‘It’s what dreams are made of’: Ashes done and dusted

Australia has won the Ashes and all is right with the world. England has nowhere to turn after Pat Cummins and Co won in Melbourne.

The Australians celebrate the moment the Ashes were retained before lunch on day three after Cameron Green, left, took the final English wicket for a total of just 68 runs. Picture: AAP

Australia has won the Ashes and all is right with the world. England has nowhere to turn and nowhere to go, with commitments to fill at the SCG and Bellerive Oval before they can escape this humiliation.

The series has been secured with almost obscene haste. The visitors appear broken beyond ­repair, while the home team is yet to put a foot wrong.

The MCG may not have been full and the contest may have been decidedly one-sided, but when Australia bowled England out for 68 to win the game and the Ashes before lunch on the third morning of the Boxing Day Test, the excitement on the field and in the stands was seismic.

Pat Cummins and Co had won in Melbourne before the first Sydney-Hobart yacht reached Constitution Dock. Won by an innings after defending the lowest total to do so in 85 years of cricket. Won it before some of the fleet had ­entered Bass Strait.

Australian crowds enjoy nothing more than the ritual humiliation of the English. All is right with the world when the home side is triumphant, the visitors pinned and wriggling.

Australia celebrates after retaining the Ashes in Melbourne on Tuesday. Picture: Getty Images

Television ratings are among the best ever. The delight taken in pulling the wings off Poms may not be the most admirable part of the national character but it is far from the worst.

Australia has an unbeatable 3-0 lead in the series with two matches to play. The Ashes, won with a 4-0 victory here in 2017-18 and retained with a draw in the 2019 away series, are secure for another two years.

England's Ollie Robinson after his dismissal on Tuesday. Picture: AFP

England’s last Test victory on these shores, in 2011, remains a distant memory but its current failings are only too present and palpable. Its batting is baleful, its selection haphazard and its bowling attack endlessly frustrated.

By way of contrast, Scott Boland, a bowler recruited from the ranks of the local first-class fraternity, completed a 6-7 haul from just four overs to secure a player of the match award on debut, but will struggle to retain his place with so much first-choice talent on hand.

Cummins, who has led the side in just two matches, is struggling to believe his good fortune.

“It’s what dreams are made of the way we’ve played,” the captain said. “And I think outside of the ­actual results, there’s so many other positives as well. It doesn’t just feel like a 3-0 victory, it feels like we’re really setting ourselves up for the next few years as well.

“I grew up watching Steve Waugh, Ricky Ponting – those guys win Ashes series. It felt a million miles away from me playing cricket in the backyard, and here I am a decade later in that position. It’s just madness.

“When you play that Boxing Day morning, you turn up to the anthems and it’s a packed house. There are millions of people watching at home. It’s a great reminder each year that you’re part of Australian cricket history. It always takes me back to my childhood. Nowhere near what I could imagine my life would become as a young kid.

“It hasn’t fully hit me, I suppose. When I think of what it means I think more about what it means for a group of players. We’ve got seven players in the top 10 in the world at the moment, four batters, three bowlers and we probably haven’t strung the performances over the past couple of years that we probably expected ourselves. So I think this really consolidates that we are a really good, strong Test cricket side. It’s a good sign for the next few years.”

Boland’s extraordinary six wickets from 24 deliveries secured him the Mullagh medal for player of the match.

Johnny Mullagh played at the MCG in only the third game ever at the ground back in 1866. The fact that Boland is only the second Indigenous male player to represent his side at Test level is indicative of how poor cricket has been at including the original inhabitants in the 144 years the game has been played.

The parochial crowd was delirious happy at seeing one of their own excel in the biggest game of cricket’s calendar, but one can only imagine the inspiration for First Nation’s people.

Pat Cummins, left, and Scott Boland after the win in Melbourne on Tuesday. Picture: Getty Images

Aunty Joy Wandin Murphy acknowledged Boland in her welcome to country on day one and Belinda Duarte, a descendant of Yanggendyinanyuk (Dick-a-Dick) observed on presenting him with the Johnny Mullagh Medal that “you cannot be what you cannot see”.

Dan Christian captained Boland on the 2018 Indigenous tour of England which marked 150 years since Mullagh and his side had toured England.

“I genuinely had tears in my eyes this morning when he accepted the Johnny Mullagh Medal,” he told The Australian.

“Actually, I had a whole range of emotions. I was thrilled for him to get the opportunity, because we played a lot of cricket together in Victoria.

“And then from the Indigenous perspective, going on the tour with him in 2018 and then to see him graduate into the Test arena filled me with pride.

“That Aussie bowling attack is the best in the world and cracking a spot in one of the three spots is probably one of the hardest things to do in world cricket, possibly the hardest in history. He wouldn’t have thought he’d get that opportunity.

“I’m not surprised he had this success given how integral he’s been to us winning all those Sheffield Shield trophies in Victoria but I didn’t expect him to get 6-7. For him to do it as an ­Aboriginal person was massive.”