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Official - Road to Ashes 2023

Ashes81

State Vice-Captain
Historically the second Ashes test was always at Lord's. Before nuffy grounds like Southampton, Cardiff and Durham became a thing, the standard sort of six test program was

Trent Bridge
Lord's
Headingley
England's Brisbane
Old Trafford
The Oval

Then when they initially went back to 5 tests it seemed like OT missed out at times and it was more

England's Brisbane
Lord's
Trent Bridge
Headingley
The Oval

This series I gather Nottingham misses out and OT is in.
Grounds now have to bid for tests which puts the likes of Trent Bridge at a disadvantage because its both a relatively small ground and doesn't have the same hospitality opportunities as the London grounds in particular.

The Welsh Gov used to put cash into the Cardiff bids for Ashes tests as it generates alot of cash for the area, but that doesn't happen any longer so Cardiff wont be holding tests anytime soon.

As ever it's cash and not cricketing reasons that decides the venues.
 

Burgey

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Harsh on Trent Bridge imo when all the UK grounds are tiny anyway. interesting Cardiff pulled the pin on the bidding though.

The money’s in TV rights for the most part these days no matter where the game is played.
 

Molehill

Cricketer Of The Year
The money’s in TV rights for the most part these days no matter where the game is played.
Thought I'd do a quick check on this out of interest. Lord's holds 30k and is probably charging on average £200 per ticket per day. That's £24m of ticket revenue from the sold out first 4 days. In the current TV deal in this country, Sky pay I believe £220m per year to ECB. I presume that Australia (and probably India too) will have paid a fair amount for this series as well.

So you're absolutely right and despite Lord's charging a fortune and raking in millions, it's still dwarfed by the TV deals.

Although does mean that total Ashes ticket revenue is probably around £80m.

Just out of interest, how much is a ticket for the Ashes in Australia?
 

ashley bach

Cricketer Of The Year
In 2019, numbers 4,5,6,7 essentially averaged about 200 runs per innings. Now admittedly, that was largely due to Smith being ridiculous. But given they never faced a single ball from Anderson in that series, is it wrong to think they'll struggle to match that this time around?
Are you really that confident a 41 year old man hobbling in to bowl will be the answer to your's and Englands prayers?
 

Adders

Cricketer Of The Year
Are you really that confident a 41 year old man hobbling in to bowl will be the answer to your's and Englands prayers?
Mate, seriously!! I rate you as a poster but that's either a really crap wind up or just a really dumb thing to say.

That Ol mate hobling in to bowl has been doing pretty good for himself of late. You should check him out.
 

GIMH

Norwood's on Fire
Harsh on Trent Bridge imo when all the UK grounds are tiny anyway. interesting Cardiff pulled the pin on the bidding though.

The money’s in TV rights for the most part these days no matter where the game is played.
We should play at Trent Bridge because our Ashes record is usually decent there too, in modern times.
 

ashley bach

Cricketer Of The Year
Mate, seriously!! I rate you as a poster but that's either a really crap wind up or just a really dumb thing to say.

That Ol mate hobling in to bowl has been doing pretty good for himself of late. You should check him out.
Firstly mate unlike many others here who take the piss, I really admire and rate Jimmy.
It's not a wind up at all but honestly do tend to believe too much faith is being put on him here by English supporters.
Seriously, as good as he's been for many years, it's not going to be easy on him, particularly as the series goes on.
He may well have to take a test or two off because of the strain he may endure playing 5 straight tests in a row at his age.
 

ashley bach

Cricketer Of The Year
Also it'll be 4 months since he played in NZ, while that doesn't seem long ago, at his age it really is a long time between drinks,
 

Molehill

Cricketer Of The Year
Also it'll be 4 months since he played in NZ, while that doesn't seem long ago, at his age it really is a long time between drinks,
We'll know very shortly, but he's rumoured to be playing against Essex for Lancashire today. There's a Test against Ireland before the Ashes and he could play at least 4 FC matches if he wanted. The one thing about so much CC cricket in April/May means that no one is short come the First Test (unless they're carrying drinks in the IPL like Root/Stokes).

Are you really that confident a 41 year old man hobbling in to bowl will be the answer to your's and Englands prayers?
He's not an answer to prayers, he's a freak. No one expected him to still be around for this series, let alone arguably bowling the best he's ever done. But he is, and to think he won't have a major say on the series if he remains fit is churlish.
 

Burgey

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It’s not necessarily churlish though given his age, just because **** comes at you so fast in sport as you age.

By that I mean he’ll probably have a good series if stays fit, but pro sport is definitely an endeavour where you can get real old real quick, so it’s not unreasonable to put a bit of a rider on how you expect him to go.
 

Adders

Cricketer Of The Year
Firstly mate unlike many others here who take the piss, I really admire and rate Jimmy.
It's not a wind up at all but honestly do tend to believe too much faith is being put on him here by English supporters.
Seriously, as good as he's been for many years, it's not going to be easy on him, particularly as the series goes on.
He may well have to take a test or two off because of the strain he may endure playing 5 straight tests in a row at his age.
If the old man can take his wickets @ 18 or whatever it was in Pakistan on the roadiest of roads then I think he'll handle himself just fine. You're right though he probably won't play all 5.......he can rest his tired old bones for the last 2 once we're 3 zip.
 

Molehill

Cricketer Of The Year
It’s not necessarily churlish though given his age, just because **** comes at you so fast in sport as you age.

By that I mean he’ll probably have a good series if stays fit, but pro sport is definitely an endeavour where you can get real old real quick, so it’s not unreasonable to put a bit of a rider on how you expect him to go.
I suspect him to have more of an impact than 2019. At the moment there's less of an injury cloud over him compared to Hazlewood.

Anyway, Anderson, Broad and Woakes all playing County Championship games starting today (along with Crawley, Duckett and Pope). So the prep begins....
 

Burgey

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Thought I'd do a quick check on this out of interest. Lord's holds 30k and is probably charging on average £200 per ticket per day. That's £24m of ticket revenue from the sold out first 4 days. In the current TV deal in this country, Sky pay I believe £220m per year to ECB. I presume that Australia (and probably India too) will have paid a fair amount for this series as well.

So you're absolutely right and despite Lord's charging a fortune and raking in millions, it's still dwarfed by the TV deals.

Although does mean that total Ashes ticket revenue is probably around £80m.

Just out of interest, how much is a ticket for the Ashes in Australia?
Yeah depends on the ground and where you want to sit I guess. You can get general admission tix at a reasonable price like Adders said, right through to seats in the better grandstands which are like $150-180 or so.

I’m not exactly sure of the precise prices these days at the scg though. I guess most of our grounds can pitch it a bit lower than in Blighty because the capacities are a fair bit bigger. SCG these days holds about 50k, Perth is up around 60, Adelaide 53. Melbourne is up around 100.

Not sure about the Gabba but it’s being rebuilt for the Olympics anyway so I don’t imagine it’ll be small. Always got to be careful counting crowds up there because Qlders all have two heads so it can be a bit deceptive
 

Spark

Global Moderator
Not sure about the Gabba but it’s being rebuilt for the Olympics anyway so I don’t imagine it’ll be small. Always got to be careful counting crowds up there because Qlders all have two heads so it can be a bit deceptive
Gabba has bigger issues than its capacity anyway
 

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