A short twelve months ago, I was crowing about receiving a present for Christmas of the DVD of England's national cricket team's famous victory over the mighty Australians in that summer's "Ashes" contest. For a generation, Australia had seemed unbeatable, and yet England had done just that. Finally! Downtrodden, perpetual losers England were at last worldbeaters.

Well, as of today, England no longer hold the Ashes, and in fact by no stretch of the imagination could they be called worldbeaters. Australia have, in fact, beaten England in all five games they have played, equalling a record for annihilating the Poms set way back in 1920-1921. England, whose Ashes squad had been wracked by injury and had suffered perhaps even more from over-confidence, simply weren't up to the task of taking on some of the greats of the modern game, such as the now retiring Shane Warne, Glen McGrath, and Justin Langer, and the insuperable Ricky Ponting and Michael Hussey.

The result is that England will have to go back to the drawing board, fire a whole load of people, and start again, next summer, against the Indians. As for the Ashes: the English will have to wait until 2009 to try to regain them. Right now, they just need to sit in them for a while.