firecracker

And Dennis Lillee has warned us that we might not get the Ashes back in 20 years

And what is it about Yorkshire and the East Midlands that gives us more candidates for the drop than promotion, year in year out.

It just seems like 1866 when England won the World Cup

Negative stuff about Sheffield? Those who always moan about anything new, and through their incessant moaning, hold the city back.

They're just as local to Sheffield as what Leeds and Bradford are (and you don't seem to be moaning about THEM being in the relegation poll).

The West Ham revolution didn't start today, though

You'd win the league if you could play Barnsley every week, though.

There's around 20 matches to go, and a few local clubs are in the promotion spots, play off spots or thereabouts. So which local clubs will get promoted, either automatically or through the playoffs?

And looking at the league tables for all four divisions, do you honestly believe the "fall over the ball when trying to control it and miss an open goal" Nags Head brigade who play for our local sides deserve £190,000 or more a year?

At least we don't have to remember him for 5 million unemployed 15% interest rates Record repossessions Negative equity A doubling of the crime rate in 5 years Riots in Toxteth, Brixton etc Crumbling schools and hospitals Of course, certain folks don't like to remember who presided over all of the above and more, for obvious reasons.

And the words of Douglas Jardine, the Scotsman who was England's captain in the 1932/33 series, who said "We're not here to win friends. We're here to win the Ashes" - and he worked out the Bodyline strategy to get out Australia's batsmen - especially Bradman, before they did much damage. Bradman's overall career Test average was just shy of 100, but in the Bodyline series, it was restricted to 56. True to what Jardine said, England won no friends, but they won the Ashes.

Gets paid too much? He probably gets paid no more than a typical player at Hillsbrough, and considerably less than those at Bramall Lane. He's only on around £190,000 a year - hardly a fortune for a Prime Minister. Did you think he gets paid a million a year - because he would have been if Prime Minister's salaries had kept in line with inflation since the days of the Duke of Wellington.

Let me have a suggestion - how about a bronze statue with a brass neck of Mrs Thatcher instead, with one foot on a miner's helmet and a dole queue behind (and underneath) the other foot, with a plaque detailing her record - mass unemployment, crime doubling, repossessions running through the roof, negative equity - and we did have the Falklands War which resulted in the deaths of 260 service personnel - still around 80 more than Iraq and Afghanistan combined, with a pocket calculator in the hand without the handbag as a tribute to the fact that she didn't seem to know which year came 150 years after the Falklands became British in 1833 (Galtieri had promised his people that British rule wouldn't last 150 years on the Falklands - meaning an invasion before 1983), which begs the question "Why wasn't the Argentinian invasion prevented in the first place?" Perhaps with this reminder in every town and city throughout the land, the ungrateful amongst us might show a bit more appreciation of Blair.

England have certainly missed Vaughan, Trescothick and Jones - the bowler, not the wicketkeeper. It might have been a much closer series with them fit and in the side. And Strauss should have been made captain instead of Flintoff, because to me, Flintoff doesn't take the captaincy seriously enough. Where's the sense of urgency on the field?

Another failing in this series is that we have been unable to bowl Australia out twice. In the four Test matches so far, England have taken 10, 14, 15 and 10 wickets respectively. To win a match, you have almost certainly got to take 20 wickets, and to do so we need a captain and bowlers who know how to get each individual batsman out, and bowl and set fields accordingly. Does anyone believe that a captain like Ray Illingworth or Mike Brearley would have allowed the Aussies to get from 84 for 5 to 419 all out? No way!

And there's a World Cup in the new year as well.

Yep, the first Ashes whitewash in 86 years is well and truly on the cards. The last time was when England, under Jessop I think, suffered a 5-0 whitewash in 1920/21. I suppose we had an excuse back then - most of our best cricketers had been killed in World War I.

Much as I presume you'd like to see Wednesday go down (that's what you meant with the top line, isn't it?), they're 16 points clear of third from bottom - thats why they weren't included amongst the choices. Likewise, Doncaster Rovers look unlikely to be involved in the relegation battle.

We are now into the second half of the season, and several local clubs are dancing on the trapdoor and in danger of falling through it, with the exceptions of Wednesday and Donny Rovers, who have a chance of making the playoffs, and Scunthorpe who might gain automatic promotion. So which Yorkshire/Yorkshire area clubs will be relegated at the end of the season?

It's made a fat lot of difference in the end though.

Hold your horses. England have let the Aussies off the hook again 10 minutes ago, they were 372/7 :rant: :rant: Hayden 153, Symonds 154 no They led by 213 :rant: :rant: 372/7 is now the close of play score. :rant:

Especially when West Indian supporters held up a banner emblazoned with the word "Blackwash" when they stuffed us 5-0 here in 1984, and we went on to suffer another "blackwash" in the West Indies two years later.

Ponting will now be thankful that he lost the toss, and Australia will probably go on to build up a lead of 250 or thereabouts, and once again drop us in the brown stuff.

Looks like ham sandwiches for Christmas dinner, or down to the pub.

Barnsley seems to have at least as many late night bars, if not more than Sheffield - and that shouldn't be the case. For starters, Walkabout opens until 4am in Barnsley, likewise the Ice Bar. Most others including Yates's opens until 2am. So if Barnsley can have late licenses all over the place, why not Sheffield?