From The Ashes [DVD]

This is a must for any cricket fan, especially those who remember the astonishing comeback by the England team, down almost entirely to one man, Sir Ian Botham. The political unrest and Royal Wedding are well covered also, but the stars of the film are Rod Marsh and Kim Hughes who look back on the series very amusingly. With Fire in Babylon and Senna coming soon, sport enthusiasts are being well catered for by the film industry. Thanks!

Ahhhhh the summer of 1981.Riots as the true meaning of Thatcherism sank in. Me, 17 year old, having finally got a proper job after floundering around on Government schemes for months since leaving school. And the cricket . A swashbuckling miracle. A luminescent ray of blazing light through turbulent sociological clouds. A riveting spellbinding affirmation of the unifying and edifying power of sport when it captures the public imagination . Of course it helps when you are winning .
As this DVD points out we were not definitely not winning under the captaincy of Ian Botham , who was playing like a man with the weight of the world on his shoulders .After an ignominious pair at Lords and leaving the field to deafening silence Botham refused to carry on as captain on a game to game basis and so resigned , ushering the second coming of the messiah Mike Brearley and by proxy the renaissance of the rejuvenated Botham and well ..... the rest is history .....astonishing history too, and anyone not fully aware of the outcome is in for an incredulous treat.
This DVD attempts to put that series in a socio-political context ( the rather shallow up-shot being that everything was really , really s**t but then the cricket came along to cheer us all up ...ohh along with the royal wedding ) and then runs through the series with grainy footage ( rather wasted on a Blu-Ray ) and talking heads including Botham, Bob Willis , Vic Marks, Kim Hughes, Geoff Lawson & Gideon Haigh
This is where the real surprise comes from this release. The English add little to what we already know, even Brearley's erudition fails to come up with anything original or perspicacious . It's left to the Australians , a craggy Marsh and careworn slightly jowly Hughes to lob in the revelatory hand grenades. The rift in the Aussie camp ( the dapper handsome sensitive Hughes undermined by his veteran hard-bitten lieutenants to the extent Lille-sadly missing from the commentary - bowled with more aggression to Hughes in the nets than he did in any test match ) is revealed for all and it's this as much as any English heroics that did for the Australians.
Bit disappointed at some of the omissions. The importance of Borders wicket in both the Headingley match ( bowled by Old ) and Edgbaston test ( caught off a popper from Emburey ) are completely absent and it would have been nice to see a Simon Hughes analyst type in depth summation of the series .
Overall though , this is a nice indulgent trip down memory lane. And here's the real rub. I actually went to the last day of the 1981 Headingley test match ( they reduced the entrance fee so I could afford it....not reduced just for me though ...obviously ) and ended up witnessing one of the most memorable amazing days of test cricket in the history of the sport. And they are right. Bob Willis did seem to be in a trance , and often still seems to be .
Unfortunately I am not on The DVD ,but you can't have everything

Just had the pleasure of watching this (for free!) on ITV4. If you missed it then a fiver is not much to pay for the story of Botham's Ashes.