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Nobody talks about the last ball of the Ashes. It's the first that's famous. That stray ball that flies to slip, that elegant shot for four, that wicket, shattering the stumps! Final deliveries? I had to research them. Moeen Ali edging a shot behind to finish an innings loss in a inconsequential game in 2015; Rankin being taken at slip off Ryan Harris, Boyd Rankin featuring in his single Test at the conclusion of a 30-over collapse in a comprehensive defeat that's been full of them in 2014; a Harmison rising delivery glancing off Justin Langer's shoulder for extras, the sole boundary the Australian team score in a run chase they'll not undertake in 2005.

It separates between wondering how things will go, and seeing how they do. One thing's certain, there's no guarantee there will be a successful conclusion. For the last decade, England's Australian tours have ended in ashes, rather than with them. Flower was removed as manager after one humiliating defeat, in 2013-14, Silverwood was let go after a further defeat, in 2021-22. You can make a couple of teams out of English cricketers who participated in their concluding Test match at the conclusion of an trip Down Under during the past 25 years, and even have a couple of men over to act as substitutes for each squad.

The current English side have never claimed to be overly concerned about outcomes. Ben Stokes, like Eoin Morgan with the one-day side before him, always says that if a lofted drive is caught on the boundary is secondary as whether it was the correct choice to attempt it in the first place, and during play he's happy to clap a pitcher who concedes runs so long as they are bringing the team toward taking that following breakthrough. But then the very reason Ben Stokes tried to guide his players to adopt this approach was so they would be in a better position to deliver the brand of the game he believes will perform effectively for them in Australia.

The upcoming Ashes, for which they have been planning extensively, already seems like the outcome they are bound to face. It is this bold strategy's decisive moment. And there are too many “I told you so’s” in English cricket for the team to get away with it if they do suffer another poor loss in the coming weeks. His methodology has been predicated on proving everyone wrong, and the flipside is it feels as if there are plenty of people who would be thrilled to be shown right.

Considering this, it's a suitable occasion to emphasize that the crucial matter goes beyond where this ultimately leads, but regardless of whether we enjoyed it along the way. Four years ago, England were an thoroughly poor cricket team. They had been beaten in four consecutive series and were trailing in the final one, against the Indian team, when it was suspended because of the pandemic. They had won exactly one Test match out of a series of 17, and lost twelve of them by humiliating deficits. Eight wickets to the Black Caps at the historic venue, A defeat by 157 runs to the Indian squad at the Oval, an a comprehensive loss to the Aussie team at Melbourne, A defeat by ten wickets to West Indies in Grenada.

The team was soundly beaten by West Indies in the island in spring 2022 just before Joe Root stepped down as captain.

By the end, after all those months of testing and preventive measures and controlled settings and repeated losses at the hands of all opponents, they were practically the most disheartened and weary Test team the English cricket board had ever fielded to a cricket field. A significant portion of what Ben Stokes and McCullum have achieved in the years since was in reaction to all that, as well as the former's personal encounters during his hiatus from the game in 2021 when he had experienced a period of mental health challenges. It was designed to emphasize to all that it was intended as fun, if it was intended as anything.

That remains true now. Even when the the historic series is on the line, and regardless if the team have ultimately accepted that they need to be a little more flexible in the way they go about performing. Normal existence has a way of imposing, it can be difficult to remember the knowledge we acquire in our toughest times.

This is the English squad that secured back-to-back final innings pursuits of significant totals in one period against New Zealand; that scored 378 to defeat the subcontinent giants that identical season; that became the pioneering away squad to win a whitewash in Pakistan; that battled hard to a tie after going two games behind in the Ashes; that overcame India in the historic venue off the back of one of the most remarkable knocks ever performed in the the region, and then overcame the Pakistani team in the location off the back of another.

Here we have the national side, too, that managed to end up being defeated in a Test by an large margin even though the opposition made a relatively low total; who fetched up losing one of the better Tests ever contested after making a confident decision in the opening session against the Kiwis, and then followed suit against the Aussies; who were routed by a massive 434 runs in the venue, and who were on the losing side of one of the island nation's finest wins. Between them, they have recorded some of the unlikeliest wins, experienced some of the most embarrassing exits, scored some of the unlikeliest centuries, and secured some of the most startling exceptional bowling spells in the annals of the English game.

However this prestigious tournament unfolds, they have been, in turn, astonishing, outrageous, ridiculous, exasperating, and entirely, unrepentantly, unashamedly entertaining.