Huge winning margins in all five Ashes Tests this summer

Playing for a trophy that cant be touched or it would disintegrate.

naaahhhh : the Urn contains the ashes of the burnt stump ! 

I think a large part of the reason why these matches were so one-sided was simply down to poor batting on both sides. Joe Root (57.50) was the only English batsman to finish with an average above 40 in the series. Cook (36.66) and Moeen Ali (36.62) were the only others to average above 30. For Australia, Rogers (60.00), Smith (56.44) and Warner (46.44) finished with averages above 40, but no other batsman had an average of 30.

Lyth and Cook averaged just 16.33 for the opening wicket and their best opening partnership in the series was a woeful 32. It is incredibly rare for teams to win a series when they get so little out of their opening partnership. My research shows that this was the third lowest average for an opening partnership in a winning team that played at least 5 Test matches in a series. The lowest average on a winning team is held by Greg Blewett and Michael Slater who combined to average just 5.40 for the first wicket against India in 1999/00.

England were repeatedly 3 down for little on the board thanks to the troubles of Lyth, Ballance and Bell. For Australia, once Rogers, Warner and Smith were out, the rest of the team offered absolutely no resistance - averaging a collective 18.42.

The ashes series has become watered-down for me and the fact that the Australian team is not as competitive away from home as in the past will make any series against a top ranked team not being balanced.

how about a See Saw series 

The Stinkaroo Series!    ::    Bandies totally stink up place three times, Poms twice.    :'(

[quote author=Rowe992 link=topic=99780.msg652325#msg652325 date=1440419886]
The ashes series has become watered-down for me and the fact that the Australian team is not as competitive away from home as in the past will make any series against a top ranked team not being balanced.
[/quote]
You keep spewing this same rhetoric all over the board and it is NOT true. Over the last 5 years, no team has won more matches away from home than Australia. If you narrow it down to the last 2 years, again, no team has won more matches away from home than Australia. If you just want to look at matches from the last 12 months, again, no team has won more matches away from home than Australia. This same Australian team went into South Africa last year and beat them. This was their first series loss away from home since the last Ashes series in 2013.

If you want to take a look at overall records, again, Australia have won the most games (13) in Test cricket over the last 2 years. Their win/loss ratio over this period is third, behind only New Zealand and South Africa. This was just Australia's second series loss over this period. This is still a very good Australian team.

Why not actually take the time to look at the numbers before making such a resolute declaration that is not grounded in reality?

England played exceptionally well to win this series. They were heavy betting underdogs. Most experts and ex-players were wondering whether England would even win one-match in the series. England were also not a top ranked side coming into this match - they were ranked 6th in the ICC ratings.

Dim tree hevin-hi stinkers negative tree yeers of Ws    :-[ :-[