Reasons to be cheerful (part 3)

The third and final instalment in this little series, with acknowledgments to the late, great Ian Dury.

There are no new boys Normally England take an apprentice to Australia – Bob Willis in 1970-71, Phil DeFreitas in 1986-87. But they have had so many injuries this year that boys who might have been new have already got through their first couple of terms. Alastair Cook, Liam Plunkett and Saj Mahmood were all left out of the original Test squad for Pakistan a year ago, and they now have 20 caps between them. It’s still an inexperienced squad, but at least every member knows how it feels to have Test cricket running through his veins.

England have improved since the Ashes… … in three areas, at least: middle-order batting (nobody is as green now as Ian Bell was then), wicketkeeping (Read is an artist, Jones a journeyman) and slow bowling (same with Panesar and Giles). On the other hand, they have gone backwards in four areas: captaincy (no Vaughan), fast bowling (no Simon Jones), tail-end batting (no journeymen), and fitness (six crocks, rising to seven today if Hoggard’s MRI scan goes badly). Time will tell whether the three areas are more significant than the four, or whether they can turn a couple of them round; their record on that is pretty good.

The Aussies are swaggering again They are hot favourites at all the bookies. Glenn McGrath is making extravagant claims, saying he is bowling faster than ever at the age of 36. And all over Australia, cricket lovers are firing off wildly bullish emails to unsuspecting bloggers. The talk is of 4-1, as if it was still 2002. The Aussies could go into this Ashes series with just the same blithe over-confidence as the last one.