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People rarely mention the final delivery of the Ashes. That initial ball that's famous. That stray ball that goes to the slips, that elegant shot for four, that dismissal, shattering the stumps! Final deliveries? I had to research them. Ali slicing a drive behind to end an innings rout in a inconsequential game in 2015; Rankin being taken at slip off Ryan Harris, Rankin participating in his one and only Test at the conclusion of a rapid downfall in a 5-0 whitewash that's been commonplace in 2014; a Harmison short ball glancing off Justin Langer's shoulder for extras, the only four the Australian team achieve in a pursuit they'll never get to make in 2005.

It's the difference between questioning how things will go, and seeing how they do. One undeniable fact, there's no assurance there will be a positive outcome. For the previous decade, England's trips Down Under have finished in defeat, instead of with them. Andy Flower lost his job as coach after an embarrassing rout, in 2013-14, Silverwood was let go 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 back end of an trip Down Under during the last quarter-century, and still have a couple of men over to act as substitutes for each squad.

Stokes' squad have never claimed to worry excessively about results. Ben Stokes, like Eoin Morgan with the ODI squad before him, always says that regardless of whether a lofted drive is taken at the rope matters less as if it was the right decision to play it in the first place, and in the field he's quick to praise a pitcher who concedes runs so long as they help bring the team closer to taking that following breakthrough. But then the primary motive Stokes tried to teach his team to play this way was so they would be in a better position to produce the style of play he believes will perform effectively for them in Australia.

The forthcoming contest, for which they have been planning extensively, already feels like the result they can't get away from. It is Bazball's make or break moment. And there are an abundance of predictions of failure in English cricket for the team to avoid backlash if they do suffer another poor loss in the upcoming period. Stokes's approach has been predicated on proving everyone wrong, and the other side is it seems that there are many individuals who would be delighted to be shown right.

Given that, it's a good moment to highlight that the important question is not only where this ultimately leads, but whether or not we enjoyed it along the way. Four years ago, England were an completely dismal cricket team. They had been defeated in a quartet of successive tournaments and were trailing in the fifth, against India, when it was halted because of the pandemic. They had won only one Test match out of seventeen, and lost a dozen of them by humiliating deficits. A loss by eight wickets to the Kiwis at the historic venue, 157 runs to the subcontinent team at the the famous stadium, an an innings defeat to the Australians at the iconic ground, 10 wickets to West Indies in the island nation.

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

By the end, after all those periods of nasal swabs and social distancing and biosecure bubbles and constant defeats at the hands of everyone they played, they were virtually the most dejected and careworn Test team England had ever sent out to a playing arena. A significant portion of what Ben Stokes and Brendon McCullum have achieved in the years since was in response to all that, as well as the former's personal encounters during his five-month break from the game in 2021 when he had experienced a bout of anxiety. It was designed to make people recall that it was intended as enjoyable, if it was meant to be something.

It still is now. Despite when the the historic series is on the line, and although the team have ultimately accepted that they need to be a slightly versatile in the way they tackle competing. Normal existence has a way of intruding, it can be difficult to retain the insights we gain in our toughest times.

This is the English squad that secured back-to-back final innings pursuits of 277, 299, and 296 in one period against the Kiwis; that made a huge total to overcome India that corresponding period; that became the first touring team to win a clean sweep in Pakistan; that battled hard to a draw after going 2-0 down in the Ashes; that overcame India in the southern city off the back of one of the greatest innings ever played in the subcontinent, and then defeated Pakistan in Multan off the back of another.

It is the national side, too, that unexpectedly end up being defeated in a Test by an innings defeat even though the rivals made a relatively low total; who ended up being defeated in one of the more exciting matches ever played after making a bold declaration in the first innings against the Kiwis, and then repeated the action against the Australian team; who were thrashed by 434 runs in the venue, and who were on the losing side of one of the island nation's finest wins. Between them, they have recorded some of the most improbable victories, experienced some of the poorest performances, scored some of the unlikeliest tons, and secured some of the most surprising exceptional bowling spells in the history of the English game.

However this historic contest shakes out, they have been, in turn, incredible, outrageous, absurd, exasperating, and completely, unrepentantly, unashamedly enjoyable.