Andy Flower

Since he's taken over as Coach only two years ago, England have won two Ashes series at home and away, and won their first ever major limited overs tournament (the T20 World Cup).

England's best ever Coach?

You might say that, but Fletcher oiled the wheels to get England moving in the first place. He just couldn't do it long enough to gain such results. The Ashes in 2005 is a severely underrated Ashes series.

Yeah, but you get the feeling that Flower is Fletcher but without the stubbornness.

IMO, the Ashes series victories with the most significance [in the past decade] are:

1. 2010/11 - first series win in Australia in over 20 years, all the players participated equally with bat, ball and in the field. Very professional unit, no disputes in the dressing room, drunken mishaps or other difficulties.

2. 2005 - The sign of England's dominance between 2003 and 2005. A short but sweet period. It's importance lies in the fact that England beat a very good Australian side, including ATG's such as Glenn McGrath, Shane Warne and Ricky Ponting. Not many sides in 2005 were able to play alongside and better than the Aussies in that year. England's bowlers engineered the victory in 2005, the batsman did well, but still crumbled too often to Warne.

3. 2009 - England's victory saw the tide turning, but many might have believed it was due to a weakened Australia side. Not necessarily, but it's always an option for the pessimist in all of us. Still it began the water tight planning of Strauss and Flower in what would be a tremendous few years to follow.

Well the professional full time international coach has only existed since the 90s really so there won't be much competition, esp as most of the competition is of the calibre of Keith Fletcher, Bumble, Illingworth and Moores. So it's Fletcher vs Flower. The former was a great cricket thinker but really deficient when it came to man management and the soft skills. Flower's been nigh on perfect to date- results (across all formats), planning and quite personable by all accounts to boot. A couple more decent series wins and he's definitely got the crown.

DJ_Smerk wrote:You might say that, but Fletcher oiled the wheels to get England moving in the first place. He just couldn't do it long enough to gain such results. The Ashes in 2005 is a severely underrated Ashes series.

The 2005 Ashes was a better one and more hard fought. That was a more credible result for England, since it was achieved against a still top world beating Aussie side with it's legendary bowling unlike the current one.

Batman wrote:

DJ_Smerk wrote:You might say that, but Fletcher oiled the wheels to get England moving in the first place. He just couldn't do it long enough to gain such results. The Ashes in 2005 is a severely underrated Ashes series.

The 2005 Ashes was a better one and more hard fought. That was a more credible result for England, since it was achieved against a still top world beating Aussie side with it's legendary bowling unlike the current one.

MvGrath missed the two tests England won with injury

Though I must question how a T20 'World Cup' can be considered a proper 'limited overs' series by any stretch of imagination? T20s don't merit any comparison to any proper form of the game.

embee wrote:

Batman wrote:

DJ_Smerk wrote:You might say that, but Fletcher oiled the wheels to get England moving in the first place. He just couldn't do it long enough to gain such results. The Ashes in 2005 is a severely underrated Ashes series.

The 2005 Ashes was a better one and more hard fought. That was a more credible result for England, since it was achieved against a still top world beating Aussie side with it's legendary bowling unlike the current one.

MvGrath missed the two tests England won with injury

Nitpickist!

You guys still had Gilliespie, and Lee [still worth something back then] and above all Warne......

Gillespie was shot and should have been retired before the series

Ditto Kasprowicz

Lee bowled well at times

Warne was fantastic

Tait was a waste of space

McGrath was injured just before the toss in the second test ...an unready Kaper then heard his idiotic captain drunky say 'we'll have a bowl , mate' ...Pidge then played T3 with a dodgy ankle which put stress on his elbow causing him to miss T4 which the Poms nearly choked (7 down) chasing about 150

Man, it almost sounds like you are still bitter about losing that series aren't you?

I'm annoyed that we didnt learn from the mistakes of that series ...repeated them 4 years later ...and again this summer

England have played well in those series but Oz has underperformed badly in each

Question for you MB .....

If just a few things had gone the other way, and Australia had retained the urn on 2005, we wouldn't have had the "celebrity circus and mentality" that we seemed to have for the next 18 months or so.

Now, whilst it's true that injuries hurt us - we never saw SiJo again, anf Fred got wrecked .... we also seemed to have thought we'd climbed the mountain, so to speak. The preparation for 06/07 away series was atrocious, and both squad and selections were poor, to say the least.

I feel we were way too confident going into the series, got a rude awakening at the Gabba ... and the capitulation at Adelaide just drained every drop of spirit out of us.

Had we not won the urn in 2005, do you think we'd have taken such a walloping 18 months later ?

If, in July 2005, spaceships had come to Earth and settled over the World's major cities ala Independence Day, would the 2005 Ashes series have even taken place?

If Oz had won in 05 I think Warne and maybe McGrath may have retired then ...as it was I think the loss inspired Hawaii to achieve his usual pre-series prediction ...

That said ...06/07 showed what a switched on focussed team can do even under an idiot Captain like Ponting

Henry wrote:If, in July 2005, spaceships had come to Earth and settled over the World's major cities ala Independence Day, would the 2005 Ashes series have even taken place?

Terrorist bombings can't stop an Ashes tour ...piss weak Aliens are no threat at all ...(so long as Will Smith is around to save us)

Henry wrote:If, in July 2005, spaceships had come to Earth and settled over the World's major cities ala Independence Day, would the 2005 Ashes series have even taken place?

Now Trev, I hope you're just being obtuse.

I'm the first to acknowledge that it was a totally hypothetical question. But to expand ..... had Aus drawn an extra game, the series would have been just as thrilling - but having failed again by such a narrow margin (having generally having had the best of the series) - I can't help but wonder whether Fletcher would have kicked on our young team to another level, instead of us coasting the way we did, to the point of going backwards.

Without some of the distractions, I think we could have improved to the point of giving Australias old men a real shock. Drawn Ashes 05 may have proved no more than a blip in a run of victories giving us a better chance of competing away from home.

Of course we'll never know ..... but I ask as a comparison between Flower and Fletch.

We treated 05 as the end of the journey ....... I believe Andy Flower will make it plain that this victory is just another step on a quest to become the undisputed number one side.

Fletcher may have given the team a kick up the bum, but he wouldn't have been able to heal Simon Jones and Michael Vaughan's injuries.

Ultimately, the 2005 ashes wining team was built on sand, not rock.

True enough Re Vaughan & Jones. We were weakened by their loss, no question - but you're not suggesting that losing one batsman and one bowler had such an influence ? We won the urn with 12 men not 2.

Strauss, Bell, KP, Colly, GoJo, Fred, Hoggy & GBH all toured, thats 8 from 11. The first 4 are still playing - and 3 of them will be around a few years yet.

Rather than comparing foundations, I think Fletcher simply failed to fix the roof when the weather was good ie bring on the likes of Anderson / Bopara / Joyce / Shah / Plunkett.

embee wrote:

Batman wrote:

DJ_Smerk wrote:You might say that, but Fletcher oiled the wheels to get England moving in the first place. He just couldn't do it long enough to gain such results. The Ashes in 2005 is a severely underrated Ashes series.

The 2005 Ashes was a better one and more hard fought. That was a more credible result for England, since it was achieved against a still top world beating Aussie side with it's legendary bowling unlike the current one.

MvGrath missed the two tests England won with injury

Australia were very lucky with injuries. Not often your entire XI only pick up one injury, and then only for 2 Tests of the series. A great side like them would surely not be hampered by the temporary loss of one player, especially with an experienced replacement with over 100 Test wickets too.

Similarly, England won in 2009 despite their two stars Pietersen and Flintoff getting injured at various times, or this time round it was Broad.

Growler wrote:True enough Re Vaughan & Jones. We were weakened by their loss, no question - but you're not suggesting that losing one batsman and one bowler had such an influence ? We won the urn with 12 men not 2.

Strauss, Bell, KP, Colly, GoJo, Fred, Hoggy & GBH all toured, thats 8 from 11. The first 4 are still playing - and 3 of them will be around a few years yet.

Rather than comparing foundations, I think Fletcher simply failed to fix the roof when the weather was good ie bring on the likes of Anderson / Bopara / Joyce / Shah / Plunkett.

I forgot to add that Fletcher wasn't able to fix Trescothick's problems either. So that was three major players out from the start.

Fletcher was too stubborn in regards to persisting with Giles and Geraint Jones in the first test at Brisbane, when Chris Read and in particular Monty Panesar had done really well in the 2006 English season and deserved to start that test ahead of Fletcher's old favourites. That created a bit of a wedge through the squad, imo.

He ignored all current form in the belief that certain players involved in the 2005 triumph would just suddenly click again, despite all evidence to the contrary.

Henry wrote:Fletcher ... ignored all current form in the belief that certain players involved in the 2005 triumph would just suddenly click again, despite all evidence to the contrary.

So Nielsen has been coaching from Fletcher's book? He ignored all current form in the belief that certain players involved in the 2009 debacle would just suddenly click, despite all evidence to the contrary.

Zat wrote:

Henry wrote:Fletcher ... ignored all current form in the belief that certain players involved in the 2005 triumph would just suddenly click again, despite all evidence to the contrary.

So Nielsen has been coaching from Fletcher's book? He ignored all current form in the belief that certain players involved in the 2009 debacle would just suddenly click, despite all evidence to the contrary.

Must have been his beliefs -
1] Failure is the first stepping stone to success.

2] Experience makes people stronger.

He forgot the principal one applicable to his ownself -
Those who refuse to learn from their mistakes are doomed to repeating them