The Ashes. Exciting cricket. Honest.

[jonnygrouville]

Exciting stuff in The Ashes. If you think the Ryder Cup is exclusive, you’ll love this as it is only ever played for between England and Australia since 1880 or something like that, a series of five five-day cricket matches played every two years or so (it is not that fussy).

So far, England look to have the upper hand with an exciting draw in the first test (yes, you can draw a game that lasts five days and, yes, it can be exciting) and appear to be in a strong position in the second although the rain might have something to say about it (yes, sometimes the weather can beat both sides).

None-the-less, the British media still love to deify successful teams that win a two-team tournament over a country with a much smaller population once every twenty years...

Ryder Cup fans will also be pleased to hear that it is practically obligatory for spectators to attend in fancy dress, unless you have an enormous beer belly and arms that look like huge pieces of stilton. Then you just take your shirt off to make sure you are unrestricted when you start dancing.

[secondary]

I know I can google it, but do you have a link?

[jonnygrouville]

I use the BBC's pages.

news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/cricket/default.stm

Look out for the 'As it happened' links for over by over narrative of the day's play interspersed with texts from fans all over the world, comments from experts and players' tweets as well. This is updated live and I find it is the best and most entertaining way to follow the matches without a live feed. There are ball by ball feeds elsewhere (cricinfo, etc.), but the BBC commentary is funnier.

Meanwhile, back on the ranch, England won the second test by an innings and 71 runs. This is a whaling. Australia all out for 245 in the first innings after the most exciting start I can remember to a test match, then England declared after 620. Drama at the end of day four as the weather report looking nasty, but the rain held off and the Aussies were bowled out for 304 on day five.

Sadly a couple of injuries for both sides and it sounds like English fast-bowler Stuart Broad is on his way home, and not sure if Katitch will be back for the Aussies. Roll on the third test!

[jonnygrouville]

Well the third test rolled on and passed without incident. Easy win for Australia as the seamers, in particular Johnson, took the England order apart.

Excitement from the first day of the fourth test though as Australia are all out for 98 and England are 156 without loss at stumps. The last time the openers beat the whole other side? 1912. Back in our century, four days to go and far from over!

Much more difficult to follow live as I'm in a different time-zone now, but still going to be a fun few days...

[jonnygrouville]

England have won the fourth test and retained The Ashes. Absolute thumping. England have beaten Australia recently, but rare for the Aussies to be totally out-classed in every aspect of the game.

The Sydney test is still to be played, so they could win outright as opposed to retain. The Barmy Army will be there as ever. The best fancy dress was the guy dressed as the Queen - he really made the most of the national anthem. The most amusing chant I heard was earlier this week when the Australian fans were flooding out of the ground, 'Is this your fire drill?'