England retain the Ashes

England retained the Ashes by drawing the third Test as rain ended Australia's final-day victory push at Old Trafford.

The tourists were in a commanding position, having removed Alastair Cook, Jonathan Trott and Kevin Pietersen to reduce England to 37-3 in pursuit of an unlikely target of 332.

But, yesterday, recurring showers prevented any resumption of a compelling contest after 14:03 BST, and the captains shook hands on a draw at 16:40.

First off I must say that Australia were very unlucky in this test because if there was a full days play yesterday then they would have won it and the series would have been back on, but the odds of having five consecutive days of good weather in England are very unfavourable.

Although as an Englishman, even though it was the dullest way to do it, we won the Ashes for the third time in a row and can now begin thinking about defending them down under in a few months time as we go for four in a row.

One tiny little technicality point to finish on, I think it’s stupid that everyone is reporting that England retained the Ashes and that more needs to be done to win them outright, but as they’ll now fly to Australia with the urn so doesn’t that mean they already have.