Ashes XIs

The best teams of Ashes matches

This guy almost made the team, but didn’t. Over to Michael for his side.

Michael Henderson

I have chosen these teams with head and heart, which compete for mastery. Statistics matter, and so does memory. Matthew Hayden was a productive batsman; I didn’t enjoy watching him. Kevin Pietersen was a brilliant strokeplayer; he was also selfish and a destructive presence.

To borrow from Ken Tynan, who was comparing Neil Harvey and ‘Winston Place of Lancashire’, I would rather watch Mark Waugh make 20 than Hayden (or Steve Smith) make a century. Taste – there’s no cure for it.

England

1. Geoffrey Boycott

When Raymond Illingworth’s team won a six-Test series in 1970/1, Boycott was at his best. Partnered by John Edrich, with Brian Luckhurst coming at first wicket down, England blunted the Australian bowlers with three openers. Boycott played his best cricket that winter. When he returned to the team in the summer of 1977, having spent three years impersonating Achilles at the gates of Troy, he made his 100^th first-class century at Headingley. In August 1982, two months short of his 42^nd birthday, he took another century off them at the Oval.