Apologies for any lack of enthusiasm in the writing of this blog entry. It’s hard for me to muster much excitement about cricket today as I’ve just witnessed England sinking 3-0 down to Australia and losing the Ashes. On the upside, I can at least salvage a degree of pride from my fictional version of the England Cricket team. Yes, I can create a world where Freddy is on top form with both the bat and ball, where Geraint Jones can score runs and catch, and where an Australian team might actually have some visible weakness.

As you may recall, my fictional Ashes is currently levelled at 1-1 after a fantabulous fight back by my England heroes at Brisbane. I decide to keep the same team for this time around with some minor adjustments. My real life annoyance with Duncan Fletcher’s faith in Geraint Jones ensures he remains excluded from my team and if only the real life manager had followed my expert lead and played Monty earlier, perhaps we wouldn’t be in this situation…oh never mind, it’s only a game right?

Anyway, back to the “real” game of animated stats and I’m finding my enthusiasm’s beginning to wane. I recklessly rush through the first innings, not bothering to change my field settings and using the same bowlers until they drop to the ground of exhaustion. By the time we get through to the second innings I’m trailing Australia by 250 runs and facing a not entirely dissimilar situation to the real life England team. At least I can tell myself that if I lose this it’s only 2-1. The onslaught continues, as does my general apathy towards cricket of any type, and I lose rather two easily and with a general cloud of gloom that has merely compounded my own real-life cricket misery. 2-1 down…..bring on the Boxing Day test….bah-humbug!