher. Even the Australian commentators spent most of their time giggling at Aussie bowler Doug Bollinger's comedic batting. "He should have his own blooper reel at the end of every match," said former Aussie bowler Shane Warne. He took one delivery hard off of his right butt cheek, which prompted much laughing. He also managed to get nailed with the ball while standing at the non-striker's end; Peter Siddle drove a liner back at his batting partner, and Bollinger ended up fending it off with his own bat while trying to get out of the way. "No, Dougie!" cried Warne. "Save those shots for the other end!"

For all of the laughter, Bollinger ended up with 7 runs and was not out, which was better than four other Aussie batsmen - including fellow bowler Ryan Harris, who was dismissed first ball in both innings. Harris is currently just barely ahead of poor English bowler Stuart Broad, who is out of the rest of the series with an injured abdominal muscle. Broad was out first ball in England's first innings in Brisbane, and didn't bat in their second innings there or their only innings in Adelaide - and will go down with batting figures in this series of no runs, one ball faced, one minute of batting time.

Perhaps nobody has batting figures quite like England bowler Steven Finn, who - despite playing both matches - has yet to face a ball in either one. So far, his entire batting contribution is to stand around at the non-striker's end for a grand total of four balls. Meanwhile, his teammate Alastair Cook has batted for - this is absolutely true - just over twenty-two and a half hours.

The third test, in Perth, doesn't begin for over a week - next Wednesday, to be precise. At the moment, everyone - English media, Australian media, everyone - is racing to bury the Aussies. There were a few commentators, pre-series, that wondered if the home team had enough good bowlers to take the twenty wickets required to win a match; so far, they've managed all of 16 in two matches. England could clinch at least a series draw - and therefore retain the Ashes - with a win in Perth, and so Australia's under the gun already.

They've got nine days to get things figured out on the bowling end - and to figure out how to get more than two runs for their first three wickets.

Weekend Links [RandBall]

This week's edition of the weekend links includes talk about snow and generation gaps, soccer and bad owners, and rugby and French philosophers. It also includes the words "reindeer" and "poop." Nothing but class!

Ashes 2010-11 Diary: First Test at Brisbane

Note: Many readers of this internet publication could not possibly care less about cricket matches between England and Australia. This has never stopped me before, and indeed won't stop me now, but fair warning: this post and all subsequent Ashes-related posts are, in fact, about cricket. If you're going to ignore me, now's the time.

First Test: Match Drawn. England 260 & 517/1d, Australia 481 & 107/1.

I'll say one thing about cricket in Australia: it certainly is convenient, as long as you happen to be in America.

Australian fans had to shirk their daytime duties on Thursday, Friday, and Monday in order to see this match; English fans had to go nocturnal and watch from midnight to 7 a.m. Those of us in America could flip open the laptop at 6pm, fire up the match, and watch until bedtime. (Even if we had to be intentionally evasive when people asked us what we were doing with the laptop. Sorry, Dad. It was easier to evade than to explain that I was keeping an eye on the cricket match while we watched the Timberwolves.)

For any cricket novices who've made it all the way down to the third graf: The Ashes is a biannual series of five Test matches between England and Australia. The name of the series refers to a mock newspaper obituary for English cricket, way back in 1882, and for any more facts than that, you may read Wikipedia.

Anyway, usually what happens when England have to go on the road in this series is this: they talk about how things will be different. They talk about how well-prepared they are. They land in Australia, and then, the thrashings commence. Last time, Australia won the series 5-0, marking (if I have my facts correct) the first time a cricket series has ended 5-0 since the infamous West Indies v. Agoraphobics & Spastics United series in 1984-85.

That series (Australia vs. England, not West Indies vs. A&S Utd.) was marked by England bowler Steve Harmison running up for the first ball of the series, and then delivering the ball so wide that most fans fell to their knees and laughed for the better part of ten minutes. It was the equivalent of Tim Lincecum winding up to begin Game 1 of the World Series, then uncorking a slider that maimed a fan in the third row behind the dugout.

Naturally, then, England - who won the coin toss and chose to bat first - were nervous about the first ball of this series. Captain Andrew Strauss let it go right by, a nice, calm, collected move. He did the same with the second. With all nerves eased, then, he decided to whack a super-awesome shot on the third ball, which of course flew straight to Australian fielder Michael Hussey for an out, thus sealing Strauss's place in the annals of England Ashes comedy.

Truthfully, though, things did end up being plenty exciting, at least on day one. England fought throughout the first day to get to 197/4. Then Aussie bowler Peter Siddle, suddenly inhabited by a demon, took a hat trick, which I'll probably watch the rest of my life without seeing again - bam, Cook gone. Matt Prior in, Matt Prior out first ball. Stuart Broad in, Stuart Broad swinging wildly and getting hit in the foot and called out leg before wicket, Stuart Broad out. This happens something on the order of twice a decade, which I should have appreciated.

Peter Siddle just looks annoying, though, which is why I turned the match off in disgust.

After that, well, things slowed down a bit. On day two, Australia made a few runs and a few outs, but then Brad Haddin and Hussey starting batting pretty well. Those two batted for much of the second day and most of the third day, giving Australia a 221-run lead after the first innings, which made everyone assume Australia was going to win.

Then Strauss and Alastair Cook came in to bat for England, and they batted for most of the fourth day, and when Strauss finally got himself out, Jonathan Trott came in and batted for the rest of the day with Cook. This lasted well into day five. By the time captain Strauss got bored with the whole thing and called the two inside for buttered toast, England had scored 517 runs, Cook and Trott had set the record for the highest-ever partnership in Brisbane - breaking Hussey and Haddin's record, set two days earlier - and any excitement in the match had ground to a halt because only an outbreak of influenza or possibly a mass delirium would cause anything but a draw. (Neither happened, but the draw did.)

A recap of popular opinion:
After three balls: Australia are going to win 5-0.
At any point for the rest of the first day or the second morning: This series will be close but thrilling, perhaps even a draw.
After Hussey and Haddin batted for a million hours: Australia are going to win 5-0.
After Strauss, Cook, and Trott swung around and batted even longer for England: Australia are terrible and won't win a thing; England may win by default.

So, as the Second Test begins tomorrow in Adelaide (tonight, for those of us in a sensible time zone), the Australians are the ones in disarray. Aussie fast bowler Mitchell Johnson has been dropped from the team; he failed to take a wicket or score a run, gave up 170 runs on his own, and bowled like he had his eyes closed (go to 0:26 of this video, and watch for Trott's stunned reaction as the ball sails twenty feet behind him, Rick Ankiel style.) Meanwhile, England will play the exact same team, and hope that they can somehow magically find a way to get a few Aussies out.

So: still 0-0. Four matches to go and the urn on the line and a convenient TV viewing schedule ahead. On to Adelaide!

SB Nation Minnesota: Keep Hope Alive

I have enjoyed writing for SB Nation Minnesota. It's given me a chance to write about things I usually don't write much about, these days - the Vikings, the Wild, that sort of thing, plus a long post about Major League Soccer in Minnesota that's up there with my favorite things I've ever written. But ultimately, I couldn't justify the added time commitment - I just have too much going on to add another pile of writing on top of the teetering stack I already have.

So I'm done, over there, though I encourage you to keep following the site. And before I left, I wrote one last thing, that had a surprising message (for me, at least): Keep hope alive, because as sports fans, it's all we have.