Have they finally morphed from whingers to winners?
England did just one thing well: they won. Their capture of this skill is precisely why the 2009 Ashes are different, because they bespeak the end of an image of Australian invincibility. We have lost our aura; they have called our bluff. Together with Britain’s ascent at the Beijing Olympics and its build-up to London in 2012, and Australia’s decline in some other headline sports, such as the rugby codes and tennis, the cricket result seems to signal a realignment of the sporting dynamic between the mother country and colony. Warwick Franks, the author of several cricket books and adjunct lecturer at Charles Sturt University, says England’s idealised portrait of Australian sportsmen arose from the early days of white settlement. ”More sunshine, brighter light, drier conditions were held to breed a superior physical type here,” he says. ”The English recruits in the Boer War and World War I were seen to be in appalling physical condition when contrasted with the Australian soldiers.’
