A chance to make history, albeit of different sorts, will confront England and Australia when the final Test of this season’s Ashes starts at The Oval in south London on Wednesday.
At 3-0 up with one to play, England have already retained the Ashes and won the series — the first time since the 1950s they’ve won three successive Test campaigns against their oldest rivals.
But they still have plenty to play as they’ve never won four Tests against Australia in England and have never taken any Ashes series by a 4-0 margin although they did win 4-1 in Australia in 1911/12 and in 1928/29 before taking a six-match series against an Australia side weakened by defections to the unofficial World Series Cricket 5-1 in 1978/79.
A result of greater resonance to both current sides is that the last England team to win the Ashes and round off the series with a defeat was Mike Gatting’s side at Sydney in 1987.
Following a narrow victory, Australia won the next eight Ashes series.
England have been forced into making a change after Tim Bresnan, who starred with both bat and ball in the 74-run fourth Test win at Chester-le-Street was ruled out of the rest of the season with a back injury. Fast bowler Chris Tremlett, looking to revive his Test career on his Surrey home ground, is one of three players along with the uncapped duo of all-rounder Chris Woakes and left-arm spinner Simon Kerrigan looking to take Bresnan’s spot.
Australia, who’ve used eight batsmen in a series where the top order has been their Achilles heel, could once again make changes despite being urged to ‘pick and stick’ by the likes of former captain Steve Waugh, who didn’t score a hundred until his 26th Test before becoming a world-class batsman.
Australia captain Michael Clarke said the tourists would give a Test debut to fast-bowling all-rounder James Faulkner and recall Mitchell Starc for the Test. The 23-year-old Faulkner replaces out-of-form batsman Usman Khawaja, who averaged just 19 in three successive Tests, after Australia coach Darren Lehmann warned his failing top-order their places were in danger following the team’s latest collapse.
Tasmania’s Faulk-ner, a left-arm fast-medium bowler and right-hand batsman, has played eight one-day internationals and three T20s.
All-rounder Shane Watson, who started the series as an opener before moving to number six, is now set to bat in the number three position previously occupied by Khawaja.
Meanwhile left-arm quick Starc’s curious tour of alternate Tests continued with this latest recall.