When England's cricketers arrive back in London this week at the end of a dismal Champions Trophy campaign, it is likely that they will be greeted by a chorus of indifference. As we have suspected all year, there's only one contest in the pipeline that matters to English fans, and it has nothing to do with one-day cricket.
A survey conducted by Cricinfo has revealed that a massive 91.3% of English respondents would prefer their country to retain the Ashes than win the World Cup. Only 8.4% believed that the World Cup, which takes place in the Caribbean in March and April next year, was the more significant tournament.
For all their excitement about the Ashes, however, the respondents to the survey were a pretty pessimistic bunch. Only 28.6% believed that England would win the series outright, compared to 47.3% backing Australia to reclaim their crown. But, and it's a big but, 24.1% favour the draw (something that hasn't happened in an Ashes series since 1972) and that would be enough for England.
Nobody's expecting a bore-draw though. Of the predicted scorelines, the most favoured by England fans is 3-1 to Australia (21.1%), while 19.4% back a repeat of last summer's 2-1 triumph. The smart money might well be on the 2-2 draw, however, which has been predicted by 17.4% of the English respondents.
As for the top-scorers and wicket-takers, English uncertainty is reflected in the scattergun nature of their predictions. The favourite in the batting stakes is Andrew Strauss, on 36.6%, but Ian Bell, Alastair Cook and Kevin Pietersen all picked up between 17.4% and 18.4% of the votes, while Andrew Flintoff, curiously, was nominated by less than 1% of the respondents.
Flintoff is, however, backed by 30.4% to be England's leading wicket-taker, with Monty Panesar (22.8%), Steve Harmison (22.4%) and Matthew Hoggard (14.5%) also rated highly.
The dangermen in the Australian team are rather more clear-cut. Ricky Ponting is backed by 55.8% of Englishmen to lead the run-scoring, with Mike Hussey bubbling under on 22.6%, while the bowling is a total no-brainer. A whopping 82.4% back Shane Warne to repeat his heroics of 2005.
Comments
Posted by: Imran Khan on 10/30/2006
this is absoulutely obsured, if this is the case England should retreat from having ICC One Day status and cancel all test matches between them and other nations outside Australia.
Posted by: Anthony on 10/30/2006
This has less to do with the rivalry and more to do with the chances of winning. There is no way the English will win the World Cup, especially if they can't even get out of the group stages of the Champions Trophy. All the highly touted names that have been overhyped by their press corps has backfired, and given that their last bit of glory came at home against Australia, there's an inkling of a feeling that maybe they can repeat. I can't wait to see this team cut down to nothing.
Posted by: Omar Ansari on 10/30/2006
Haha well thats not a surprise, I mean England have lost around 80% of the odi matches they have played in the last couple of years.... if my team showed such results i would probably turn to the cave man version of cricket known as base ball :P
Posted by: madi on 10/30/2006
England never going to win the world cup. All they can do talk. They all talking before go to the competition but as usual they losing. this what happened to football as well. Ashes just another tour game it's not the world cup. Only two teams playing that. It’s not hard to wining than world cup. I guess that’s why fans like it. Because they know that’s the only way to wining the cricket
Posted by: Dave on 10/30/2006
Its funny how the English win one tournament(the last Ashes)and the British public and media forget everything else. Ofcourse they dont care about the World Cup or other ODI's. They cant win any, can they? Have you kept count how many times you have lost to the Aussies in both forms of the game? One tournament does not change anything!
Now ask yourself this, what happens if England lose the Ashes? What excuses will they have remaining? No longer will they be able to say, "We dont care, we're just worried about the Ashes."
I hope the English get thrashed; this should put an end to the whinning.
Posted by: Seepaul on 10/30/2006
I think English fans know that England Cannot win the WC that why they value the "Urn"
Posted by: pat on 10/31/2006
Only cos they have no chance at the World Cup. Come to think of it, the same could be said of their Ashes chances ;)
Posted by: Chris Buduls on 10/31/2006
91.3%?!
I would suspect the number of Australian fans who would prize an Ashes triumph over retaining the world cup would be closer to 100%.
Posted by: salem on 10/31/2006
understandable... considering their odi team have zero hopes of winning the world cup! i'd route for the ashes too if i knew my team sucked so bad in odis
Posted by: Terry Andrews on 11/03/2006
Interesting to see all the comments from non-english posters here.
If having no chance of winning was the reason behind the ashes importance, England shouldn't have bothered trying to win the Ashes the past 20 years
Seems to me there is a lot of jealousy about the Ashes - whilst Ind/Pak series take place in front of sparse crowds, the MCG test will have a 400,000 + attendance.
As an Aussie, i would take not retaining the WC, so long as it meant that we regained the Ashes
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