Flintoff's domination, and Warne's one-man act

Head-to-head contests
Andrew Flintoff's domination of Adam Gilchrist was perhaps the one contest which influenced the result of the Ashes more than any other, but Flintoff was as effective against the other left-handers in the Australian line-up. He ended up as England's star bowler not only because he took the maximum number of wickets, but also because he nailed their top-order batsmen the most number of times - 18 of his 24 wickets were of batsmen in the top seven, against whom his average was an incredible 23.72, almost four better than the overall average. Against the four left-handers in the Australian top order, Flintoff conceded just 18.57 per wicket: Gilchrist averaged 21.25 (85 runs, four dismissals), Justin Langer 23.50 (47, 2), Matthew Hayden 16.25 (65, 4) and Simon Katich 15.75 (63, 4). Against the top-order right-handers he was less successful, averaging 41.75, primarily due to the fact that Michael Clarke managed 60 runs off him without being dismissed.

If Flintoff took care of the top order, then Simon Jones was king when it came to tackling the tail. His ability to bowl it fast and swing it both ways meant that even the recognised batsmen struggled to tackle him, but he was more than a handful for the tail, with his eight lower-order wickets costing him a mere 13.13 apiece. Here's further proof of how well Flintoff and Jones complemented each other - Clarke, the only batsman who escaped Flintoff's clutches, fell to Jones three times, at an average of 15.67. Matthew Hoggard played his part well too, nailing 13 top-order wickets, with Clarke and Hayden falling to him three times each.

All this meant that the patchy form of Steve Harmison, reckoned to be England's only strike bowler when the series began, didn't bother the team much. Harmison was the only regular bowler who didn't dismiss Gilchrist even once through the series - in fact, Gilchrist only played 11 deliveries from him, and got him away for 10 runs, an indication of how Harmison slipped down England's bowling ladder. He may have hit Langer on the body a few times, but both Australian openers had a pretty good time against him otherwise - together they scored 183 off him, and Langer fell to him just once, while Hayden had an unblemished record against him. Harmison did have his bunny, though, with Katich falling three times for 31 runs, an average of 10.33.

If England had various wicket-taking options throughout the series, then Australia's began and ended with Shane Warne and Glenn McGrath. Together, they accounted for 59 out of the 93 wickets taken by all bowlers, at an exceptional average of 20.97. Australia's problem, and one which turned out to be insurmountable at the end, was the support seamers - Brett Lee, Michael Kasprowicz, Jason Gillespie and Shaun Tait managed only 32 wickets among them at 49.44.

With McGrath missing out on two matches and the support cast so ineffective, Warne was often battling England all by himself, and finished with a Murali-like haul of 40 wickets, that's an average of eight per game. (It also offers an indication of how many more wickets Warne would have had in his career had he been part of a less potent attack.)

A look at some of Warne's bowling feats: he was the only bowler from either team to nail a batsman six times - Andrew Strauss and Ashley Giles both fell to him on six occasions, while Marcus Trescothick was dismissed by him five times. In fact, Warne took the first wicket in England's innings six times - twice each in the second and fourth Tests, when McGrath was missing, and then both times again at The Oval.

The batsman who played him most successfully was his Hampshire team-mate, Kevin Pietersen, who ended up with a splendid average of 51 against him (62 of which came in the final innings of the series). Geraint Jones, Andrew Flintoff and Michael Vaughan played him pretty well too, as the table below indicates.

Against England's top seven, though, McGrath was an even better bet than Warne, taking his 15 wickets at less than 24 apiece, whereas Warne's 25 came at 28.36. And McGrath certainly won his battle against Flintoff, dismissing him three times at the cost of just 20 runs.

Brett Lee, the other bowler expected to threaten England, had his moments, but his aggression also meant plenty of run-scoring opportunities, which the batsmen made full use of. Trescothick (154 off 250 balls, one dismissal) and Flintoff (120 off 123 balls, one dismissal) made merry, but Lee had good stats against Pietersen (135 runs, four dismissals), and those numbers would have looked even better had Warne not dropped that slip chance on the last day at The Oval.