*****Warning - if you don't like cricket then look way now*****

It was Christmas Eve at 5pm. Work was over and that meant one thing - a mad dash to the airport to catch a flight to Melbourne. This was no ordinary Christmas Eve....you see, the England Cricket team were over in Australia attempting to retain the Ashes for the first time in 24 years and there was only one place I would be this Christmas and New Year - cheering them on with the Barmy Army!

Since I was knee high to a grasshopper I have always dreamt of coming on an Ashes tour. This longing was only intensified when visiting the SCG & the MCG watching South Africa play against Australia two years ago and thinking what it would be like to see England play at these two magnificent stadiums. Especially the MCG, which is one of the world's greatest sporting arenas and which would be packed to the rafters on boxing day for the first day of the test. 100,000 screaming convicts and poms wathing the old enemy do battle in one of sports greatest contests - the battle for the ashes urn.

All the way through my childhood and now adulthood, watching the England cricket team has, for the most part been pretty depressing. It has only been since one year prior to our Ashes victory in 2005 that things have been looking up. Despite this though, England went over to Australia 18 months later and got slaughtered 5-0. I don't remember winning it in 1986.I was too young. Therefore in my lifetime(at least the bits I remember) we have never won in Australia. English cricket has been steadily improving though. There was the Ashes win in 2005 and then again another home Ashes win in 2009. We also won the Twenty20 World Cup last year. With English seemingly 'on the up' and Australian cricket appearing to be going ' belly up' there was a feeling amongst England fans that we could finally achieve an ashes win in Australia. Still, it would be very tough.

The series was tantalisingly poised at 1-1. Australia had somehow thrashed England in Perth with the help of the inconsistent mummy's boy Mitchell Johnson to level the series after England dominated the Aussies in Adelaide to take a 1-0 lead. With two test matches left the series couldn't be more intruiging. I was on my way from Auckland to Melbourne and very excited about it!

I arrived into Melbourne early Christmas day. I was staying at a friend's apartment in the city who was also an avid cricket fan. With everyone's focus being on the cricket, Christmas and New Year seemed like almost a side-show this year. An appetizer for the main event. Christmas Day was fantastic though. After an awesome breakfast - pancakes, croissants and the like we ventured out to St Kilda beach for an afternoon of beach cricket. It was full of English ex-pats and travellers with the same idea. Never have you seen so many games of beach cricket going on! The weather, although a little overcast, was very warm and perfect for swing bowling on the sand. Taking out Paul Speller's middle wicket with a beautiful yorker was definitely the highlight of the game. After the beach cricket we headed back to the flat for Christmas dinner, another awesome spread, barbecued after the oven had broken a couple of days before. With Christmas day coming to a close, thoughts were turning to Boxing day, the first day of the test in front of a sold out MCG. It was all very exciting.....

It was an early start the next day. I had to pick up my tickets for both Melbourne & Sydney from the ticket office and I didn't want to miss any of the play or the national anthems before the start of play. I got there at 9am and the atmosphere was already building up. I found my seat for day one and what a great place to be.....front row pretty much behind the bowlers arm. I was sat next to three Aussie's but there were plently of 'Pom's' in the vicinity. I sat down with my England shirt on...."You're going to cop some stick today mate" piped up the Tasmanian guy sat next to me. "We'll see" I replied!

The crowd was building up in anticipation of the the national anthems. I'm not sure how long they have been playing national anthems in test matches but this is a really great touch. It certainly must pump the players up into even more of a frenzy listening to that just before they go out onto the field. It was officially a sell-out, but noticeably there were a lot of empty seats in the members stands. Seemingly around 16,000 members had not bothered to turn up for the biggest day of the cricket calendar ensuring that the crowd was 'only' 84,000. Incredible really, but disappointing that it wasn't full. In my opinion it is pretty disgraceful that these tickets were not made available to the general public prior to the match. If the members arent going to come then there should be some process to ensure that their seats are given to the real fans. Evidentally these members cannot possibly be cricket fans. More likely they are AFL (Aussie Rules) fans.

Seeing the boxing day test between England and Australia was always something I had dreamed about and the day certainly did not disappoint. In fact it would have to go down as one of the best days of cricket ever played by England in the history of the game. If not THE best. Despite two early dropped catches England rolled over the Aussie's after winning the toss and putting them into bat. 98 all out with Tremlett, Anderson & Bresnan all making use of the overcast conditions and a first day bowler friendly wicket. If you had written a script it wouldn't have been this good. The Aussie's were stunned into silence. The usual 'banter' coming from the stands from the convicts was pretty much non-existant. If there were any doubts about England batting with the same ineffectiveness these were banished by the end of the day with Strauss & Cook finishing unbeaten with England on 157/0. Was this the best boxing day ever? Without question.

If one day of cricket had defined where the Ashes would be going it was this. There was still work to be done but things couldn't have gone any better! A quick walk back down the Yarra to PJ O'Brien's - the Barmy Army headquarters for a few celebratory beverages and a sing-song to end an absolutely perfect boxing day.

The first day of the test match had set the tone for the match. Despite losing Strauss and Cook early on day two Jonathan Trott, Kevin Pietersen & Matty Prior contrived to put England into an unbelievable position - a total of 513 and Australia need a massive score just to make England bat again! There were some scenes that I'll never forget during the England innings. Pietersen was about to reach his half-century when the Aussies thought they'd got him caught-behind. Ponting was adamant that it was out and challenged the umpire's not out decision but Pietersen stood his ground and didn't walk. The decision was upheld and Ponting continued to argue with the umpires and later got fined for his whining. "You've never walked in your life" shouted an English fan behind me! Was it the pressure getting to Ponting? Apparently Pietersen jokingly told Ponting he'd hit it at the time. If that's true then that is brilliant. Either way, it certainly upped the volume of the MCG crowd. There was also another instance when Prior was given out but the umpire reviewed his own decision as he thought it might have been a no-ball'. It turned out to be a no-ball, much to the delight of the Barmy Army and the disgust of the Aussie's in the crowd. It only added to the superb atmosphere and frustration for the Aussies!

The test match couldn't have gone better for England. By the time it reached the morning of day four England needed four wickets to retain the ashes with Australia in an impossible situation to save the match. Not even rain could save the Australian's now! 20,000 english fans were there to witness England retain the Ashes to unbelievable scenes. It was like a football match atmosphere with the Barmy Army in full voice and not an Australian fan in sight. The England team did a lap of honour and then did the sprinkler dance much to the delight of the travelling masses. It was four days of the finest Ashes cricket ever witnessed. It was almost surreal to be standing there in the MCG seeing England finally victorius in retaining the Ashes for the first thee in 24 years. The big screen at the Melbourne Cricket Ground had a big St Georges Cross with the words 'England retain the Ashes'and I was there to witness it. Something I will never ever forget.

So, the Ashes were retained but there was still work to be done. It was 2-1 in the series and we want to win the series in style. It would be a big disappointment to go to Sydney and lose. The next stop was Sydney for the final test but there was a small matter of New Years Eve in Melbourne to look forward to before heading to New South Wales and some beautiful sunny weather in the greatest city in the world!

New Years Eve was spent with the same crowd as Christmas Day at Speller's flat. We headed down to the Mornington Peninsula on a scorching 40 degree day to spend the day on the beach, more beach cricket and tanning was the order of the day before heading back to the flat to see the New Year in. We headed down to the river to watch the Melbourne fireworks which although not up to Sydney's standard, were impressive nonetheless! Another brilliant day.

I had decided to book the greyhound bus over to Sydney. A long journey was to come.I jumped on the bus and it was pretty much all English fans going to the test. Another exciting few days awaited. Could England win the Ashes series.....?