"The Ashes ends with the story book finish it deserved" #ashes #ashescricket

A short and hopefully sweet recounting of the historic final day of the 2023 Ashes series between England and Australia.

An extract from this chapter follows, together with a link to a self-published book I'm incredibly proud of and other ways and means of supporting me to thumb the eye of traditional publishers who refused to read my original manuscript!

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CF4FRKSH

https://www.patreon.com/TheBlackfordBookClub
https://www.paypal.me/TheBlackfordBookClub
https://www.buymeacoffee.com/steveblackford

“Oh I don’t believe it! He’s a magician this Stuart Broad”

Jim Maxwell, second sexiest voice in cricket

Minutes later, and at around 6.30pm local time after a two hour break for rain had threatened to scupper any chance of a positive result, “Stuart Broad takes the final wicket in a dream finale” and you could hear the unabashed pride flowing through the voice of commentator Jonathan Agnew for an England legend he’s watched from a very young boy grow into one of the very finest cricketers to ever grace the game. He writes his own scripts apparently, as well as lifting and replacing the bails atop the stumps when in need of a wicket, a form of cricketing witchcraft known only to the man who will seemingly pick a fight in an empty house if only to get his competitive juices flowing or bowling into that trademarked “corridor of uncertainty” to snag the edge of David Warner’s bat.

This evening’s storybook ending came not from the flashing blade of David Warner but a tentative edge from the bat of Alex Carey, caught Jonny Bairstow, bowled Stuart Broad. These sporting stories simply write themselves, don’t they? The triad of Lord’s together once more. Broad, simmering with anger as the spirit of cricket came into question. Bairstow the wronged party. Carey the pantomime villain. All a nonsense of course but tinder to fan the flames of an Ashes contest yet to really catch alight. All these incredible sporting weeks later: Broad grabs the wicket of Carey caught safely behind the stumps by Bairstow, and an Ashes and England legend had written his own story once more by taking the final wicket on the final day of his final ever Test Match, ensuring a 49 run victory and an Ashes series finishing level, rightly, at 2–2".

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