The best (and worst) Ashes cameo appearances in history

The Dukes of Edgbaston

Reverse swing was fundamental to England’s 2005 win, but it was the ball which did nothing at all that changed the course of the series. Glenn McGrath had no answer to the most innocuous of deliveries on the first morning of the Edgbaston Test, collapsing in a crumpled heap and rupturing ligaments in his right ankle after standing on a stray cricket ball in the warm-up.

Having been unplayable at Lord’s, the curse was suddenly broken. McGrath was sidelined for two Tests and averaged 36 for the remainder of the series. JH

England’s 12th man

Here in England, in the backyard of Bubbles, Eddie the Eagle and Liz Truss, it’s perfectly natural to leaven our own inadequacies by elevating the plucky no-hoper.

While it’s much harder to picture those Type A beefcakes in the other room doing the same, here in England the limby sub in the baggy shirt is our guy: we all like to think we’re Gary Pratt, swooping in from obscurity to run out the great Ponting; failing that, we’ll definitely have some of Bilal Shafayat standing mid-pitch in a yellow bib, sifting through chestfuls of batting gloves, soaking up time and volleys of abuse. Most likely, of course, we’re Stephen Peters, lurking with intent with minutes to go, gathering cleanly, aiming and firing, and missing altogether. PW

Ashton’s big day out

A curveball selection for the series opener in 2013, Ashton Agar had made only a handful of first-class appearances when he was parachuted in for his Test debut at Trent Bridge and the 19-year-old spinner etched his name in Ashes history with an innings of brazen brilliance.

Arriving at the crease with Australia struggling on 117-9, Agar dominated a 163-run stand with Phillip Hughes, eventually being dismissed for 98 – still the highest score by a No.11 in Test cricket – after smoking 14 sumptuous boundaries. “Was I kicking myself when I got out? Not really, I was absolutely delighted,” he said. But the joy was short-lived: Agar was dropped one Test later and hasn’t played in the Ashes since. JH

Richard Ellison in ’85

He of the Magnum moustache and Brookside perm, stealing the ’85 Ashes with a four-wicket spell of late-swinging Englishness in the evening sunshine at Birmingham that saw him clean-bowl Allan Border with a beautiful break back for his 10th wicket in the game. He only played five more Tests, and was done with cricket by 33, but that corner of Edgbaston, and Border’s off-bail, would always be his. PW

Fireman Sam

The chaos that surrounded England’s 2021/22 Ashes omnishambles was perhaps best demonstrated by Sam Billings’s 820km drive from the Gold Coast to Sydney in the dying embers of a truly miserable tour. With Buttler and Bairstow unable to keep wicket, an SOS was sent to the Kent stumper shortly before he boarded a flight back to the UK following a stint in the Big Bash. He dutifully answered the call, the only snag being he couldn’t risk a flight because of the rising number of Covid cases and instead embarked on a 12-hour journey by car.

After a spell in quarantine and rigorous testing Billings eventually received his Test cap at Hobart, where England succumbed inside three days and slumped to a 4-0 defeat. JH

The lonesome death of Simon Kerrigan

The Oval has witnessed a few sporting deaths and Simon Kerrigan’s in 2013 is right up there; a sweaty, scarring fever-dream of a debut, Kerrigan naked and tiny in a foreign field, gripping a strange orb with clammy palms as far off in the distance Shane Watson grows more multitudinous, the nightmarish yips made flesh on the grandest of stages.

A Test career came and went in the totality of 48 balls, from which 53 runs were pilfered; it’s testament to Kerrigan’s resilience that he was still taking first-class wickets last summer. PW

Colly stops the wobbles

England’s 2005 triumph was built around Michael Vaughan’s determination to meet fire with fire but when it came down to the decider at The Oval, with the hosts needing only a draw to secure their first Ashes win for 18 years, the skipper went safety-first, drafting in an extra batter for the injured Simon Jones. Paul Collingwood faced 77 deliveries and scored a grand total of 17 runs, merrily scooping up an MBE as Shane Warne labelled his accolade an “embarrassment”. JH

Broad’s copy of the Brisbane Courier-Mail

When a psychological study was done of each member of England’s Ashes squad ahead of the 2013/14 series, Stuart Broad was one of only three players fitting the profile of someone who would thrive in the cauldron of Australian ultra-violence. Already despised across large swathes of the land for his nick-it-to-first-slip-and-shrug in the previous series – later estimated to be the first person in Ashes history to stand his ground after he’s edged it – Broad was delighted to find himself de-platformed by Brisbane’s ever-balanced Courier-Mail newspaper.

And so, when ‘the English medium pacer’ took a five-bag on the first morning of the series, he swaggered into that evening’s press conference brandishing a copy of the issue, with its iconic front page featuring a STOP sign slapped across Broad’s beamingly smug visage. He’s been riling them up forever, even going so far as to declare the last series void. Never lose it, Stu. PW

The wrong Taylor

Australian cricket was in need of some sparkle after the hosts were thrashed by an innings in the Boxing Day Test of 1986, losing the series in the process. And so, when the selectors turned to Peter Taylor, a 30-year-old spinner struggling to find a place in the New South Wales side, it led journalists to speculate they’d dialled the wrong number and had intended to call up his namesake and NSW teammate, Mark.

Given that Peter had made just six first-class appearances, the bemusement was understandable, but his selection proved a minor masterstroke. He took eight wickets on debut at Sydney and made a crucial 42 in Australia’s second innings to claim the Player of the Match award in a morale-boosting win. The ‘wrong Taylor’ went on to have a solid international career, playing 13 Tests and 83 ODIs before being usurped by Shane Warne. JH

Hollies’ only Ashes Test

“And Hollies pitches the ball up slowly and... he’s bowled. Bradman. Bowled. Hollies. Nought.” John Arlott there, struck dumb by the consequences of Eric Hollies’s speculative googly. The pint-sized wrist spinner, 36 at the time, would never play another Ashes Test. Didn’t need to. Bradman bowed to no man, except little Eric Hollies. PW

The freaker

At 3.15pm on Monday August 4th 1975, Lord’s was basking in 33-degree-heat on the fourth day of the second Ashes Test. With the game heading for a draw, the soporific afternoon session was given a jumpstart of sorts by one Michael Angelow. The 24-year-old had imbibed plenty of ale by mid-afternoon and duly accepted a bet from his surrounding (Australian) supporters. He slid free from his garments and sprinted onto the pitch in just his socks and trainers.

Hurtling past a good length (ahem) he headed for the stumps, which he duly hurdled with aplomb... plums clacking over the bails like Newton’s pendulum. The moment was captured on camera and called by John Arlott in the commentary box, who, caught up in the excitement, forgot the word ‘streaker’. “We’ve got a freaker! Not very shapely and it’s masculine...” The bet was for £20 – the exact amount that Angelow was charged by the magistrate for his misdemeanour. JW

X-man misses the spot

“I don’t think I’m going to take 800 wickets in Test cricket,” conceded Xavier Doherty after he was called up for the 2010/11 Ashes, “but I hope to make some impact.” His first-class bowling average – 48 at the time – backed up his suggestion that he probably wasn’t the next Warne, but the Aussies hoped the fact that he bowled spin with his left-arm would be enough to nullify Kevin Pietersen.

It quickly became clear, though, that the ‘X-Man’ possessed no superhuman abilities, the Tasmanian returning second-innings figures of 0-107 on debut at Brisbane and then going the distance at Adelaide (1-158 from 27 overs) as Pietersen mercilessly tucked into him on his way to a brutal double-century. JH

Reginald’s obit

In the 1882 Oval Test that started the whole thing, Fred ‘The Demon’ Spofforth snatched victory for Australia in a finish so tense that it caused a fatal heart attack for one spectator and another to gnaw through the handle of his brolly.

England’s shock defeat even inspired the booze-soaked scribe Reginald Shirley Brooks to set aside his drink and curtail his womanising just long enough to pen the now-famous 40-word satirical obituary in The Sporting Times. Brooks died of his ‘excesses’ in 1888, aged just 33, but his playful prose afforded him Ashes mortality that would be the envy of his more dedicated peers. JW

Mistaken identity

Ashley Kerekes, a 22-year-old babysitter from Massachusetts, found herself at the centre of a social media frenzy during the 2010/11 Ashes when her Twitter handle led to her being confused with Test cricket’s longest-running rivalry. “Check profiles before you send mentions, it’s incredibly annoying and rude,” Ashley tweeted from her account, @theashes. And her frustration grew as the mentions flooded in. “I’M NOT A FREAKING CRICKET MATCH!!!!” she screamed at the Twittersphere.

Happily, though, things turned out rather well for Ashley. With #gettheashestotheashes gaining traction, she was given complimentary flights to Sydney to see what all the fuss was about where she appeared on Test Match Special, met the Aussie PM and launched her own t-shirt range. JH

Percy’s elevation

The 1926 series was locked at 0-0 with one match to play when England’s selectors decided to hit the red button. They made five changes for the decider at The Oval, including recalling 48-year-old Wilfred Rhodes, a member of the selection panel, after a five-year absence. But the appointment of Percy Chapman as skipper, in place of the ousted Arthur Carr, caused the most puzzlement.

The Kent dasher had almost no captaincy experience and had been dropped from the side only a match earlier. “Well, it’s news to me, complete news,” he replied when a reporter called to drop the bombshell. “Are you absolutely sure?” Percy cantered to 49 in England’s first innings and guided his side to a 289-run victory to take the series. Chapman went on to captain England in 17 Tests which included only two defeats and a 4-1 drubbing of Australia in 1928/29. JH

Punter snaffles Vaughan

Hocking up saliva into his hands and rubbing them in the dirt at silly point with features scrunched into a snarl, Ricky Ponting played the game hard. Level at one apiece in the ’05 series, you were more likely to see a sow somersaulting in the clouds above Trent Bridge than a flicker of a smile creep across Punter’s chops. That was until he took matters, and the ball, into his own hands towards the end of day one.

With his opposite number Michael Vaughan having purred to a half-century, Ponting – with four Test wickets to his name across the best part of a decade, each celebrated with uncharacteristic abandon – brought himself on for a trundle. In the fifth over of his spell, he got the ball to shape away from a swishing Vaughan, who feathered an edge through to Gilchrist. A moment of pure elation for Ponting, who wheeled away in ecstasy. Off Vaughan trudged, destined to be called ‘Rabbit’ by his Aussie counterpart whenever the two met in the years to come. JW

The ComBat

A cricket bat, made of aluminium? Why ever not?! Dennis Lillee’s decision in 1979 to promote his mate’s innovation in a Test match backfired when he clumped a drive off Botham and the ball, having made a terrible clanging noise, failed to reach the boundary.

Mike Brearley complained that the ball was getting damaged, Lillee got narked, and when his own captain Greg Chappell – peeved that Lillee’s shot had only resulted in three runs – came on to the pitch to demand he use a wooden one, Lillee hurled the offending article 40 yards away. The ComBat, swiftly declared illegal, was never seen again, and Lillee ended up with a garage full of unused gear. PW

Sydney’s grab

Sydney Copley’s career was going nowhere fast when he was summoned to perform 12th-man duties for England at Trent Bridge in 1930. Aged 24, he’d made a few unremarkable appearances for the Notts second XI but his agility in the outfield had caught the eye and when Harold Larwood went down with gastritis on day four, his chance to shine arrived. Chasing an unlikely target, Stan McCabe was refusing to go down gently and Maurice Tate warned Copley to watch out if he pitched it short. Sure enough, McCabe launched a short delivery from Tate towards mid-on and suddenly all eyes were on Copley.

“Stan played it hard and low, not more than six inches off the ground,” he recalled. “I made many yards to reach it and with a terrific effort I seized the ball and turned a somersault, still clinging to the ball.” England went on to win but this was as good as it got for Sydney. He made his first-class debut the following week before drifting away from the professional game without making any further appearances. JH

Beefy gets the gig

Perennial Ashes bit-part player, Lord Ian Botham, was handed another cameo just in time for the last series, but this time by close chum and occasional PM Boris Johnson, who gave his Brexit-clinching helpmeet the role of the UK government’s official trade ambassador to Australia.

The then international trade secretary Liz Truss, making her second appearance in these pages, cheerfully declared that Beefy would “bat for business Down Under” by boosting exports and promoting investment on the back of the two countries’ “historic trade deal”, an agreement which, when it kicked in earlier this year, was met with a fierce backlash from many British farmers, who felt their own beef had been seriously undervalued. Never. PW

George Davis is everywhere

For a time in the mid-Seventies, George Davis was the most famous alleged criminal in the land, whose conviction for armed robbery at the London Electricity Board offices in Ilford led to a concerted campaign of activism from Davis’s associates to quash the verdict.

And so, on the final day of the 1975 Leeds Test, with England hopeful of cleaning up the Aussie tail and chasing down a target, fans turned up to find the words ‘SORRY IT [HAD] TO BE DONE’ daubed on the walls of the ground, followed by the legend: ‘FREE GEORGE DAVIS’, while inside the ground, ground staff surveyed the unsalvageable wreckage of the pitch, dug up overnight and its potholes filled with oil.

As for Davis, in 1976 the home secretary Roy Jenkins granted his early release on account of insufficient and unreliable evidence; two years later, however, Davis pleaded guilty to an armed bank raid in Tottenham and served seven years, and three years after that he was jailed again, this time for stealing mailbags. PW

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