This is Clare's and my review of Cricketing Tales from the Dressing Room: The Ashes Special. Introduced and linked by Jonathan Agnew. Clare speaks.
I listened to these two CDs in their entirety but it took only five minutes to understand the nature of this spun-off compilation. England's recent victory in The Ashes was never assured and came as a delightful surprise to all but that is little excuse for this hastily assembled set of extracts, which seems to include Jonathan Agnew interviews from his TMS lunchtime chat spots.
The chronology was confusing and the status of the contributors was very mixed. On the plus side there was a balance between English and Australian contributions but overall it lacked the excitement that TMS generates so effortlessly. It must be said that not all the featured speakers can tell an anecdote that well, and some were in truth not worth telling. Had the interviews been interspersed with snippets from real-time commentary of highspots in the relevant test matches the result might have been more atmospheric.
Regrettably I will not be replaying this and would not gift it to anyone else.
