The iconic images that
make the men's Ashes
by BBC Sport with Getty Images
Cricket's greatest contest begins on Friday as England meet Australia at Edgbaston. Ashes series have a fabled history few sporting events can match - packed with legend, famous names and drama. Throughout its 141-year history, there have been hundreds of iconic Ashes images - think Ben Stokes at Headingley in 2019 or Andrew Flintoff and Brett Lee in 2005. BBC Sport and Getty Images have teamed up to get you in the mood by bringing you some of the best photographs...
Gladiators
The Ashes has seen countless examples of gladiatorial performances with both bat and ball in the heat of the contest.
For England, there has been Ben Stokes in 2019 and Andrew Flintoff in 2005.
But first there was Ian Terence Botham in the summer of 1981...
Legendary all-rounder Botham began the series as captain, only to be stripped of the position with Australia leading 1-0 after two Tests.
What followed, in the third Test, was the first Miracle of Headingley and perhaps Botham's finest hour.
England were 135-7 in their second innings, following on with a first-innings deficit of 227 - their Ashes hopes seemingly fading
But Botham scored a stunning 149 not out, combining with Graham Dilley for a famous partnership of 117...
Bob Willis then took 8-43 to bowl Australia out for 111 and complete the most unlikely of victories, by just 18 runs.
In the fourth Test, Botham took 5-11 to bowl England to victory as Australia failed to chase just 151 to win, and in the fifth he scored 118 from 102 balls to set up another England win.
The series would become known as Botham's Ashes...
Botham's Ashes feats were unmatched by an Englishman until 2005, when a similarly burly all-rounder stole the show... and the Ashes were finally torn from Australia's clutches.
It had been 18 years since England had won the Ashes.
Australia won the first Test, dampening the optimism created by an energised England under captain Michael Vaughan.
But the series swung on a piece of misfortune before the second.
Australia bowler Glenn McGrath tripped on a stray ball in the warm-up and was ruled out.
What followed was a gripping match that swung one way and then the other, thanks in main to Andrew Flintoff, who muscled two half-centuries while returning seven wickets with the ball.
England eventually clinched a thrilling two-run victory. It resulted in one of the most iconic images in Ashes history, as Flintoff embraced opponent Brett Lee...
From there, England - and Flintoff - had momentum. A nation was hooked.
Thousands of people were locked outside Old Trafford as the third Test finished in a dramatic draw.
At Trent Bridge, England took a 2-1 lead...
That set up a finale at The Oval, England only needing to draw to regain the Ashes.
Of course, Australia fought hard. England players and fans were forced to sweat but eventually one of the great innings from Kevin Pietersen secured the series victory and sparked celebrations that went on and on...
Fast forward to 2019 and a third England talisman was demoralising Australia.
With the series on the line, Ben Stokes, fresh from leading England to World Cup glory weeks earlier, played one of Test cricket's greatest innings to drag England to a one-wicket win.
The series would eventually be drawn 2-2 and Australia therefore retained the Ashes, but there was no doubt this was an innings for the ages…
135 runs, 219 balls, 330 minutes...
"What an incredible innings this is from Ben Stokes"
"It's six or out... it's six!"
"Cut away, cut away for four..."
"That's the most extraordinary innings, ever, ever by an Englishman"
The Greatest...
While England cherish their all-rounders, Australia can convincingly lay claim to the greatest bowler and the greatest batter of all time.
Few, if any, cricketers were as famous as Shane Warne.
It all started with one delivery in 1993...
Then a little-known leg-spinner, Warne delivered his first ball in Ashes cricket at Old Trafford - a delivery that would go down in legend.
The ball pitched outside leg stump, turned and flicked the top of off to leave England batter Mike Gatting dumbfounded.
The delivery would become known as the Ball of the Century.
It catapulted Warne into superstardom.
Warne became the key tormentor in a period of sustained Australian dominance the Ashes had not seen before.
Between 1989 and 2003, Australia won eight series in a row.
In the 2006-07 series, Warne became the first player to reach 700 Test wickets as he dismissed Andrew Strauss at his home ground in Melbourne.
At the end of that series Warne bowed out of the Test arena for the final time, Australia 5-0 victors and the 2005 defeat avenged...
"700 for Shane Warne!"
65 years before Warne there was Don Bradman.
The right-handed batter scaled heights with the bat no other has ever reached, dominating England throughout Ashes series between 1928 and 1948.
He scored 5,028 runs in 37 Tests against England, including a famous 334 at Headingley - the world record score at the time.
On his final tour to England, he led Australia's 'Invincibles' as captain - they played 34 matches on tour, losing none.
But arguably his most famous innings was his last. Bradman was cheered to the crease by the crowd and opposition, needing to score four to finish his career with a Test average of 100.
He was bowled by spinner Eric Hollies for a duck, leaving his average forever stuck and immortalised on 99.94...
Controversy
Just like with great players, the Ashes goes hand in hand with controversy.
Bradman's dominance in the 1930s - and England's inability to contain his genius - was such it resulted in the 1932-33 series down under being forever known as Bodyline...
England, under captain Douglas Jardine, used controversial bowling tactics from fast bowler Harold Larwood in an attempt to stop Bradman and his team-mates.
Larwood repeatedly bowled short-pitched deliveries, aimed at the batter's body...
A packed leg-side field then waited for the catch...
The tipping point came when Australia captain Bill Woodfull was hit over the heart by a ball from Harold Larwood.
The Australians said the tactics went against all cricketing values and the fallout strained relations between the two countries away from the cricket field.
England won the series 4-1.
It wasn't to be the last time politics and cricket became intertwined.
In 1975, England's hopes of levelling the series at Headingley were ruined when the Test was abandoned.
Protesters broke into the ground overnight, dug up sections of the pitch and poured oil over one end...
The campaigners were calling for the release of George Davis, who had been convicted of armed robbery.
Captains Tony Greig and Ian Chappell surveyed the damage...
And almost 40 years on, Stuart Broad - a man who has become one of the key protagonists in modern-day Ashes cricket - was involved in his own controversial moment.
He edged the ball to slip but did not walk. The umpire missed it.
England went on to win the Test and series but a vicious response awaited Broad on his next visit to Australia, with the local newspaper, the Brisbane Courier Mail, refusing to name him or show his picture in their coverage...
Agony and Ecstasy
In 2015, Stuart Broad took 8-15 to skittle Australia for just 60 on the first morning at Trent Bridge.
The iconic wicket - and celebration - came when Ben Stokes took a sensational, diving catch to remove Adam Voges...
Broad has played throughout the highs and lows of modern Ashes cricket.
He was in the 2010-11 England team, led by captain Andrew Strauss, which won a series in Australia for the first time since 1986-87.
Three years later, however, a team that reached the heights of world number one crumbled as one man completed his own Hollywood storyline...
Mitchell Johnson, mocked by England supporters in series past, blew away the tourists in a 5-0 clean sweep...
England's iconic team fell apart...
During Ashes series, pain has been mental but also physical.
Few people encapsulate that better than Simon Jones, who suffered a serious knee injury in Brisbane in 2002.
Also in 2002, England pace bowler Alex Tudor was floored by a ferocious Brett Lee bouncer at the notoriously fast Waca in Perth.
On the first day of the 2005 series, England wanted to make a statement and their fast bowlers bounced the Australia top order.
One Steve Harmison bumper burst through Ricky Ponting's helmet grille and caused a cut on the opposition captain's cheek.
It wasn't to be the last time an England fast bowler hit an Australia batter.
In an exhilarating period of play in 2019 at Lord's, Jofra Archer targeted Australia's Steve Smith with short-pitched bowling.
It ended up with a bouncer flooring Smith and the Australian leaving the field with concussion.
It was all done in pursuit of that famous urn...
Want to learn more?
Credits
Written and produced by Matthew Henry and Marc Higginson
Sub-edited by Alan Jewell
Images by Getty Images
The men's Ashes 2023 begins on Friday, 16 June...