Pat Cummins is in rare air as an Ashes captain. Can his Dad's Army go around again? | Geoff Lemon
While it took longer than expected on the fifth day in Adelaide, eventually it was done,A series won, the Ashes retained for another year and a half until they next go up for grabs in England,For Pat Cummins, this makes three consecutive Ashes series captained without giving up the urn,The feat leaves him in sparse but fine company: the others to do it are Joe Darling, Don Bradman, Richie Benaud, Mike Brearley, Allan Border and Mark Taylor,It made things neater that Steve Smith missed this third Test, having captained the first two wins in Cummins’ absence, so that it didn’t feel like the full-time captain was swooping in to hoover up the stand-in’s lunch.
Those situations can be odd, like Adam Gilchrist filling in to lead what was very much Ricky Ponting’s team, captaining two wins in India in 2004 before Ponting returned from injury once the series was decided.Who gets credit for the win?Smith and Cummins have both made their contribution to the current result, just as both have contributed throughout a team streak of five series holding the urn, a run dating back to Smith’s batting heroics in 2017-18 just before the tour to South Africa that blew up his full-time captaincy.Australia teams have had only three better Ashes streaks: six series between 1934 and 1950-51, six between 1958-59 and 1968, and eight series between 1989 and 2002-03.Through this time, though, despite three thumping wins at home, what is missing is a series win in England, where Australia have twice retained the trophy 2-2 after dropping the fifth Test at The Oval.The corporate messaging after those draws has stayed upbeat, framing possession of the urn as the most important part of the equation, but the lack of an outright win in England still rankles with the core of players who are yet to experience one despite such long careers.
Take Cummins first, who will be 34 in 2027 and may well still be in charge.If so, he can try to match Bradman as the only captain to hold the urn four times.Mitchell Starc will be 37 but, given the way he has got better and better over the last six years, and given he has bossed this series so far with 22 wickets at 17, it’s not outlandish to think that he can still be a force in a year and a half.Josh Hazlewood and Nathan Lyon now have the longer prices for 2027 given their injury troubles, as players who will be 36 and 39 respectively, but Hazlewood has bowled as well as ever in recent months before the current setback, and Lyon had moments of his best in Adelaide with balls that still drifted, dipped and turned.There is no other spinner in Australia with such attributes.
As for Smith, he’s had a volatile few years in terms of runs and his own apparent interest in the game, and would turn 38 shortly before the next Ashes starts.His enthusiasm for such a mission remains a mystery.The critiques of Australia as Dad’s Army, brushed off before this series, have proven to have some substance.Cummins and Hazlewood went down injured before a ball was bowled, Lyon ripped a hamstring diving in his first match back after a break, Smith had to miss Adelaide with a bout of the wobbles, Usman Khawaja can’t reach catches below his knees and hobbled off twice with a bad back during fielding innings shorter than a Sunday social game.Scott Boland will be 38 next Ashes, the reserve seamers are a few years behind and Cameron Green as the lone twenty-something is short of runs and increasingly short of time to find them.
And yet, that next series is not that far away, and this current team has still smashed up England in near record time.Much note has been taken of a winning span of 11 playing days, and how it equals the two thrashings dished out at the turn of this millennium.All of those trail Warwick Armstrong’s team from 1921, who won the Ashes in eight days of play, although given those Tests only had three scheduled days, their pacing as contests was very different.By deliveries bowled, this year’s win in 786.3 overs was still faster than Armstrong’s team with 791.
5, substantially faster than Steve Waugh’s 2002-03 team with 896.4, and trailed only Waugh’s 2001 tour of England that wrapped things up in 665.1 overs.Smith and Khawaja have played Ashes cricket since 2010 and 2011 respectively, Starc and Lyon since 2013, Hazlewood since 2015, and while Cummins came in latest in 2017-18, he has been the most consistently picked bowler, then the leader, and has never tasted a loss.None of these players needs 2027 to justify their place in the pantheon of this contest, that much now is settled.
But still, the next adventure sits there, a bauble glowing gently on the Christmas tree for now.It will be interesting to see who is drawn by its light.
A fresh take on wine pairings for Christmas dessert
It may well be that you already have a drink that you traditionally like to sip on after dinner (or lunch), and who am I to tell you that needs to change? Even so, I have a few ideas for drinks you might like to try instead.The Guardian’s journalism is independent. We will earn a commission if you buy something through an affiliate link. Learn more.Let’s start with the classics
How to eat, drink and be merry – while pregnant – at Christmas
For a festival with childbirth at its religious heart, it is perverse how much of our traditional Christmas spread isn’t recommended for pregnant women. Pre-pregnancy, this was not something I’d clocked. I was the soft cheese supremo, canape queen – at my happiest with a smoked trout blini in one hand and a champagne flute in the other. Then one day in October, two blue lines appeared on a test result and everything started to change: my body, my future and most pressingly my Christmas.The Guardian’s journalism is independent
Jeremy Lee’s recipe for almond, chocolate and prune tart
A recipe box was rifled through, but, alas, much like shopping for a present last minute, nothing leapt to the fore. Out of the corner of an eye I spied an old folder of pudding menus, all stained and tattered. A wonder at how this might have escaped notice was soon dispelled – unsurprising, really, given the usual state of my desk and shelves – and the page on which it fell open revealed the scribbles for a midwinter pudding menu. And, just like that, as if the scent rose from the page itself, came a memory of an almond, chocolate, walnut and prune tart being lifted from the oven, all mahogany hued and with a few bubbles bursting from the pieces of chocolate among the prunes peeking out.My appetite for almond tart has never waned; be it in a restaurant kitchen or at home, an almond tart is nigh-on inevitable
Creme brulee and chocolate bundt cake: Nicola Lamb’s Christmas crowdpleasers – recipes
Even though our to-do lists are longer and our homes busier than ever, there’s something about Christmas that gives us the extra chutzpah to bake. And not just any baking, but baking for a crowd. So, with this in mind, here are two crowdpleasing recipes – a rich hazelnut “Nutcracker” creme brulee and a resplendent chocolate fondant bundt cake – with a few make-ahead and shortcut secrets to give you a head start.Serve this rich, decadent dessert warm from the oven in the centre of the table, piled with ice-cream (and perhaps pouring cream, too – why not? It’s Christmas!). The batter can be made and kept in the fridge for up to 24 hours, then baked from chilled; add an extra 10 minutes to the cooking time if you do so, though
How to turn excess yoghurt into a silky-smooth dessert – recipe | Waste not
A delicious, gelatine-free panna cotta that saves yoghurt from the waste binI was really shocked to learn from environmental action NGO Wrap that, of the 51,000 tonnes of yoghurt that’s wasted in the UK every year, half of it is in unopened pots! The reason is our old arch enemy, date labels, which can cause confusion and trick us into thinking that perfectly safe yoghurt is not OK to eat. That’s one reason many supermarkets have scrapped use-by dates on the likes of yoghurt, but they still use best-before dates. Remember, if a product doesn’t have a use-by date, always do the sniff test before throwing it away.Today’s recipe is a light, gelatine-free version of panna cotta that’s instead set with agar agar (a type of seaweed), which gives it a soft-set texture. It’s refreshing, deliciously sour and simple to make
Benjamina Ebuehi’s pistachio and cherry meringue cake recipe | The sweet spot
I’m switching up my usual Christmas pavlova this year for a slightly different but equally delicious meringue-based dessert. Discs of pistachio meringue are baked until crisp, then layered with pistachio cream and cherry compote. The meringue softens a little under the cream as it sits, giving it a pleasingly chewy, cake-like texture. A very good option if you’re after a Christmas dessert without chocolate, alcohol or dried fruit.Thanks to the viral Dubai chocolate bar, pistachio creme is quite easy to come by in most supermarkets these days; it’s already sweetened and brings a lovely, soft green colour
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