Poor decisions lose the Ashes

WELL the Poms have regained the Ashes, but in boxing terms it wasn’t a knockout victory, it was a points decision and a hotly disputed one at that.
They will be waking up with sore heads this morning after celebrating their win but when they sober up they might consider just how lucky they were.
Sure, several Poms played well at times but there is little doubt that Australia were cruelly treated and a series of poor decisions by a series of people that made the difference between victory and defeat.
Nobody doubts that umpiring at that level is tough and there is clearly always going to be mistakes but how come they all seemed to favour England?
Absolutely nothing worse than not calling for the video umpire when Flintoff claimed a clearly “grassed” catch early in the series.
We won’t go as far as calling Flintoff a cheat but can you imagine how the jackals of the English press would have squealed had that been the other way around with an Australian claiming the catch.
There were numerous other doubtful decisions and several that were absolutely doubtless.
How Billy Bowden did not give Strauss out LBW first ball defies belief.
And in this final and deciding Test Marcus North copped two poor decisions.
He clearly edged the ball on to his pads in the first innings but was given out LBW and then in the second innings there is no way a video umpire could not have given him the benefit of doubt had they called for a replay of his “alleged” stumping by Prior.
You could think that Bowden seemed to get caught up in the emotion of the English player’s appeal his finger went up that quick.
But it would be terribly wrong to simply blame the umpires.
The Australian captain was on the wrong side of several bad calls with the coin toss throughout the series and had he won the toss and batted in the final Test it would likely have been a different result.
Of course you can’t blame Ponting for that, a coin toss is a matter of luck.
But not so a matter of luck when it comes to team selection.
It was criminal to see Nathan Hauritz sitting out this final Test.
Hauritz is not the best off-spinner in the world but either is English spinner Graeme Swan and he was turning the ball a mile from the start.
The Poms had left the covers off the pitch the day before the Test started and it was clearly going to be a spinners wicket.
From day one it was a dustbowl and as far as I know it is up to the selectors to understand these things.
The end result probably matches the lack of judgement shown by the team management before the first Test even started.
How the Australian’s prepared for that match by using practice balls brought over from Australia instead of using the local ball defies belief.
What were they thinking?
Costs?
Whatever it was it was a poor decision and one of many that cost Australia the Ashes.