How to Win The Ashes: A student's perspective.

It has been a tough winter for students. First they shoot fees sky high making every hour of contact for us BA students worth (probably) at least £100, then they put the Ashes series slap bang through the business end of Michaelmas term.

Any hope of attending those 4 hours of lectures a week is bleaker than the mid-winter itself. Mentally, we are down under; physically, we can't cope.

Ashes fever has been sprinkling across Durham. The results will be released late June as to whether we have survived.

The symptoms are bizarre. Men are driven to commit that most serious of faux pas - engaging in conversation at the urinals (not even Ashes banter can justify it), and rather than the onus being on pulling at any cost, staying single and mobile is imperative for a rapid get away to catch those all important early morning overs.

In fact, staying away from the alcohol all together is vital to the success of an Ashes party. Lessons were learnt the hard way on the first day of the first test. My drunken euphoria lasted about as long as a Ricky Ponting innings.

Counting down days until your dissertation hand in date is not best done sober, but it’s a sacrifice worth making to witness records tumble like Aussie wickets. I’ve lost count of the number of times a record was broken for, e.g., ‘the 6^th wicket partnership on a 3^rd day of an Ashes test match for England in Adelaide,’ but every one was priceless.

Only the bitterest Aussie will sledge Collingwood for his meagre contribution with the bat this series. He is the type that we will only know what we had once he’s gone.

Nevertheless, the future looks bright for England. Steven Finn will feel hard done by to miss out on the last two tests, Stuart Broad will relegate Tim Bresnan to a very good reserve and Eoin Morgan will be more than a match for Colly’s efforts at the crease and even in the field.

Judging by England’s latest fielding efforts, Colly’s absence in this department will barely be noticed - a legacy he can be proud of leaving.

But in the end, it is for the big record that this series will be remembered. We were not alive the last time England won in Australia, and most of the last 24 years of Ashes wilderness in the Aussie bush will have been inconsequential to us - “Go to bed! You can watch the highlights (or lowlights) tomorrow” - but the sense of history is very palpable.

Watching the normally long faced Boycott, Nasser and Botham grinning like kids in a sweet shop is enough to get us equally giddy at 4am.

As academics we are able to use a few more adjectives than KP (everything is "just amazing”), though outstanding, superlative and unrivaled can’t quite sum up this England squad as well as they deserve.

The series will not reverberate around the globe in the way 2005’s did, mainly because Australia’s efforts had all the heart of sticking a large white flag out of their window most mornings. And for that may we gloat for two and a half glorious years. If Geoffrey Boycott can, it’s about time Andrew Flower afforded himself a smile.