Rivalry makes the Ashes burn bright

Like two wrestlers who

need each other to

keep a famous show

alive, England and

Australia are squaring

up again with ‘Love’ and

‘Hate’ tattooed on their fists.

Under a lemon summer sun in

Brisbane, the ferries carry boisterous

punters to the place of reckoning,

where we in the media file through a

gate conveniently located in Vulture

Street.

Downtown, England fans devour

rabbit pie in the Pig ‘N’ Whistle, the

title of which evokes the day

Australian students smuggled a

squealing porker into The Gabba

and wrote ‘Botham’ on one swathe

of pig skin and (Eddie) ‘Hemmings’

on the other and then prodded the

creature on to the outfield to mock

the English girth.

Ian Botham is in town again and

so, of course, is his incarnation:

Andrew ‘Freddie’ Flintoff, yeoman

patriot from the shires, just as Beefy

was when an Aussie comedian made

a joke about the Queen and Botham

stomped out, prompting Prime

Minister Paul Keating to call him

‘precious.’ The great all-rounder’s

response was: "I’m very, very proud

of my heritage — and, unlike Mr

Keating, I have one."

You see where this is heading?

Strip away the cartoon animosity

and the two teams fighting over the

world’s most famous handful of dust

are locked in a duet of ugly, beautiful,

mutual dependence.

They are mirror images, disputatious

twins, prize fighters who

batter each other onto the ropes and

then hold each other up to extend

the contest into another bloody

round. Without Australia, there

would be no one for the English to

sneer at. Without the Poms,

Australia would have no controlling

parent to rebel against, no island of

stale culture to sail away from.

In his uproarious history of sledging,

Stiff Upper Lips and Baggy Green

Caps, Simon Briggs tells us: "From

Adelaide to Wagga Wagga, Aussie

cricket is full of what the locals call

'mongrel'. Wicketkeepers growl,

close fielders yap, fast bowlers foam

at the mouth. If the English game

likes to see itself as a distinguished

public school, Australia’s is more of a

borstal."

And while these ancient contrasts

and enmities anchor sport’s oldest

and perhaps most compelling

international rivalry, plenty of

commentators are calling this the

most eagerly anticipated Ashes

series of all. Certainly, seeing the

players in the nets yesterday brought

a moment of instant intoxication:

more so than the first glimpse of an

Olympic Stadium or the first kick of

a ball at the average World Cup.

This Rubik’s cube of a series can be

previewed in an infinite number of

ways. The pessimist will recall the slender margin of England’s triumph

in surely the best sporting summer

since 1966. He will count the ghosts

at the feast — Marcus Trescothick,

Michael Vaughan, Simon Jones —

and conclude that Ricky ‘Punter’

Ponting, Glenn ‘Pigeon’ McGrath,

Michael ‘Mr Cricket’ Hussey and

Brett ‘Binga’ Lee are about to

descend on Flintoff’s men like a mob

of ‘repo’ men with axes and clubs.

The optimist sees a rebirth of

English talent and self-esteem and

speaks through Andrew Strauss,

who said yesterday: "We know from

previous Ashes series you’ve got to

stick together. It’s one-in, all-in. Australia are desperate to regain the

Ashes. If anything, the pressure is on

them to grab them off us."

Privately, some of the green and

gold persuasion are dismayed by

England’s refusal to wilt under the

usual propaganda. McGrath calling

Monty Panesar’s sessions with a

sports psychologist to discuss

touchline abuse 'a bit soft' and 'a bit

ridiculous' have had no discernible

effect. These England players merely

get the giggles when they hear Warne

citing Kevin Pietersen’s 'demotion'

to No 5 in the batting as evidence of

timidity. The darts bounce out when

the home team say that picking

Ashley Giles ahead of Panesar would

be proof of cowardice. To Strauss,

England’s only problem is "an

embarrassment of riches".

The planted quote has become a

feeble weapon. These are men who

drank together at Lord’s, Edgbaston

and The Oval and are bound by

mutual respect far more than the

Botham-David Gower generation,

who were still locked in the old

battle of Empire versus colony.

Let's hope, though, that antipathy’s flame doesn’t burn too

low. In his book, Briggs reveals that

when the England debutant James

Ormond came out to bat at The

Oval in 2001, Australia’s Mark Waugh

chuntered: "Mate, what are you

doing out here? There’s no way you’re

good enough to play for England," to

which Ormond responded: "Maybe

not, but at least I’m the best player

in my family."

The verbal sludge flows in all

directions, not just externally. The

Aussie wicketkeeper Ian Healy said

of the game’s greatest spin bowler:

"Shane Warne’s idea of a balanced

diet is a cheeseburger in each hand."

Who could ask for more than a

comedy festival wrapped round 25

days of loathing, some of it pantomime, plenty of it still genuine.

Australian sport went one

down on the eve of the

Ashes when their greatest

Olympian and swimmer, Ian

Thorpe, decided that the

billboard life of a multimillionaire

no longer

compelled him to jump into

a chlorinated pool at dawn

and perform mindnumbingly

repetitious

exercises.

Thorpe won five Olympic

golds and 10 world titles and

set 13 world records. He was

a world champion at 15 but

was fed up with his trade by

24.

There is no comparison

between the physical

sacrifices made by

cricketers and swimmers

(when did you last see a

breaststroker sink 52

‘tinnies’ on a flight from

Sydney to London?), but

Thorpe’s burn-out casts

more flattering light on

Shane Warne, who still

wants to eat Englishmen for

breakfast, lunch and dinner.

The Thorpedo’s farewell

address lacked the

amphibian brilliance he

brought to the pool. He said:

"I’ve decided I’m going to

discontinue my career."

Management-speak aside,

he was the poet of the

waters.

Hand it to Jone

Packing his bruised wrist

with ice in the nets at The

Gabba, Ian Bell had

probably not the heard

the tale of Jone Tawake,

the Brumbies No 8 who

went into a panic when

an infected finger

seemed to be ruining his

chance of making the

Australia squad for next

year’s rugby union World

Cup.

The doctors told Tawake

he would be out for at

least three months, but

the big man had a better

idea. Cut to the photo of

him holding up the

bandaged stump of his right ring finger. Yes,

rather than wait, he had

it amputated.

The happy patient

explained: "I thought

about my rugby future,

especially with my

history of injuries and I

couldn’t afford to have

any more time off."

Bell could escape the

scalpel and the hacksaw

by pointing out that a

one-handed batsmen is

unlikely to take many

runs off Brett Lee.

But I fear Tawake has set

a precedent that injured

sportsmen will be

expected to follow.

Aussies feel their age

Payback time has

arrived for every

travelling Pom who had

to listen to Australian

commentators

dismissing Sir Clive

Woodward’s World Cupwinning

rugby team as

dinosaurs who ought to

be sponsored by Help

The Aged.

Suddenly it’s the baggy

greens protesting that

ear hair and memory

loss have yet to afflict

the country’s finest

players. The theory that

Australia are in terminal

decline runs up against

the awkward fact that

they have won 11 of their

12 Tests since England

deprived them of the

Ashes.

But the English can still

draw blood by

reminding their hosts

that Glenn McGrath (36)

Shane Warne (37),

Stuart MacGill (35),

Adam Gilchrist (35),

Justin Langer (36

yesterday), Matthew

Hayden and Damien

Martyn (also both 35)

really ought to be at the

garden centre, sucking

a Werther’s Original.

Their captain Ricky

Ponting talks of ‘this age

nonsense’ and insists:

"All of that is irrelevant.

They are the best

players in Australia,

regardless of age, and

they will prove that

through the series."

Hayden adds: "It’s

straight out false to

think age is the most

important factor,

especially in batters,

where it’s a less physical

game."

So watch out for ‘The

Old Gang’ as one

headline writer called

them. And remember to

help them across the

road.