1934 to 1953
On the batting-friendly wickets that prevailed in the late 1930s, most Tests up to the Second World War still gave results. It should be borne in mind that Tests in Australia prior to the war were all played to a finish. Many batting records were set in this period.
The 1934 Ashes series began with the notable absence of Larwood, Voce and Jardine. The MCC had made it clear, in light of the revelations of the bodyline series, that these players would not face Australia. It should be noted that the MCC, although it had earlier condoned and encouraged[citation needed] bodyline tactics in the 1932–33 series, laid the blame on Larwood when relations turned sour. Larwood was forced by the MCC to either apologise or be removed from the Test side. He went for the latter.
Australia recovered the Ashes in 1934 and held them until 1953, although no international cricket was possible during the Second World War.
As in 1930, the 1934 series was decided in the final Test at The Oval. Australia, batting first, posted a massive 701 in the first innings. Bradman (244) and Ponsford (266) were in record-breaking form with a partnership of 451 for the second wicket. England eventually faced a massive 707 run target for victory and failed, Australia winning the series 2–1.[17] This made Woodfull the only captain to regain the Ashes and he retired upon his return to Australia.
In 1936–37 Bradman succeeded Woodfull as Australian captain. He started badly, losing the first two Tests heavily after Australia were caught on sticky wickets. However, the Australians fought back and Bradman won his first series in charge 3–2.
The 1938 series was high-scoring affair with many high-scoring draws, resulting in a 1–1 result, Australia retaining the Ashes. After the first two matches ended in stalemate and the Third Test at Old Trafford never started due to rain. Australia then scraped home by five wickets inside three days in a low-scoring match at Headingley to retain the urn. In the timeless Fifth Test at The Oval, the highlight was Len Hutton's then world record score of 364 as England made 7/903 declared. Bradman and Jack Fingleton injured themselves during Hutton's marathon effort, and with only nine men, Australia fell to defeat by an innings and 578 runs, the heaviest in Test history.
The Ashes resumed after the war when England toured in 1946–47, and as in 1920–21, found that Australia had made the best post-war recovery. Still captained by Bradman and now featuring the potent new ball partnership of Ray Lindwall and Keith Miller, Australia were convincing 3–0 winners.
Aged 38 and having been unwell during the war, Bradman had been reluctant to play. He batted unconvincingly and reached 28 when he hit a ball to Jack Ikin; England believed it was a catch, but Bradman stood his ground, believing it to be a bump ball. The umpire ruled in the Australian captain's favour and he appeared to regain his fluency of yesteryear, scoring 187. Australia promptly reached seized the initiative, won the First Test convincingly and inaugurated a dominant post-war era. The controversy over the Ikin catch was one of the biggest disputes of the era.
In 1948 Australia set new standards, completely outplaying their hosts to win 4–0 with one draw. This Australian team, led by Bradman, who turned 40 during his final tour of England, has gone down in history as The Invincibles. Playing 34 matches on tour—three of which were not first-class—including the five Tests, they remained unbeaten, winning 27 and drawing only 7.
Bradman's men were greeted by packed crowds across the country, and records for Test attendances in England were set in the Second and Fourth Tests at Lord's and Headingley respectively; the crowd at Headingley remains a record, and it was there that Australia set a world record by chasing down 404 on the last day for a seven-wicket victory.
The 1948 series ended with one of the most poignant moments in cricket history, as Bradman played his final innings for Australia in the Fifth Test at The Oval, needing to score only four runs to end with a career batting average of exactly 100. However, Bradman made a second ball duck, bowled by a Eric Hollies googly that sent him into retirement with a career average of 99.94.
Bradman was succeeded as Australian captain by Lindsay Hassett, who led the team to 4–1 victory in 1950–51. The series was not as one-sided as the number of wins suggest, with several tight matches.
The tide finally turned in 1953 when England won the final Test at The Oval to take the series 1–0, having narrowly evaded defeat in the preceding Test at Headingley. This was the beginning of one of the greatest periods in English cricket history with players such as captain Len Hutton, batsmen Denis Compton, Peter May, Tom Graveney, Colin Cowdrey, bowlers Fred Trueman, Brian Statham, Alec Bedser, Jim Laker, Tony Lock and wicket-keeper Godfrey Evans.
[edit] 1954 to 1971
In 1954–55, Australia's batsmen had no answer to the pace of Frank Tyson and Statham. After winning the First Test by an innings after being controversially sent in by Hutton, Australia lost its way and England took a hat-trick of victories to win the series 3–1.[18]
A dramatic series in 1956 saw a record that will probably never be beaten: off-spinner Jim Laker's monumental effort at Old Trafford when he bowled 68 of 191 overs to take 19 out of 20 possible Australian wickets in the Fourth Test.[19] It was Australia's second consecutive innings defeat in a wet summer, and the hosts were in strong positions in the two drawn Tests, in which half the playing time was washed out. Bradman rated the team that won the series 2–1 as England's best ever.
England's dominance was not to last. Australia won 4–0 in 1958–59, having found a high-quality spinner of their own in new skipper Richie Benaud, who took 31 wickets in the five-Test series, and paceman Alan Davidson, who took 24 wickets at 19.00. The series was overshadowed by the furore over various Australian bowlers, most notably Ian Meckiff, whom the English management and media accused of illegally throwing Australia to victory.
Australia consolidated their status as the leading team in world cricket with a hard-fought 2–1 away series. After narrowly winning the Second Test at Lord's, dubbed "The Battle of the Ridge" because of a protrusion on the pitch that caused erratic bounce, Australia mounted a comeback on the final day of the Fourth Test at Old Trafford and sealed the series after a heavy collapse during the English runchase.
The tempo of the play changed over the next series in the 1960s, held in 1962–63, 1964, 1965–66 and 1968. The powerful array of bowlers that both countries boasted in the preceding decade moved into retirement, and their replacements were of lesser quality, making it more difficult to force a result. England failed to win any series during the 1960s, a period dominated by draws as teams found it more prudent to save face than risk losing. Of the 20 Tests played during the four series, Australia won five and England two. As they held the Ashes, Australian captains Bob Simpson and Bill Lawry were happy to adopt safety-first tactics and their strategy of sedate batting saw many draws. During this period, spectator attendances dropped and media condemnation increased, but Simpson and Lawry flatly disregarded the public dissatisfaction.
It was in the 1960s that the bipolar dominance of England and Australia in world cricket was seriously challenged for the first time. West Indies defeated England twice in the mid-1960s and South Africa, in two series before they were banned for apartheid, completely outplayed Australia 3–1 and 4–0. Australia had lost 3–1 during a tour of the West Indies in 1964–65 the first time they had lost a series to any team other than England.
In 1970–71, Ray Illingworth led England to a 2–0 win in Australia, mainly due to John Snow's fast bowling, and the prolific batting of Geoffrey Boycott and John Edrich. It was not until the last session of what was the 7th Test (one match having been abandoned without a ball bowled) that England's success was secured. Lawry was sacked after the Sixth Test after the selectors finally lost patience with Australia's lack of success and dour strategy. Lawry was not informed of the decision privately and heard his fate over the radio.[20]
[edit] 1972 to 1987
The 1972 series finished 2–2, with England under Illingworth retaining the Ashes.[21]
In the 1974–75 series, with the England team breaking up and their best batsman Geoff Boycott refusing to play, Australian pace bowlers Jeff Thomson and Dennis Lillee wreaked havoc. A 4–1 result was a fair reflection as England were left shell shocked.[22] England then lost the 1975 series 0–1, but at least restored some pride under new captain Tony Greig.[23]
Australia won the 1977 Centenary Test[24] which was not an Ashes contest, but then a storm broke as Kerry Packer announced his intention to form World Series Cricket.[25] WSC affected all Test playing nations but it weakened Australia especially as the bulk of its players had signed up with Packer; the Australian Cricket Board (ACB) would not select WSC-contracted players and an almost completely new Test team had to be formed. WSC came after an era during which the duopoly of Australian and English dominance dissipated; the Ashes had long been seen as a cricket world championship but the rise of the West Indies in the late 1970s challenged that view. The West Indies would go on to record resounding Test series wins over Australia and England and dominated world cricket until the 1990s.
With Greig having joined WSC, England appointed Mike Brearley as their captain and he enjoyed great success against Australia. Largely assisted by the return of Boycott, Brearley's men won the 1977 series 3–0 and then completed an overwhelming 5–1 series win against an Australian side missing its WSC players in 1978–79. Allan Border made his Test debut for Australia in 1978–79.
Brearley retired from Test cricket in 1979 and was succeeded by Ian Botham, who started the 1981 series as England captain, by which time the WSC split had ended. After Australia took a 1–0 lead in the first two Tests, Botham was forced to resign or was sacked (depending on the source). Brearley surprisingly agreed to be reappointed before the Third Test at Headingley. This was a remarkable match in which Australia looked certain to take a 2–0 series lead after they had forced England to follow-on 227 runs behind. England, despite being 135 for 7, produced a second innings total of 356, Botham scoring 149*. Chasing just 130, Australia were sensationally dismissed for 111, Bob Willis taking 8/43. It was the first time since 1894–95 that a team following on had won a Test match. Under Brearley's leadership, England went on to win the next two matches before a drawn final match at The Oval.[26]
In 1982–83 Australia had Greg Chappell back from WSC as captain, while the England team was weakened by the enforced omission of their South African tour rebels, particularly Graham Gooch and John Emburey. Australia went 2–0 up after three Tests, but England won the Fourth Test by 3 runs (after a 70-run last wicket stand) to set up the final decider, which was drawn.[27]
In 1985 David Gower's England team was strengthened by the return of Gooch and Emburey as well as the emergence at international level of Tim Robinson and Mike Gatting. Australia, now captained by Allan Border, had themselves been weakened by a rebel South African tour, the loss of Terry Alderman being a particular factor. England won 3–1.
Despite suffering heavy defeats against the West Indies during the 1980s, England continued to do well in the Ashes. Mike Gatting was the captain in 1986–87 but his team started badly and attracted some criticism.[28] Then Chris Broad scored three hundreds in successive Tests and bowling successes from Graham Dilley and Gladstone Small meant England won the series 2–1.[29] At the time, few would have predicted that England would have to wait until 2005 to win the Ashes again.
[edit] 1989 to 2003
The Australian team of 1989 was comparable to the great Australian teams of the past, and resoundingly defeated England 4–0.[30] Well led by Allan Border, the team included the young cricketers Mark Taylor, Merv Hughes, David Boon, Ian Healy and Steve Waugh, who were all to prove long-serving and successful Ashes competitors. England, now led once again by David Gower, suffered from injuries and poor form. During the Fourth Test news broke that prominent England players had agreed to take part in a "rebel tour" of South Africa the following winter; three of them (Tim Robinson, Neil Foster and John Emburey) were playing in the match, and were subsequently dropped from the England side.[31]
Australia reached a cricketing peak in the 1990s and early 2000s, coupled with a general decline in England's fortunes. After re-establishing its credibility in 1989, Australia underlined its superiority with victories in the 1990–91, 1993, 1994–95, 1997, 1998–99, 2001 and 2002–03 series, all by convincing margins.
Great Australian players in the early years included batsmen Border, Boon and Taylor. The captaincy passed from Border to Taylor in the mid-1990s and then to Steve Waugh before the 2001 series. In the latter part of the 1990s Waugh himself, along with his twin brother Mark, scored heavily for Australia and fast bowlers Glenn McGrath and Jason Gillespie made a serious impact. The wicketkeeper-batsman position was held by Ian Healy for most of the 1990s and by Adam Gilchrist from 2001 to 2006–07. In the 2000s, batsmen Justin Langer, Damien Martyn and Matthew Hayden became noted players for Australia. But the most dominant Australian player was legspinner Shane Warne, whose first delivery in Ashes cricket in 1993 became known as the ball of the century.
Australia's record between 1989 and 2005 had a significant impact on the statistics between the two sides. Before the 1989 series began, the win-loss ratio was almost even, with 87 wins for Australia to England's 86, 74 having been drawn.[32] By the 2005 series Australia's wins had increased to 115 whereas England's had increased to only 93 (and a further 82 draws).[33] In the period between 1989 and the beginning of the 2005 series, the two sides had played 43 times; Australia winning 28 times, England 7 times, with 8 draws. Only a single England victory had come in a match in which the Ashes were still at stake, namely the First Test of the 1997 series. All others were consolation victories when the Ashes had been secured by Australia.[34]
[edit] 2005 to present
England began to recover in the early 2000s and were undefeated in Test matches through the 2004 calendar year. This elevated them to second in the ICC Test Championship. Hopes that the 2005 Ashes series would be closely fought proved well founded, as the series was more competitive than anyone had predicted and was still undecided as the closing session of the final Test began. Experienced journalists including Richie Benaud rated the series as the most exciting in living memory. It has been compared with the great series of the distant past, such as 1894–95 and 1902.
The First Test at Lord's was convincingly won by Australia, but in the remaining four matches the teams were evenly matched and England fought back to win the Second Test by 2 runs, the smallest victory by a runs margin in Ashes history, and the second-closest such victory in all Tests. The rain-affected Third Test ended with the last two Australian batsmen holding out for a draw and England won the Fourth Test by three wickets after forcing Australia to follow-on for the first time in 191 Tests. A draw in the final Test gave England victory in an Ashes series for the first time in 18 years and their first Ashes victory at home since 1985.
Australia regained The Ashes in the 2006–07 series with a convincing 5–0 victory, the second time an Ashes series has been won by that margin. Glenn McGrath, Shane Warne and Justin Langer retired from Test cricket after the series, having been the backbone of the Australian team for almost a decade. Damien Martyn also retired during the series.[35]
The 2009 series began with a tense draw in the first Test at Cardiff. England then achieved their first Ashes win at Lord's since 1934 to go 1-0 up. After a rain-affected draw at Edgbaston, the fourth match at Headingley was convincingly won by Australia to level the series. England finally took the fifth and last Test at The Oval by a large margin to regain the Ashes.
[edit] Summary of results and statistics
See also: List of Ashes series for a full listing of all the Ashes series since 1882.

Chart of the matches won between the two sides.
A team must win a series to gain the right to hold the Ashes. A drawn series results in the previous holders retaining the Ashes. Sixty-four series have been played, with Australia winning 31 and England 28. The remaining five series were drawn, with Australia retaining the Ashes four times (1938, 1962-63, 1965-66, 1968) and England retaining it once (1972). The win-loss ratio in Ashes Tests[36] (up to and including the 2006/07 series) stands at 121 wins for Australia to 95 wins for England, with 84 draws.[37]
Ashes series have generally been played over five Test matches, although there have been four-match series (1938; 1975) and six-match series (1970-71; 1974-75; 1978-79; 1981; 1985; 1989; 1993 and 1997). Australians have made 264 centuries in Ashes Tests, 23 of them over 200, while Englishmen have scored 212 centuries, of which ten have been over 200. On 41 occasions Australians have taken ten wickets in a match, Englishmen 38 times.
[edit] The Ashes today
The Ashes is one of the most fiercely contested competitions in cricket.
The failure of England to regain the Ashes for 16 years from 1989, coupled with the global dominance of the Australian team, had dulled the lustre of the series in recent years throughout most of the cricketing world, although it has remained the most popular cricketing contest for Australians. However, the close results in the 2005 Ashes series, and the overall high quality and competitiveness of the cricket greatly boosted the popularity of the sport in Britain and considerably enhanced the profile of the Ashes around the world. Despite the lop-sided result of the 2006-07 Ashes series, which owed much to off-the-field pressures in the England camp, this popularity has endured, and England's win in the 2009 Ashes series will ensure much speculation and anticipation of the return in 2010-11.[citation needed]
[edit] Match venues
The series alternates between the United Kingdom and Australia, and within each country each of the (usually) five matches is held at a different cricket ground.
In Australia, the grounds currently used are "The Gabba" in Brisbane (first staged an England-Australia Test in the 1932-33 season), Adelaide Oval (1884-85), The WACA, Perth (1970-71) the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) (1876-77) and the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) (1881-82). One Test was held at the Brisbane Exhibition Ground in 1928-29. Traditionally, Melbourne hosts the Boxing Day Test and Sydney hosts the New Year Test, which is the first Test of every year. Cricket Australia has proposed that the 2010-11 series consist of six Tests, with the additional game to be played at Bellerive Oval in Hobart. The England Cricket Board is yet to agree to this.
In England the grounds used are The Oval (since 1880), Old Trafford (1884), Lord's (1884), Trent Bridge (1899), Headingley (1899) and Edgbaston (1902). One Test was held at Bramall Lane, Sheffield in 1902. Sophia Gardens in Cardiff held the First Test in the 2009 Ashes series, the first time England had played a home Test in Wales.
[edit] The Ashes outside cricket
The popularity and reputation of the cricket series has led to many other events taking the name for England against Australia contests. The best-known and longest-running of these events is the rugby league contest between Great Britain and Australia (see The Ashes (rugby league)). The contest first started in 1908, the name being suggested by the touring Australians. Another example is in the British television show Gladiators, where two series were based around the Australia–England contest.
The urn is also featured in the science fiction comedy novel Life, the Universe and Everything, the third "Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy" book by Douglas Adams. The urn is stolen by alien robots, as the burnt bail inside it is part of the key needed to unlock the "Wikkit Gate" and release the imprisoned world of "Krikkit".
The Ashes featured in the film The Final Test, released in 1953, based on a television play by Terence Rattigan. It stars Jack Warner as an England cricketer playing the last Test of his career, which is the last of an Ashes series; the film contains cameo appearances from cricketers, including Jim Laker and Denis Compton,[38] who were part of England's 1953 triumph.