Storied yet never stolid, England and Australia revisit Ashes amid ever-changing environment

The Ashes loom with the cricket world having yet again changed significantly since the 2013/14 series – to say nothing of a decade ago when England famously broke their drought.

Australia captain Michael Clarke and England captain Alastair Cook shakes hands after the second Test in the last Ashes series in 2013/14. Dave Hunt / EPA / December 9, 2013

England, and Australia, must live the moment again in this Ashes summer of 2015.

Yes, it may be a decade exactly since English cricket entranced the nation in one of the greatest tussles for the urn – one they won too, of course, after almost 30 years of failure.

As the next Ashes battle approaches then, 2005 inevitably is being re-bottled across the country with a bombardment of broadcast archive footage, talking heads and eye-witness reminiscences.

It is all irrestistible fare, but a glorious irrelevance too.

Memories of 2005 will not win the Ashes again for Alastair Cook’s England or lose them for Michael Clarke’s Australia.

By all means, delight for a few minutes in the consolation and camaraderie of Edgbaston – or the post-match excesses of the Oval even.

But if you want to make the most of 2015, on July 8 you had better be ready to snap out of it.

Cook, Clarke and their fellow protagonists certainly will. But they will be wanting to carry their countries with them too – because that is how early gains will be consolidated, or fightbacks begun.

Cricket, and the world, has changed greatly since the days when Andrew Flintoff and Brett Lee gave their last ounce – just as it had back then, a near quarter-century after Ian Botham and Bob Willis were forces of nature at Headingley.

The Ashes story goes back much further than that, of course – another century, in fact.

But next month, it will be bang up to date again.

On the pitch, reverse-swing will be a generation old but still a potential match-winner if conditions are conducive to honed skills.

It will be fascinating as well to witness whether the ever more expansive shot-making of this year’s World Cup, and then England and New Zealand’s set-tos at the start of this summer in all formats, will have a knock-on influence on the oldest cricketing contest of all.

Beyond the boundary, terrestrial television can no longer provide – as it did so wonderfully in 2005 – the exposure cricket will always deserve to many of its ardent converts; instead, the “Twitter-sphere” will spread the word, form the consensus and doubtless cause a ruckus here and there as well.

The blurred lines between the heat of battle and the throng of the crowd, meanwhile, have a new driving force thanks to DRS.

Absent a decade ago, but decidedly not so at the start of the last Ashes in this country – when it dominated a titanic opening Test at Trent Bridge – the technology has added an extra layer of controversy which is sure to play a prominent role at some point this summer.

The noises off, though, will all be secondary when the captains toss up in Cardiff and still more so when someone – a left-hander presumably, looking at the likely line-ups – has to face the first ball of the Ashes.

Success or otherwise, in that moment and then for the next seven weeks, will make or compromise careers.

Among them it is Australia, we are being told, who are sure to dominate after their whitewash victory at home in 2013/14 and England’s overhaul of management, twice over, in the aftermath.

The counter-argument is not quite so persuasive, but bears repeating – as it was by Australia captain Clarke, no less, at his first press conference of the summer.

He has never won the Ashes in England and Australia have been second-best in their last three attempts since 2001.

A more recent potted sequence of respective fortunes is maybe more pertinent.

Since trouncing England two winters ago on the back of the unstoppable Mitchell Johnson’s 37 wickets, at under 14 each, Australia have beaten the world’s leading Test team South Africa away, lost 2-0 to Pakistan in the UAE, and then won 2-0 at home to India and 2-0 in the West Indies just last month.

There is also the small matter of a home World Cup triumph, under Clarke’s captaincy.

England were embarrassingly eliminated from the global tournament before it reached its knockout stages, but have since reinvented themselves in the white-ball formats and edged a thrilling series against World Cup finalists New Zealand this month.

They can perhaps tap into that feelgood factor for the Ashes, albeit with few of those who matched the Kiwis shot for amazing shot included in the Test team.

Of more obvious relevance is the mixed bag of drawn Test series in West Indies and then at home to New Zealand this year, both of which saw England hint at significant improvement only to be hauled back to 1-1 by defeat in the final Test.

So it is that Australian Trevor Bayliss, arriving here less than two weeks before the start of the Ashes to take on his new role, replaces the sacked Peter Moores to work again alongside assistant Paul Farbrace.

It is an intriguing set of circumstances, portrayed as another new era by England under their 2013/14 Ashes-surviving captain Cook, and – with a twist of nationality – an uncanny echo of Australia’s decision to sack Mickey Arthur and appoint Darren Lehmann in a similar time frame before the last series here.

Australia lost that one, of course, and England are favourites to do likewise this time.

No one knows, though; it is all anticipation and guesswork.

Just as in 2005, 1981 ... and 1884 ... we will have to wait for history to be made.

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