Can Flintoff carry the weight of expectations?
With Kevin Pietersen out of the Ashes, Andrew Flintoff now carries England on his shoulders
Ashwin Achal
25-Feb-2013
With Kevin Pietersen out of the Ashes, Andrew Flintoff now carries England on his shoulders. Australia will look to work on Flintoff's fitness, trying to get him tired and test his stamina. James Lawton, in the Independent, asks if Flintoff will be able to deliver once again or if he will fade away like the 2007 Ashes series.
The question is a big one, however. Can he really carry the freight? Can he do what he did so memorably four years ago, when his body was much less assailed, and wage the fight right up to the moment the Ashes are regained? Or will he lapse into the mode of 2006-07, when the highest expectations foundered amid some of the worst neglect of competitive responsibilities ever seen in a major sportsman?
That might sound like a mean appraisal of Flintoff's situation after his spectacular performance at Lord's but we can be sure it is one the Australians, however highly they rate the recent evidence of their most celebrated opponent's match-winning potential, will be entertaining today.
Ricky Ponting is just 25 runs short of becoming Australia's highest Test run-getter. David Lloyd, also in the Independent, wonders if it is now time to call Ponting is the best ever Australian batsman, barring Donald Badman.
But apart from Bradman, then, where does Ponting stand? Well, like beauty, batting is in the eye of the beholder, and there are some real belters all the way down to The Don, who is in 36th place with his 6,996 runs. For sheer elegance, you could not do much better than either Mark Waugh (8,029 runs from 128 Tests) or Greg Chappell (7,110 from 87), who were from different generations but broke bowlers' hearts in the same way through their purity of stroke.