maybe with your internet connection. Anyway, you can't beat quality. You're not going to tell me that the 'fair and balanced' view is superior to the great british broadcasting corporations, are you?

Anyway, is this the worst Australian team for thirty years? or are they trying to lull england into a false sense of security, thinking that is the only possible way they have a chance of beating them? One thing's for sure, only england could contrive to lose to a team this bad, but it looks at the moment as if it will go the same way as the recent rugby game.

What's wrong with your sportsmen, australia? Have you lost your way?

Yeah after being quietly confident ive now lost all hope. Although we very nearly beat India (the so-called best team in the world) in India last month so maybe we're not as bad as we seem atm.

Definitely need to mix up the team. Probably North and Hussey need to go in place of Ferguson and another middle order player

That's funny, up until recently I always thought australia were the best team in the world

Nah we havent been top test team in the world for over a year i think. Im pretty sure we're still top in ODIs though.

Yes.

As an Australian it pains me to say that, but I think it's true to a degree. For me it started in the Olympic swimming pool a few years back. There was a time when we were THE team to be feared, but no longer. The beginning of the end was when The Thorpedo hung up his speedos at the tender age of 24!

Cricket well we could never sustain the dizzying heights achieved by Steve Waugh and Mark 'tubby' Taylor, but to fall as far as that idiot Pontnut is a national disgrace. Don't get me started on Clarke.

Rugby, dunno. Bring back Campo *shrugs*

Nobody really cares about rugby and soccer though. They're not even the 4th most popular sports in Australia

Dizzying heights of tubby and steve waugh? Didnt we beat the poms 5-0 with punter at the helm? Tubby is the real national disgrace imo. Australian of the year my arse

Im not really so fussed at us not being top anymore. We have a lot of depth in Australian cricket and once they start clearing out the team and blooding some talent I think we'll be back winning in no time

ive got a horrible feeling england will lose. australia being the underdogs etc is probably what they want and i can just see them comign good at the right time like they always seem to do

Heh don't get me wrong, I hope we do manage to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.

I guess my main qualm is, in relation to Menace's earlier post; is that I feel Australian sports 'in general' has slipped down a rung compared to the 90s when we were seen as one of the greatest sporting nations in the world.

1999 in particular. We held a stupid number of world champions. But i think even now we do a lot better than countries with larger populations and resources. I mean look at the commonwealth games (i know i know, theyre lame) but we thoroughly dominated everyone even with people pulling out. Thats a decent effort

Absolutely, pound per pound we still rock - no one can rock more per capita.

I guess this Australian sporting-identity malaise of mine wont fully recover until we win the World Cup 2022 our best chance perhaps.....

If only everyone played the best sport in the world.... Aussie rules footy

If only Australia played only football (ahem Soccer) we'd win the World Cup for sure

For our masculinities sake I sure hope we dont

I guess alot of canines would also be disappointed also

yeah those rugby league dudes are a disgrace. Real facepalm material there

Jeeze that was a bit of a surprise. Great to see the siddler kicking arse. He's definitely my favourite player in the lineup ever since that seth african tour about 3 years ago. Such an aussie country boy

Can see England still doing ok tomorrow. Gabba always gives the bowlers a chance

Nice, as much as I despise pontclarke I don't want the poms winning, gloating, boasting.

I've come back around to come on aussie come on, come on

Totally ballsed this up, thought it was kicking off tonight. Difficult to judge without seeing it, but 260 doesn't seem enough, but we won't know until the Aussies bat. Surprised at Strauss, delighted for Cook and Bell. Well done to Siddle, test hattricks are very few and far between and it seems to have turned the tables somewhat, 19o-odd for 4 isn't too shabby on a lively wicket, 200-odd for 7 definitely is.

Sounds like a typical England series.

Hype them up to no end because they had some good results.

Phrases like 'THIS IS THE BEST CHANCE ENGLAND HAVE HAD IN YEARS TO WIN THE ASHES DOWN UNDER' would be required.

When they ballz it up call for a review into the sorry state of English cricket.

Its the mentality of english public in general. Its just like the soccer (albiet the cricket side are a lot more competitive globally than the english soccer team), where the expectation rediculously outweighs the talent of the team. If the press and the entire country looked at their chances logically they wouldn't put so much pressure on the team.

The english team on paper are better than the aussies at the moment. So they deserve to be favourites and will probably do well this ashes series (probably will win - unfort. for me ). But england havent won in Australia for a looooooong time and people in england seem to overlook that.