The
"Ashes Cup"
Sean Fagan of RL1908.com
The
Rugby League "Ashes Cup"
First presented in 1928
The Cup's inscription reads:
INTERNATIONAL
RUGBY LEAGUE FOOTBALL
Australia v England
(The Ashes)
Presented by
CITY TATTERSALLS CLUB
Photo courtesy:
National Museum of Australia.
The
"Ashes Cup"
was lost for a decade
After
being retained by England following
their 1933/34 series victory, the Cup
vanished.
It
was not taken to Australia on the Lions
1936 tour, and could not be found when
the Kangaroos visited England in 1937/38.
The
Lions won every Ashes series in the 1930s,
so the Cup's absence wasn't noticed by
many.
Fortunately,
in October 1945 it was found and brought
to Australia the next year for the resumption
of the Ashes contests.
The
Kangaroos first gained possession of the
"Ashes Cup" in 1950, after winning
the series 2-1.
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The
"Ashes" series concept and tradition
began in cricket in the late 1800s, but was quickly
taken up by other sports in representative contests
between states/countries.
The
Adelaide Advertiser (15 June 1911) reported
that the winning state at Australian rules national
carnivals took possession of a silver-mounted
glass bottle containing "the ashes"
(though what the ashes were derived from wasn't
stated).
In
rugby, Test series between the Wallabies and All
Blacks were for "rugby's Ashes" before
the Bledisloe Cup was donated in 1931.
By
the start of the 20th century it was an accepted
principal that the "fight for the Ashes"
had to comprise at least 3 games to be a true
test of strength between the nations.
Hence,
rugby league contests between Australia and England
have been 3 Test series ever since they began
in 1908 and took on the Ashes name.
In 1928 Sydney's "City Tattersall's Club"
donated the "Ashes Cup" trophy.
League's
Ashes battles were seen by public (in NSW &
Qld) as the football/winter equivalent of summer's
cricket Ashes.
The
idea that the Ashes could be for grabs in a one-off
game goes against that tradition, and the very
reason that made Ashes contests special, unique
and revered.
The
result of a one-off game could fall either way
based upon a referee's decision, a player being
sent-off (rightly or wrongly), a team suffering
a bad run of injuries, weather conditions that
suited the locals better than the visitors, or
simply bad luck.
A
one-off game gives the loser no chance to revenge
their loss, and the winner no chance to prove
once and for all their supremacy. After the one-off
game, no one would be the wiser as to which team
was genuinely the superior.
Over
a 3 game series (hence why it was adopted) such
arguments and hard luck excuses became meaningless
- the results could not be argued after a "best
of three contest" to prove superiority.
The
playing of three tests was a fair and reasonable
means to battle for supremacy and have the Ashes
settled with some measure of finality.
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