Sports Psychologist Required - Apply Within

I was a bit worried for a couple of weeks there, England actually looked better than usual at cricket and we looked ... well, love 'em as you will, this team ain't quite the one that toured 8 years ago, now, is it?

And then Lords happened. England won a test and they did what England cricket teams always do - they got so excited that they're playing well that they, um ... forgot to play well. The psychology is shot: We're winning, we're winning! Shit, now what do we do ...? It's like England are so unused to winning at cricket that they genuinely don't know how to handle it.

Sports Psychologist Required
Must be in post and at the Oval by next Wednesday
to apply email: andy_flower@englandasheslosers.co.uk (Ex-Australian captains with the surname Waugh preferred)

Edgbaston started well, but all it took was the heroics of two batsmen and England have dropped into the psychological toilet. Didn't it just show in the England batting at Headingley? They were so bad, they made walking-abortion-Siddle look like a good bowler for heaven's sakes!!

So now, in the post-Headingley world, it's all "let's call up this old fart" "let's get rid of his zimmer frame and make him bat". What's really funny is that Australia actually only have the upper hand by a toenail. We haven't won, it's not in the bag for us Aussies (yet) - all we've done is even up the series.

It's all panic stations and I love it: this is the shite England I've been laughing at for 20 years. This is the Ashes as I know it. The world makes sense again.