The first test of the Ashes finished today. Somehow, they were able to squeak some play in between raindrops, and the Aussies were able to finish England in less than an hour. Australia was able to get the 5 wickets while England scored less than 30 runs. Oh, the humanity! English cricket fans take heart, there’s still 20 more days of cricket left to play in the Ashes. Eli, this is far from over…

It’s that time again, the time when the world screeches to a halt to watch the famous Ashes. Okay maybe not the whole world, but most of England is at least paying attention to the Ashes.

For those of you in the states that think baseball is boring, thank your lucky stars that cricket isn’t popular, because as a spectator sport, cricket ranks somewhere near golf.

The Ashes is a “test” cricket series played every other year between the country that invented the game (England) and the country that is good at the game (Australia). England last won the Ashes in 1987.

The series consists of 5 test matches, each test match being up to 5 days in duration. Play starts at 10:30 each day and continues until around 6 o’clock. That’s 150 hours of competition! All this for a small urn containing “the ashes of English cricket'’ which “died'’ in a match in 1882 when Australia beat England for the first time.

Test cricket is very unusual, and I think I like it for its peculiarities. For example, during the day the players break for a 40-minute lunch break, a 20-minute tea break, and three 10-minute drink breaks. What other sport breaks for tea?

The test match is over when both teams have batted two full innings. If for any reason, day five ends and both teams have not finished batting, the result is a draw. Can you believe that? Five full days of competition and no winner! What really confuses me is that they can declare a winner when play ends prematurely for a four hour Twenty20 cricket match, but not for a five day test match.

So we’re currently in the middle of the first test of the series, which is being played at Lord’s in London. Today is day four. Day one saw the Aussies get off to a bad start by being bowled out before tea with only 190 runs in their first innings. England did worse being bowled out the next morning with only 155 runs. The Aussies finished with 384 runs in their second innings leaving England with over 400 runs to make up. At the end of day three, England had 156 runs with only 5 wickets (outs) left. It wasn’t looking good for England.

Today is day four and play has been suspended due to rain. It doesn’t look like there will be any action today, and tomorrow’s forecast has a possibility of rain too. So right now it looks as if a rain induced draw is England’s best chance. Poor Aussies, up by 250 runs and facing the possibility of a draw. Ah, but that’s the way the wicket falls!