The Ashes

I wasn't really planning to say much about the Ashes -- the legendary series of five-day cricket matches between England and Australia currently taking place Down Under -- because Australia practically always wins the Ashes when it's at home. The last time England won the Ashes in Australia was during the 1986-87 matches. This is what has happened in the five Ashes series played in Australia since then:

1990-91: Australia 3 wins, England 0 wins, 2 draws
1994-95: Australia 3 wins, England 1 win, 1 draw
1998-99: Australia 3 wins, England 1 win, 1 draw
2002-03: Australia 4 wins, England 1 win
2006-07: Australia 5 wins
Total for five series: Australia 18 wins, England 3 wins, 4 draws

See? Not all that interesting.

But England did upset Australia to win the Ashes the last time the series was played in England -- back in 2009 -- so I thought I would at least see how it is going. It turns out that England has gotten off to a pretty decent start. You will recall that each match lasts for five days -- or two innings, whichever comes first. In the first match, played in Brisbane, Australia was ahead 481-260 after the first innings, but England scored 517 runs in the second innings for a total of 777, and Australia could only score 107 in their second innings for before time ran out. Since the two innings were not completed, the match ended in a draw -- a great result for England.

So there are four matches left. Here is when and where they will be played:

December 3-7: Adelaide Oval, Adelaide
December 16-20: WACA Ground, Perth
December 26-30: Melbourne Cricket Ground, Melbourne
January 3-7: Sydney Cricket Ground, Sydney

One final point: we Americans now live in a world where many events -- such as the Orange and Sugar Bowls -- now have corporate sponsors. But we are not alone. The Ashes -- which have been contested since the 19th Century -- are now officially known as the "Vodafone Ashes Series."