The difference between the sides

Is bugger all. England should have won, but the ball didn’t swing. This essentially rules James Anderson and Graham Onions out of the attack.

Stuart Broad can’t bowl.

Freddie’s legs are stuck together with blu-tak.

Graeme Swann is in the side for his sledging.

So, we have a one-dimensional attack that is entirely dependent on swing and occasional burst of Flintofian genius.

The Australian batsmen look comfortable and unflustered in favourable conditions. Of course, they lunge around like panicked orang-utans when the ball moves a bit.

English batsmen look a bit rubbish, they are all-weather rubbish though. It’s the non-batsmen where the Australian bowling runs out ideas – at least, once the tail steps forth, the Ozzlers replace their “line and length” ideas with “long” and “hop”.

So, the outcome of this season much depends on how overcast it is. If the weather’s bad, England wins; if the sun shines, Australia wins.

Now, in completely unrelated news, the Met Office revised their seasonal forecast for August from a scorcher in April, to a wash-out this July.

Is a terrible summer a price worth paying for the Ashes? The all-powerful English weathermen think so. And, fair play to them, I say.