Australians want more of the same

Australian cricket fans may declare that England are a joke, but they are buying tickets in record numbers to watch the Ashes series.

Advance sales for this week's Adelaide Test have never been so high, and the crowd at the four-day Test at the Gabba was just over 80,000, which was 30,000 up on four years ago. In fact it was the biggest audience at a Brisbane Test since the Bodyline series 70 years ago.

The television audience for the First Test greatly exceeded expectations and the Australian Cricket Board report a record number of hits on their website on the second day of the Test. Perhaps they felt they needed confirmation that England really had taken eight Australian wickets for 128 and scored 154 for 1.

The ACB are delighted but not entirely sure why sales are so good. Only 7,000 of 43,000 tickets are unsold for day one of the Sydney Test; Melbourne reports sales well ahead of 1998-99.

The ACB's Patrick O'Breirne suggests that crowds appreciate a great Australian team: "They love seeing this brand of cricket." He was referring to the run-rate of the batsmen although what he means is that they love watching Australia win big. But their market research also shows that Australia v England battles still stir the emotions here. For the crowd, though perhaps not the cricketers, a win against England is still the most satisfying of all.

After the Gabba game a Sydney Morning Herald reader wrote to the editor: "There were two teams out there and only one of them was playing cricket." This is a playful reference to the crushing remark by Australian captain Bill Woodfull to England manager Sir Pelham Warner during the Bodyline series. And in case Australians should forget, the national television broadcaster last week screened a remarkably well-balanced account of the series entitled Bodyline. Viewing figures for that were good too.

The programme suggested that today's chauvinistic Australian cricket writers – they write most violently in Rupert Murdoch-owned newspapers – do not necessarily echo the attitudes of their readers.

Towards the end of Bodyline on TV, Harold Larwood and Bill Voce, having grown old, returned to the Melbourne Cricket Ground and were given a standing ovation as they walked to the middle. How do you explain that? It may be one reason why record numbers want to see what Nasser Hussain's team are made of.