Ashes Cricket betting

The Ashes

The Ashes cricket is one the leading events that there is in the sport. It’s not actually competition status, and at the core, it is nothing more than a regular Test series. But for England and Australia, it is a lot more than that. It’s for pride, it’s for that famous little urn which supposedly holds the ashes of a burned bail.

England lost at The Oval in 1882 to Australia, their first ever defeat on home soil against the Australians. The English media decided that English cricket had died in that match and that “the body will be cremated and the ashes taken to Australia”. It was nothing more than a satirical prod.

However, it stuck and the England captain at the time, Ivo Bligh said they would go on tour to Australia In the next Series (in 1882) and “regain those ashes”. England won two of the three Tests Down Under and were given an urn which was said to the “ashes of Australian cricket” in it. A replica is used for celebrating teams, the original one never was.

The ever-changing landscape

Of course, the landscape has changed so much between England and Australia over the many, many years of the Ashes. It was England who were dominant in the 1880s but then things started to even out with Australia getting back at their rivals.

Between 1920 and the Second World War, it was largely all Australia in Ashes series and when things picked up again it was much the same way. England couldn’t get their hands on it for a good decade in the in 1960’s but the subsequent twenty years saw England regain some control.

But then came Australia’s golden period. Their incredible team from 1989, captained by Allan Border, sparked something so special. They trounced England 4-0 in the 1989 series and just went on a streak of beating England in the 1990–91, 1993, 1994–95, 1997, 1998–99, 2001 and 2002–03 series as well.

England finally ended the rot in 2005 on home soil, in what is still regarded as being on the greatest Ashes series ever played. After losing the opening match, England managed to dramatically win the second match by just two runs after Steve Harmison had tailender Michael Kasprowicz caught with the tourists needing only three to win. That was the match that gave us that enduring image of England’s Freddie Flintoff consoling unbeaten tailender Brett Lee at the end of the match.

Fast bowler Lee had posted a brilliant 43 to edge Australia towards victory, but with the dismissal of Kasprowicz, Lee’s efforts fell short, the Australians losing by just two runs. That remains the narrowest margin of victory/loss in an Ashes test match. England ended an 18-year barren spell in the Ashes with the series win.

2017/18 Ashes Review

England were expected to hold onto the Ashes as they toured Australia in the 2017/18 series. Basically, Australia were a team who were solely reliant on the output of Steve Smith and David Warner and there was little other substance in their batting line up. While England were not looking at their strongest, they were hopeful of at least getting out with a draw and hanging on to the urn.

It didn’t quite pan out that way though. It ended up being the weakness of England’s middle-order that was the key factor of the Series. In the first test, England posted 302 batting first and got stuck into the Australian line up well. They had gotten rid of a fair chunk of the Australian batting line up but Steve Smith still helped the hosts to surpass England’s innings total somehow. Aside from a knock by Joe Root, England’s second innings never went anywhere and they lost by 10 wickets.

That set the tone. For England it went from bad to worse from there. Australia won the second Test by 120 runs and embarrassed the tourists ever further in the Third Test. The Australians won by an innings and 41 runs in Perth to sweep the series. England fought back a little bit with a draw in the fourth test in Melbourne, with England captain Alastair Cook finally coming good in what was a really poor series from him. Cook made an unbeaten 244 in the match. Australia took another convincing win in the final Test, by an innings and 123 runs.

2019 Ashes Preview

It is back to England for the 2019 Ashes series which is being played a little later than usual because of the 2019 Cricket World Cup, which England won. England have to try and change their mindset from that thrilling ODI effort in lifting the World Cup title, to the steadier pace of Test cricket. England boasts such an explosive batting line up in the ODI game, and with some of those players taking part in the Ashes, a more subtle approach is going to be needed.

Can England get that balance right? England are ranked 4th in the ICC Test rankings with Australia one place beneath them. So there is not likely to be too much to choose between them. England’s captain Joe Root needs a big performance in leadership throughout this series. His own batting averages at the Test level have been dropping a bit over the last couple of years, England struggling to find a settled batting order at the top of the list. That is something that just heaps pressure on a captain. Pre-series England traded at 10/11 at Bet365 to win the Ashes 2019* (betting odds taken from bet365 on July 28th, 2019 at 2:12 pm).

Australia do boost arguably a better opening line up with the bat in being able to call on Cameron Bancroft, Steve Smith and David Warner. All three of them were involved in the ball-tampering scandal against South Africa in 2018 but have all served out their bans. They look a little steadier at the top of the batting line up than England do and Smith, who was the player of the series in the last Ashes meeting is 5/1 to be the top scorer in this series. On top of Australia will be bringing a strong pace attack with the likes of Mitchel Starc and Pat Cummins in the mix.

2019 Ashes Dates

August 1-5 1st Test, Edgbaston

August 14-18 2nd Test, Lord’s

August  22-26 3rd Test, Headingley

September 4-8 4th Test, Old Trafford

September 12-16 5th Test, The Oval