1986: England v India Second Test

A year is a long time in English cricket. Take the end of the 20th century as a prime example of the fluctuating fortunes of the national team. In the summer of 1998, England celebrated a rare five-Test series victory over South Africa. A year later, new skipper Nasser Hussain was being booed on the balcony at the Oval after losing to New Zealand.

That series defeat against the Kiwis saw England sink to the bottom of the unofficial world standings. Fast forward a year and Hussain was being soaked in champagne at the same ground as England won the Wisden Trophy against the West Indies for the first time since 1969. You never quite knew what to expect from the English cricket team from one summer to the next.

England's unwanted Test record

England's recent win at Lord's against New Zealand was just their second in 18 matches. In the 1980s we weren't so fortunate.

All seemed rosy in the England cricket garden in December 1986. As Gladstone Small settled himself to claim the catch that retained the Ashes at the MCG, the "can't bat, can't bowl, can't bowl" outfit had silenced the doubters. The celebrations were long and hard that night in Melbourne, and in hindsight that was just as well. Because England would not win another Test match for 20 months.

1989 Ashes: An A to Z of humiliation

Failing to regain the Ashes in 2019 hurt, but nothing can compare to the 1989 series that provided an A to Z of humiliation.

They may have been billed as the worst Australian team to tour England, yet in David Boon the tourists at least had a drinker to contend with the best.  Reportedly drinking fifty-two cans of lager on the flight over, Boon had to be carried off the plane. 

English Test cricket in the 80s

With England’s 1000th Test being played at Edgbaston this week, it has been a joy for a cricket nerd like me to wallow in the numerous articles taking a look back at the best matches and players that have been part of 141 years of history.

Naturally, I am drawn to the decade of my childhood, and I started to recall the highs and lows of English Test cricket in the 1980s. Sadly, there were far too few of the former and rather too many of the latter.

1984/85: England in India

This piece is a shortened version of my previous blogs on England's tour to India in 1984/85, which can be found here and here.

1986: Mike Gatting and his broken nose

Mike Gatting was in a confident frame of mind at the start of England's tour to the Caribbean in 1986, but one ball from Malcolm Marshall changed everything.

Mike Gatting faced his fair share of famous deliveries during his career. Many will remember that reverse sweep he attempted off Allan Border's bowling in the 1987 World Cup final, a shot that was accompanied with derision and disappointment in England. And naturally the role played by Gatting in the Ball of the Century is still discussed, his confused expression after Shane Warne had fizzed a leg break past his outside edge all part of the theatre that surrounds that moment in cricketing history.

1985: Ashes memories

If the 1981 Ashes series was seriously good, and the 1989 version distinctly bad from an English perspective, then I would argue that the 1985 series was far from the ugly relative in comparison. Above all it was the series that made me fall in love with the game, during a summer when I didn't have a care in the world, and I found new heroes in Botham, Ellison and Robinson. So I hope you enjoy some of my favourite memories of the 1985 Ashes, starting with the day cricket found me. 

Sporting what ifs of the 1980s

The life of That1980sSportsBlogger has produced enough what if moments to fill a blog or two, albeit probably not that interesting to anyone who doesn't know me (how does that differ from this blog I hear you ask). What if I hadn't gone to that nightclub in Northampton on that fateful evening of December 1, 1995, where unbeknown to me, the future Mrs That1980sSportsBlogger was located? What if my parents had decided to move to New Zealand when I was barely out of nappies, as they were carefully considering? What if my dad had been a Tottenham supporter? All of those what ifs, and in particular the last one, are quite scary to comprehend, as my life as I know it today would be very different indeed.