Ben Stokes' team have demonstrated the world that cricket is meant to be enjoyment.

Nobody talks about the last ball of the Ashes. It's the first that's famous. That wide that goes to the slips, that beautiful stroke for four, that wicket, clean bowled! Final deliveries? I had to research them. Moeen Ali edging a shot behind to end an innings rout in a inconsequential game in 2015; Boyd Rankin being caught in the slips off Ryan Harris, Rankin participating in his single Test at the conclusion of a quick disintegration in a comprehensive defeat that's been full of them in 2014; a Steve Harmison short ball deflecting off Justin Langer's shoulder for runs, the single four the Australian team score in a run chase they'll never get to make in 2005.

It separates between speculating how things will go, and seeing how they do. One thing's certain, there's no assurance there will be a happy ending. For the previous decade, the English visits to Australia have finished in defeat, as opposed to with them. Andy Flower was removed as manager after one humiliating defeat, in 2013-14, Chris Silverwood was sacked after a further defeat, in 2021-22. It's possible to form a two lineups out of England players who played their last Test match at the conclusion of an trip Down Under during the previous 25 years, and even have a couple of men over to carry the drinks for either side.

This England team have never claimed to be overly concerned about outcomes. Ben Stokes, like Eoin Morgan with the limited-overs team before him, consistently states that whether or not a aerial shot is grabbed near the fence is secondary as whether it was the correct choice to execute it in the beginning, and while fielding he's happy to clap a bowler who concedes runs so long as they bringing the team toward taking that subsequent dismissal. But then the very reason Ben Stokes tried to guide his players to follow this style was so they would be in a better position to deliver the style of play he believes will do well for them in Australia.

The forthcoming contest, for which they have been training rigorously, already appears as the conclusion they are bound to face. It is Bazball's critical moment. And there are an abundance of warnings of defeat in English cricket for the team to escape criticism if they do suffer another poor loss in the next few weeks. His methodology has been predicated on defying expectations, and the counterpart is it seems that there are numerous observers who would be pleased to be validated.

In light of this, it's a good moment to point out that the important question goes beyond where this all ends up, but if we had fun along the way. In the recent past, England were an thoroughly poor national side. They had been beaten in four consecutive series and were falling behind in the fifth, against India, when it was halted because of Covid. They had won exactly one Test match out of 17, and lost a dozen of them by large defeats. Eight wickets to the Kiwis at the Birmingham ground, A defeat by 157 runs to India at the the famous stadium, an a comprehensive loss to the Australians at the MCG, A defeat by ten wickets to the Caribbean side in the scenic location.

England were thrashed by West Indies in the venue in March 2022 just before Root resigned as skipper.

By the conclusion, after all those periods of nasal swabs and preventive measures and restricted environments and repeated losses at the hands of each rival, they were virtually the most miserable and weary Test team England had ever put on to a playing arena. A significant portion of what Stokes and McCullum have achieved in the subsequent years was in a consequence of all that, as well as the Stokes' experiences during his five-month break from the game in 2021 when he had suffered a bout of anxiety. It was designed to make people recall that it was intended as entertaining, if it was supposed to be anything.

That remains true now. Even when the the historic series is on the line, and even if the team have ultimately accepted that they need to be a little more flexible in the way they approach performing. Everyday life has a way of imposing, it can be hard to remember the insights we gain in our most difficult periods.

This is the English squad that peeled off consecutive run chases of three challenging targets in one summer against the Black Caps; that made a massive 378 to defeat the Indian team that same summer; that became the first touring team to win a whitewash in the host nation; that battled hard to a tie after going trailing by two matches in the the series; that overcame India in the southern city off the back of one of the most remarkable knocks ever played in the subcontinent, and then overcame Pakistan in Multan off the back of a subsequent one.

It is the England team, too, that unexpectedly end up being defeated in a Test by an innings defeat even though the other team made only 326; who ended up suffering a loss in one of the better Tests ever staged after making a bold declaration in the opening session against the Kiwis, and then did the same thing against the Australian team; who were soundly beaten by a huge margin in the Indian city, and who were on the losing side of one of Sri Lanka's greatest victories. Between them, they have secured some of the unlikeliest wins, experienced some of the most embarrassing exits, made some of the surprising hundreds, and secured some of the most startling five-wicket hauls in the history of the national sport.

No matter how this Ashes series shakes out, they have been, successively, incredible, unbelievable, ridiculous, frustrating, and completely, unapologetically, boldly entertaining.