The cricket world moves on, as always. The cricket coverage that I consume has a decided England slant to it, and so from my perspective, in the months preceding the Ashes series, there was simply nothing else being talked about anywhere in cricket. And then England went Down Under and cleaned up comprehensively, and after expressing admiration and no little shock, the topics have moved on. The Cricket World Cup is coming up next month. The Ashes triumph has been, if not exactly forgotten, then pushed to the back burner.

As for me, I’m still new to all this, and so what follows is a few random thoughts, which I’ll give the illusion of coherence by organizing them in a bulleted list.

  • This series has confirmed something I already knew: no sport is inherently exciting, but when there’s something on the line, any sport can be thrilling. The last time I watched a Test cricket match, England were in Bangladesh, cleaning up against the home side. The series didn’t matter to anyone – not least the Bangladesh fans, who didn’t bother to show up to watch the matches – and I ended up pronouncing Test cricket on TV as suitable entertainment for convalescents and others who cannot handle even the least bit of excitement. The Ashes, though – despite everything, they truly are exciting, and every wicket is a mini-skirmish as part of a five-day battle that makes up the framework of a hundred-year war (to stretch a military metaphor to its absolute breaking point.) I’m reminded of the central thing I’ve learned about sports, in all of my time watching them: they matter only because we pretend they matter, but when we pretend they matter they are absolutely fascinating. Even when they take five days to play and stretch on into the middle of the night.
  • You probably don’t have to read very closely to note that I was pulling for England in this series. I don’t have a good explanation for this, my embarrassing and confusing Anglophilia aside, except that the Australian team seemed like playground bullies to me, and England seemed like the underdog, and who can resist rooting for the underdog? At any rate, it’s not easy for an American-born person with no restricting ancestry to pick out a team for which to cheer. There’s no home team for an American, not in Test cricket, and I’m not Indian or Pakistani or South African on my mother’s side or anything like that, and so I suppose the choices are open. The West Indies are our closest geographic team, and New Zealand has just signed a deal to help develop American cricket, so I guess those are possibilities. Perhaps I’ll have to root for three different teams, at least until the USA starts playing Test cricket.
  • If nothing else, this series has introduced me to the comedy stylings of England bowler Graeme Swann, who did a video diary for the official England cricket website. Swann would appear to be a world-class goof – his main contribution to this victory, other than his top-notch spin bowling, has been to introduce “The Sprinkler” as the official dance of English cricket. I look forward to Swann’s future career, which I can only assume will include talk shows and comedy DVDs, or at least a long and fruitful stint as the star of silly web videos.
  • There were a lot of great moments in the series, but I think my favorite is still the beginning of the second test in Adelaide, when Australia chose to bat and then lost two wickets without scoring a run. Aussie captain Ricky Ponting was out against the first ball he faced; the highlight is here, and ultimately, it was a sign of what was to come in the series, and for me it was the top moment.

I’ll end this with the joke that I used when the series itself ended, almost two weeks ago: Well, that’s that then. Now you don’t have to hear from me about cricket ever ag- hey, look! it’s the first test of the New Zealand-Pakistan series! Awesome!