You don't just win the Ashes, you urn them

AN ICONIC RIVALRY

- Kunal Pradhan

The story of how the Ashes got its name is well-known. It was August 1882 and the Australian cricket team were visiting England for a solitary Test at The Oval. In the second innings, as Australia toiled in tough conditions to set a respectable target for the home side, cricket's first superstar WG Grace had a particularly ungentlemanly moment.

The visiting captain Billy Murdoch, batting on 29, was gardening in the middle of the pitch after the ball seemed dead, when Grace removed the bails and appealed for a dismissal. It was an event of grave controversy as the two English umpires, Bob Thoms and Luke Greenwood, declared Murdoch run out. Australia were dismissed for 122, and England needed just 85 for victory.

The goings-on on the field angered the Australian team, particularly their fiery fast-pacer Fred Spofforth, nicknamed “Demon Bowler” for how quick he was, and because he was, according to his biographer Richard Cashman, “eminently recognisable, with a prominent nose and seemed to reflect the popular physical notions of what the Devil looked like”. An enraged Spofforth orchestrated a devilish debacle for the ages, grabbing seven wickets, five of them clean bowled, to dismiss England for 77 to seal a famous seven-run victory.

Such was the impact of the result that English journalist Reginald Brooks put out this famous death notice in the Sporting Times on September 2, 1882: