BY DR HERMAN

The Ashes are over.

Five consecutive comprehensive ass whoopings. Ass whooping after ass whooping after ass whooping. Not one of the five test was close. Not even a little bit close. Not even if you close your eyes and believe really really hard close. Heck, the last two Australia lost were over in the first session of day one. Heck the first fucking hour. A five day test match, functionally no longer a contest in an hour. Yet the series finished 3-2. What the actual fuck? How the fuck? Why the fuck?

To be honest, I’m still not really sure what happened. I have absolutely no idea if what we just witnessed was a good series, a fucking great series, a bad series, an embarrassment of a series or something else entirely, like a chipmunk. Or maybe a platypus. Entertaining, but completely, utterly and thoroughly bizarre. Henceforth, these will be known as the platypus Ashes. The Ashes that made bugger all sense.

Did we learn anything? Why do you keep asking yourself questions? I don’t know, did we? Fuck man…. Most of the obvious lessons the we “learnt” weren’t really lessons at all. Having both Johnson and Starc in a test bowling attack means it will be unbalanced. No shit, we told you that a year ago and then at the start of the Ashes and then during the Ashes and we weren’t even one of the first 500 people to call Danos Direct to point it out. We didn’t even get a free set of steak knives and a nurtribullet. The attack is better balanced when you pick someone like Siddle who can bowl line and length and doesn’t just spray balls randomly in the vague direction of the batsman. Smith and Root are good. English bowlers are good on English decks. Australian batsmen can’t play the moving ball and love collapsing. Broad has the most punchable face in cricket. Nothing new there…

No the big questions to come out of the fuzzy, mystical, yet enjoyable confusion of the Platypus Ashes are of a more existential nature. Can either of these sides cricket? If yes, how cricket can they cricket? A lot of cricket, little cricket, much cricket? Can Cook actually captain good, or was that thing where it looked like he was captaining OK really just a dream? It was probably just a dream wasn’t it? How fucking great are Harris and Buckey?

How cute are chipmunks? What is the Platypus’ spirit animal? Will the Australian public suddenly love Clarke in like 6 months? How disappointed will the public be in Smith when Australia invariably lose to New Zealand? Not at all, a lot, Smith can’t lose because he has positive intent which solves all problems all the time forever?

Will Maxwell save the Australian middle order?

I have no idea to be honest, but it will be fun finding out…

Over and out

Dr