you need to sleep! not good news for us. it depends if you need to sleep! you not good news for us. it depends if you need to sleep! you can - not good news for us. it depends if you need to sleep! you can just - not good news for us. it depends if| you need to sleep! you can just stay you need to sleep! you can ust stay u -i the news reaching us overnight is that james anderson won t be playing in the opening test. england say he s fit, there s no injury and the plan was always to get him ready for the second test in adelaide. so it all begins tonight at the gabba in brisbane and england are looking to win their first ashes down under in ten years. patrick gearey looks at a unique contest. in english imagination, australia means danger. uncomfortable, unfamiliar, uncompromising. english cricketers are used to feeling isolated down under but rarely so literally. they ve had to quarantine and abide by strict and changeable australian covid rules. it s very different to any series w
in, it will be frustrating for these players because specifically around the ashes, that festival is the history, that is what you are remembered for. that first ball. the fact that i am wearing a jacket in december in australia is unusual. there is every chance it will rain most of them are in brisbane. in terms of setting your alarm for midnight, you might have to push it out a bit longer before the bowl is bald. ball is bowled. the fifth test match was cancelled in perth yesterday to be rescheduled, now there is a bidding war between the other states as to who will host a day night test match with a pink ball to finish it in the middle of january. there has not been an ashes series in australia go the distance, until the fifth match, since 1980 to slash 83. i think the team space look vulnerable i think both teams look vulnerable in the batting
away from home, for the first time in 10 years. james anderson was speaking to the project ashes podcast. it s not like years ago when there was such a dominant force in australia that you are going there tentatively thinking you might win if we could just do this or that, but now we have seen them in india, the last two series here, south africa have one here, and it s definitely not an impossible task. plenty of hopes for england and this time next week i will be reporting on the first session, the first day of play in the gabba in brisbane where england have only won twice since the war, so maybe they can turnit since the war, so maybe they can turn it around and breakfast will be the place, wake up and we will be reporting on the ashes as it happens overnight. you reporting on the ashes as it happens overniaht. ., ., , overnight. you won t quite be there. but ou overnight. you won t quite be there. but you can overnight. you won t quite be there. but you can imagine overnight