The Ashes: England's greatest batting displays

The 2010/11 Ashes are nearly upon us as England look to retain the urn against Australia.

As we build up to what is promising to be a hard-fought and competitive series, we bring you the greatest English batting displays seen in the Ashes.

Click here or on the image on the right to launch our guide

There have obviously been countless performances of merit, so we laid down a few ground rules. For a start, we've only looked at Englishmen (no Australians allowed). Second, only one performance from each decade (although this did lead to the omission of Wally Hammond's imperishable deeds in 1928-29 because 1926 took precedent and David Gower's wondrous summer of 1985 was overlooked because of a certain event at Headingley in 1981). And thirdly, only innings played when the Ashes were still at stake have been chosen.

What this leaves us with is a list of innings played by men who influenced or turned matches and series, who truly altered the destiny of the Ashes in England's favour.