The Ashes Crown The Year Again

A glorious summer beckons but make the most of it for this is the twilight of test cricket

Trigger warning: this is a post about cricket and so therefore unlikely to appeal to all of you. But, look, who cares about Boris Johnson or Rishi Sunak or the SNP or here-today-gone-tomorrow politicians when there is an Ashes series for the ages underway. Politics will return soon; let us enjoy its absence for a moment.

Seventy years ago the Ashes capped a coronation year of wonders. A new age beckoned, signalled by the crowning of a young and radiant queen, the conquest of Everest and, at long, long last, the repatriation of the little urn for the first time since 1932-33.

Douglas Jardine was the only person to solve the problem of Don Bradman in 20 years of (war-interrupted) cricket and for that reason alone he should be considered England’s greatest-ever captain. Ben Stokes is not there yet even if his reign has thus far been an uncommonly interesting and thrilling one.

Jardine, cricket’s Iron Duke, would not have declared at 393/8 on the first evening of the first test of an Ashe…