Long before an illicit incursion into sacred territory at Lord’s that Australia would live to regret in 2005, a dressing room breach that stirred the Gods of cricket and cursed the tour, they knew England was coming.
Nine months prior to arguably the greatest Ashes series played, the Aussies had sensed a new belief in their rivals when well-beaten in a Champions Trophy semi-final at Edgbaston.
It was noted with some concern that England managed to square a series in India a few months later, which included a last day rout of the hosts in Wankhede, with all-rounder Andrew Flintoff the star of both the Test and also the series. This was a worry.
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After winning a series against New Zealand in March, skipper Ricky Ponting declared the 2005 series had the potential to be the closest since Australia’s domination began in 1989.
“We’ve said that about the Ashes before and it hasn’t been (true) but this England side has a different feel to them. They have a bit of a winning habit and a winning culture which they haven’t had for a while,” he said.
“They’re the number two in the world now and have played excellent cricket of late and I think both sides match up particularly well. (But) once we hit England, we’re very confident that if we’ve got everyone fit and we play somewhere near our best, that we’re going to be very competitive right through that series.”
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By drinks on the first morning of the first Test at Lord’s, as he wiped blood from his face after being struck in the helmet by a delivery from Steve Harmison, Ponting had reason to be convinced it would tight. The English fast bowler had already pegged Justin Langer and Matthew Hayden before nailing him in a venomous spell and was clearly up for the fight.
The crack of the ball smashing into Ponting’s grill, with the score at 1-49, sounded as deadly as a pistol firing as West Indian great Michael Holding whispered in commentary; “Another helmet has been hit. All three Australian batsmen have now been hit.”
Stunned by an opening day barrage, the Aussies were bowled out for 190, but rebounded brilliantly to take seven wickets by stumps in an extraordinary start to the Ashes.
But by the afternoon session on Day 4, the first Test had been claimed by Australia by a whopping 239 runs and it felt, according to Adam Gilchrist, like “business as usual.”
England had enjoyed a fine first morning. And Kevin Pietersen, on debut and sporting a lairish hairdo, clearly had some gumption. But it was one-nil Australia and a drink was in order.
A couple of hours after stumps had been called, the Aussies grabbed a traveller for the road and headed across to the English rooms for a traditional post-match debriefing.
But, as Gilchrist told foxsports.com.au at the launch of the Kayo Summer of Cricket in the Parramatta Town Hall in October, what followed was far from regular and sparked regret. The lights were out and England had departed the home of cricket.
“We drank in their change rooms. But they weren’t there,” Gilchrist said.
“We did the team song there, which proved to be a shocking thing to do. Karma, it is fair to say, came back to bite us.
“We went down there and did our team song in there and it is sort of like, ‘Ooooh. Maybe that was just getting ahead of ourselves.’”
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THE GREATEST SERIES EVER?
Cricket’s spirit had been stirred but there was a difference. England was bowed after the Lord’s loss but not broken. Under the guidance of Michael Vaughan, they had reason to feel they could compete against the greats.
And Karma? The cricket Gods waited a fortnight but bit hard when Australia arrived in Birmingham. But the tone for one of the finest series cricket has seen was set at Lord’s despite the lopsided result.
Leading into each Test this summer, Fox Cricket will delve into corresponding matches on the 20th anniversary of the famous Ashes series clinched by England, one that captured the imagination in the UK and breathed life back into the Ashes.
Joe Root, the champion English batsman who carries significant responsibility this summer, was playing against men in Yorkshire for Sheffield Collegiate at the time and was inspired by the deeds of the Michael Vaughan-led squad.
“I watched it pretty much uninterrupted. As soon as I got home from school, I’d switch on the telly,” he told The Guardian in 2016.
“I was 14 and it was brilliant. I remember being ill on the last day of The Oval Test. I watched the whole day instead of being at school. (It was) amazing.
“I remember a few years before that playing in the seconds and getting a couple of 50s. I had the pleasure of batting with Michael Vaughan’s brother, David, which was another good experience. Watching Michael growing up and seeing how he played helped my game.”
It is a series Usman Khawaja, who was on the cusp of the New South Wales team at the time, credits with helping him realise just how special the Australia-England rivalry was.
“I think everyone was glued to that series. It was on at a decent time for Australians to watch too, because cricket in England is a perfect time for us to watch. So I think that’s why I made it easier,” he said in an interview in Brisbane in September.
Harmison’s first ball hits second slip | 00:18
“And just as a young kid – I was playing First Grade at the time, I was playing New South Wales under-19s, Australian under-19s, and in 2005-2006 I went to Sri Lanka – so I was very much into cricket and just wanted to be an Australian cricketer.
“So for me, I was living every moment of it and it was inspirational in a lot of ways. And even though Australia didn’t win, it was (in a strange way) inspirational that Australia didn’t win, because I don’t think we’d be talking about the series the same way had Australia won.
“Me growing up, every time we played the Ashes, I just didn’t get it and I was like, ‘Oh, another Ashes series. Here we go. We’re going to smash England again.’ Honestly, that’s what it felt like for the majority of my younger career until 2005, because before then, I didn’t find Ashes cricket that fun.
“That’s why 2005 was like, ‘Oh, England won.’ And from then on the rivalry, at least for my generation, was built. I think 2005 was big for our generation for that reason. That’s why everyone, particularly my generation, remembers it, because we were so used to winning.”
Glenn Maxwell had the series on DVD and, even though the Aussies were beaten, watched it on repeat.
“That was one of the best Test series to watch. The first Test was on its own (was spectacular). And I just remember I used to watch it over and over again,” he said.
“It was just like the extended highlights of all the games and I just (became) infatuated with the ebbs and flows of every Test. McGrath getting injured. The close finishes.
“Gary, what’s his name? The sub fielder? Gary Pratt. That’s right. Gary Pratt runs out Punter and he kind of loses his mind as he’s walking off the ground. Just so many cool moments. It was great to watch.”
And it all started with Ricky Ponting being struck in the head on the first morning at Lord’s.
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SPILLING BLOOD
As Errol Alcott tended to Ponting in the 11th over of the morning, with Australia rattling along at a good pace, the hum in the crowd around Lord’s was at a fervour pitch.
There was a groan when a replay was shown of the Harmison delivery smashing into Ponting, with the Aussie skipper clearly beaten by both the pace and bounce of the delivery.
English great Ian Botham noted Alcott, the Australian physiotherapist, had spent part of the previous year working with Russell Crowe during the filming of The Cinderalla Man and was putting his skills to use by trying to stem the bleeding from cut on the No.3s face.
“They certainly need a boxing expert out there to stop the bleeding. That cut on his face certainly looks like it needed a stitch or two,” his co-commentator Holding responded.
“It can be very disturbing, and not just because of the sound that ball makes on the helmet but the fact that you have been hit. It is a good thing there are helmets around in the game.”
The Aussies added only six more runs before Ponting edged another ripper from Harmison to Andrew Strauss at third slip to depart for nine, with England celebrating his demise wildly.
NO NICETIES
Matthew Hoggard had secured the first wicket of the series when bowling Hayden for 12, a delivery symbolic given the Aussie opener had smashed him and the English attack in the first Test in Brisbane in 2002 when making two hundreds at the Gabba.
More important, he says, was the response of the English team after the Ponting incident, with the footage showing not one player going to check on the Aussie captain.
England did not win the Test match but it proved to them they could win a battle at least.
“What happened is we hit the Aussies hard. We hit Langer. We hit Hayden. We hit Ponting. And when I say we, it was ‘Harmi’” Hoggard told Fox Cricket podcast The Follow On.
“He hit Ponting and when Ricky got hit in the head, not one single person went to see if he was all right (despite the) blood coming down his cheek. Not one person went to see him because we didn’t want to take a backward step. We didn’t want to get bullied.
“Because you look at that side that we played in 2005 and it had Gilchrist coming in at seven. Seven! I mean … there wasn’t a weak link in that side and they were by far the best side in the early 2000s, so we knew we had to be on top of our game (and) we knew we had to step up and look you in the eye and take you on face-to-face.
“So that incident where we didn’t ask, ‘Are you OK?’, whereas normally we’d be all apologetic, (was important). And we (had) bowled you out for less than 200 on the first day, so we knew we could take 10 wickets.
“It was a decent deck, so we knew we could take wickets. So all we needed to do was score runs, which we didn’t do too well. But it was the start of that Ashes series and we knew that we could hurt you and we could match you with firepower.”
Botham backs Poms’ pace attack v Aussies | 01:31
Watching from the pavilion, Gilchrist cast his mind back to a painful blow he received in the Champions Trophy semi-final at Edgbaston the previous September.
“When you look back and consider it, I think the first signs of that England team starting to step up was back in 2004,” Gilchrist said.
“They were showing signs of being on the improve and then in the Champions Trophy, a white ball 50-over tournament, we played them in the semi-final at Edgbaston and Steve Harmison hit me in the forearm with a delivery when I was batting and, one, it hurt a lot, but the aggression and the intensity from them, albeit in white ball cricket, it just made a really strong statement and they beat us.”
Brett Lee, who featured in an iconic finish to the second Test at Edgbaston, had no qualms with the tough approach the English adopted.
“The way I played my cricket was when you walk over that white line, the boundary rope, it’s game on it. ‘Do not get in my way, because I’m going to get out swinging here’” he said.
“But off the field, you have got to be a gentleman. You have got to appreciate your competition. And that’s what it was.”
English wicketkeeper Geraint Jones, a son of Welsh parents who was born in Papua New Guinea and raised in Toowoomba before moving to the United Kingdom in his early 20s, said there was nothing like the sensation of returning to the Lord’s Pavilion at lunch on Day 1.
“That first Test match walking out at Lord’s, walking from the change room through the pavilion, where the members are, and going out onto the grass that first morning was one of the most brilliant memories I have out of cricket,” Jones told The Follow On podcast.
“We had a shoulder width corridor … so from all the way from the home dressing rooms, you have to go down some stairs and just the noise walking out that first morning was utterly incredible.
“And then we bowled first and at lunch we had them five down, so the reception we got going through that Long Room again was even better than walking out that morning. But that sort of changed a bit from then.”
WARNING SIGNS AMID A TRIUMPH
Gilchrist, Simon Katich and Shane Warne showed some resistance with the bat to get Australia to 190 from just 40 overs. BazBall? Not quite. But the Aussies scored quickly.
But in a remarkable response McGrath charged through England’s top order, with the ‘oohs’ at the ground when Ponting was struck turning into ‘aaahs’, at least from the Aussie fans, as the champion fast bowler reduced England to 5-21 after 16 overs.
Pitted against foes he had competed against in club cricket back in Brisbane, Jones stuck around for a bit alongside the newcomer Pietersen, but by stumps England was 7-92.
On the second day Warne struck his first blow in an extraordinary individual series when snaring the punchy Pietersen for 57 and later snared Harmison to bowl England out for 190.
Australia feasted in the second innings, with Michael Clarke adding 91 runs to a tally of 381, before McGrath and Warne ran amok to bowl England out for 180, with the one asterisk. Pietersen was brilliant again when unbeaten on 64.
As superbly as McGrath had bowled, there was an air of relief around the form of Warne after he entered the Ashes in the spotlight, a scenario scarcely unusual for the great one.
His marriage with Simone had recently ended and Warne was axed by the Nine Network as well for off-field indiscretions that caught the attention of the English tabloids.
More concerning was that the 36-year-old was struggling for form in the nets, with Warne describing his form “as crap”, prompting Ponting to ask whether he was holding up OK. Warne told him firmly he would deliver once play began.
As reported by former England captain Mike Atherton in The Times earlier this year, a phone call to his coach Terry Jenner identified the problem – Warne was too closed when releasing the ball because his front foot was coming too far across his body. The tip unleashed the champ, who went on to take a staggering 40 wickets for the series.
The headlines involving Warne were not the only off-field distractions preceding the Ashes, with Andrew Symonds banned for a couple of matches after turning up drunk to an ODI in Cardiff earlier in the summer, a match Australia lost to Bangladesh in an unsettling affair. The Aussies clinched the first Test but there were signs not everything was in sync.
“We then got there for ‘05, for that first Test, and we had the white ball series leading up to that full of controversy internally for us with ‘Roy’ and then we lost to Bangladesh, but then we won the series, so it was an interesting time,” Gilchrist said.
“But Lord’s just felt, save for one thing, it felt like business as usual. We were challenged a little bit but then we got a hold of them, and then we nailed them by a couple of hundred runs, I think, but it was pretty convincing.
“But I say save for one thing, and that was Kevin Pietersen, who made a pair of 50s and particularly with hindsight, his inclusion and his positive intent against ‘Pigeon’ and Warney in particular was the catalyst for that whole batting line-up in changing their mentality.”
Stokes speaks ahead of England warm up | 10:23
‘THE FLAMINGO’ RUFFLES AUSSIE FEATHERS
It was an onslaught that did not win England the Lord’s Test but did set the tone for what was to follow. And every cricket fan remembers Pietersen smashing McGrath into the Members, with the Aussie legend turning around in disbelief.
“We had KP coming down and attacking McGrath, smacking him back into the pavilion, and nobody does that to Glenn McGrath,” Hoggard, who is now working on the motivational speaking circuit while running a hog roasting business in the English Midlands, said.
“Nobody attacks him and smacks him back over his head. And KP said, ‘Why not? It’s just a ball. Don’t play the man. Play the ball.’”
Less remembered from the infancy of the innings, though, is that Pietersen’s initial plunder in a sinking ship was resplendent for the quality of the strokes he played against McGrath.
He batted magnificently against the tide and Jones, who shared an innings high 58-run partnership with Pietersen after joining him with England at 5-21, describes it as a pivotal moment in the series.
“You mentioned how much we lost by but definitely KP set a bit of a marker out in that first Test and I got the chance to bat with him for quite a bit of it,” Jones said.
“We’d seen how good KP could be because in South Africa, in a one-day series, he got three hundreds out of the seven matches there and so he forced his way into that Test and he wanted to make an impact. And he definitely did that in that first Test match.”
Watching back in Australia, Fox Cricket expert analyst Kerry O’Keeffe could not help but be impressed by the newcomer with the tipped hair strutting around like he owned Lord’s.
“We saw ‘the Flamingo’. We saw a player that was going to take Australia on,” O’Keeffe said.
“He had a tremendous series and that was the thing. He attacked Australia. That Australian side had McGrath and Warne in it, and they thought England would just sit back. But not with Kevin Pietersen in the line-up. I thought he was fantastic.”
England lost its last four batsmen in the Lord’s Test for ducks, with McGrath and Warne sharing the spoils. But when they went to share drinks later, their rivals had ducked off.
“There was talk at the time that their coach didn’t want them to chat to our team and I remember after the win at Lord’s, we went into the change rooms an hour or two after the match had finished and they’d gone home,” Lee said.
“So there was no socialising on that front after the first Test. And I just thought, ‘This is something different. They’re really hurting.’”
And then the Aussies sang their song, as Gilchrist said, unaware of that the Karma bus was en route to Edgbaston and about to wreak havoc in their defence of the Urn.
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