England finally emerged victorious at the Oval to win back the coveted Ashes, beating Australia by 197 runs, all credited to Andrew Flintoff’s genius.
Flintoff was certainly the center of attention during England’s wind over the Australians. Though his balling performance was somewhat under achieving due to the surfacing concerns over his injury, his presence alone on the cricket pitch was inspiring enough for the likes of Stuart Broad to steal the win.
After the deserving victory, Flintoff has finally hung up his gloves for good from Test cricket. He has played a total of 79 Tests for England. Post his operation on the troubling right knee injury, Flintoff however has plans of pursuing a full-fledged one-day international career. Flintoff hold the ambition of becoming the best one-day player in the world. Although having taken retirement from Test cricket, Flintoff is still contracted to play for Lancashire for another year. His recovery from the injury will be a deciding factor over the term for which he will play for the club. However, Flintoff feels that though he would not be available for the 4 day matches, he certainly would participate in one as a practice session ahead of any one day series.
Player contracts with England are to be reviewed at September end, but it is not wise for Flintoff to expect the kind of contract he had playing Test cricket although he expects the ECB to take it under consideration.
Speaking about his future, Flintoff added, “Over the next week it will probably unfold a bit more clearly, what I’m thinking and what they are thinking. But at this moment contracts are the furthest thing from my mind. I’m booked in for an op and I can’t stop thinking about that. And then ‘Rooster’ (Dave Roberts, Flintoff’s personal physio) is getting married on Saturday, so that’s the next biggest day in my life. Beefy (Ian Botham) is best man and I’m a page boy, which is quite fitting.”
The Broad Show
Though Flintoff stole all the attention at the Oval, another player was the crown jewel for England’s promising victory over the Aussies. Stuart Broad, the 23 year old all-rounder was announced man of the match during the 5th test and he just can’t stop smiling since then.
With Flintoff now retired from Test cricket, Broad and company realize the hard work that need to be put into the team’s preparations.
Speaking about the same, Broad said, “We move on and focus on future challenges. Our ultimate aim is to become the number one team in the world - but that does not happen overnight. We are not rabbits in the headlights without Fred. We have had to play at times without him before. But he has been a huge help to me, and I cannot thank him enough for what he has done for English cricket.”
Following Broad’s smashing display with the ball, he will now be expected by all to fill in Flintoff’s shoes just like when they did with other players when Ian Botham had retired. However, Broad disagrees saying, “It’s surreal being mentioned in the same sentence as those two. But I’m not under any extra pressure - I just try to improve my game as much as I can. I’m certainly not in the all-rounder class Ian Botham and Andrew Flintoff were - they could make big hundreds. But I would like to be in the future.”