Is there another Test happening?

With the Ashes currently dominating the cricketing world, and attracting millions of betting fans seeking out the best odds, and perhaps rightly so as the series carries with it a huge amount of memories and great moments, the current series between cricket's world number one and two sides is currently being left firmly in the shade.

Despite the fact that India and South Africa are battling it out to show who is the best in the world, the glamour and passion of the Ashes has shown that the historic series still ranks as the biggest in test cricket, with only a small percentage of betting fans seeking out fixed odds for the clash between the countries. With Australian and English fans more concerned with seeing their side defeat the other rather concentrating upon their team's ICC world ranking position, or that of any other team, the fact remains that for a test match to be truly popular, there needs to be some history and bad blood between the two sides, something that is clearly the case with the current Ashes series.

However, with Australia suddenly showing themselves to be nothing more than a mediocre cricket team and England firmly on the rise, the fact remains that the Ashes series may begin to lose its allure if it returns to the uncompetitive nature that dominated from the late 1980s to the early 2000s. Should Australia fail to arrest the slide that has seen its cricket side slip to depths that South Africa and India would be devastated to witness then maybe, just maybe, the cricketing world will start to turn its head away from the Ashes series and instead look for more recent rivalries to focus upon.

Having said all this, a sudden twist in the current series, or an Australian comeback would surely cement the Ashes as the best test series in terms of both the quality and passion that is on display.