Since the 1998 – 99 Ashes series, a Waterford Crystal representation of the Ashes urn has been presented to the winners of an Ashes series as the official trophy of that series.

As it took many years for the name " The Ashes " to be given to the ongoing series between England and Australia, there was no concept of there being a representation of the ashes being presented to the winners.

In 1971, they won a Test series in England for the first time ever, surprisingly defeating Ray Illingworth's Ashes winners.

Only from 1998 – 99 were the winners of the Ashes presented with a replica ( not to scale ) of the urn in Waterford Crystal.

Sporting trophies are also crafted by Waterford, such as the Masters Series crystal shield trophies that are awarded to the winner of each of the nine men's professional tennis Masters Series tournaments, the AFCA National Championship Trophy that is awarded to the US college football team which finishes the season at the top of the Coaches Poll, and a representation of the Ashes urn that is presented to the winners of the Test cricket series between England and Australia.

Since the 1998 / 99 Ashes series, a Waterford crystal trophy has been presented to the winners.

The Ashes is a Test cricket series played between England and Australia since 1882.

England is the current holder after winning the Ashes in 2009 and again in the 2010 / 11 series in Australia.

The first Test match between England and Australia was played in 1877, though the Ashes legend started later, after the ninth Test, played in 1882.

At the end of the Third Test, England were generally considered to have " won back the Ashes " 2 – 1.

England lost only four Ashes Tests in the 1880s out of 23 played, and they won all the seven series contested.

In 1896 England under the captaincy of W G Grace won the series 2 – 1, and this marked the end of England's longest period of Ashes dominance.

England won it against the odds, and Plum Warner, the England captain, wrote up his version of the tour in his book How We Recovered The Ashes.

The title of this book revived the Ashes legend and it was after this that England v Australia series were customarily referred to as " The Ashes ".

England retained the Ashes when they won the 1912 Triangular Tournament, which also featured South Africa.

Although England decisively won the Ashes 4 – 1, Bodyline caused such a furore in Australia that diplomats had to intervene to prevent serious harm to Anglo-Australian relations, and the MCC eventually changed the Laws of cricket to curtail the number of leg side fielders.

The Ashes resumed after the war when England toured in 1946 – 47, and as in 1920 – 21, found that Australia had made the best post-war recovery.

The 1972 series finished 2 – 2, with England under Illingworth retaining the Ashes.

Despite suffering heavy defeats against the West Indies during the 1980s, England continued to do well in the Ashes.

Only a single England victory had come in a match in which the Ashes were still at stake, namely the First Test of the 1997 series.

The First Test at Lord's was convincingly won by Australia, but in the remaining four matches the teams were evenly matched and England fought back to win the Second Test by 2 runs, the smallest victory by a runs margin in Ashes history, and the second-closest such victory in all Tests.

A draw in the final Test gave England victory in an Ashes series for the first time in 18 years and their first Ashes victory at home since 1985.

With several England players having retired or been injured after the 2005 series, Australia regained The Ashes in the 2006 – 07 series with a convincing 5 – 0 victory, the second time an Ashes series has been won by that margin.

England then achieved their first Ashes win at Lord's since 1934 to go 1 – 0 up.

Finally, England won the Fifth Test at The Oval by a margin of 197 runs to regain the Ashes.

This allowed England to take an unbeatable 2 – 1 lead in the series and so they retained The Ashes.

Australia went on to win the Third, Fourth and Fifth Tests and retain the Ashes 3 – 2.

The band went on to record their next two albums, Catastrophe Ballet and Ashes, under this lineup.

And on Friday 30 April Roy went back in time to the 1980s in the BBC TV programme Ashes to Ashes, as Frank Hardwick.

During the 1978 – 79 Ashes series, Boycott unusually went in at No. 11 in the second innings of a match against state side South Australia ( not due to injury ).

He was not the first Clifton schoolboy to hold this record: in 1868, Edward Tylecote, who went on to help England reclaim the Ashes in 1882 / 3, was a previous holder, with 404 not out in a game between Classicals and Moderns.

Australia went onto lose the series 2 – 1 and Ponting became only the third Australian captain to lose the Ashes twice.

Great Britain went on to win The Ashes.

Jones went on to be a mainstay of the Australian Test team middle order over the next six years and being one of the stars of the successful 1989 Ashes tour of England.

Jones finished the Ashes series with 18 wickets at an average of 21. 00, and England went on to win the series 2-1, reclaiming the Ashes for the first time since 1986-87.

Harmison went on to play in the 5th Test at the Oval ; on the final day of the series, Harmison claimed the three penultimate wickets to fall, including those of Peter Siddle and Stuart Clark with consecutive deliveries, both caught after attempting to play to the leg side, to create a unique opportunity to win the Ashes with a hat-trick ( Ben Hilfenhaus successfully blocked the hat-trick ball ).

Without Zanuck, Brown went on to produce films including the drama Angela's Ashes ( 1999 ) and the romance Chocolat ( 2000 ).

He went on to play 6 Test matches in 1985, 5 on the Ashes tour of England and one at home, but with a low bowling strike rate in 5 and 4 day cricket, he was more successful in the shorter form of the game.

While Tait went wicketless in the second innings, he held his spot to play in the final Test of the Ashes series at The Oval, taking 1 / 61 in the first innings and 1 / 28 in the second.

Longest period without being forced to follow-on in Test cricket is held by Australia, who after being asked to follow on by Pakistan in Karachi in 1988, went 190 matches without being forced to follow on until being asked to do so in the fourth test of the 2005 Ashes series against England.

At the end of the season he was selected for his second Kangaroo Tour as the back up fullback to Gary Belcher and went on to be selected for every game on tour, although unlike Terry Lamb who played in every game on the 1986 tour, Alexander, along with the Kangaroo's other replacements that day ( David Gillespie, Des Hasler and Mark Sargent ), didn't get off the bench in the 14-10 second test win against Great Britain at Old Trafford that kept The Ashes series alive.

The band toured the United States in Fall 2007 with From Autumn to Ashes and then went on a month-long European tour with Blessthefall.

The game's database was accidentally destroyed on April 15, 1994, leading to a game split that resulted in the creation of two other prominent Star Wars-themed MUSHes, Star Wars MUSH 2: A New Threat, later From the Ashes, and Star Wars MUSH 3: Minos Cluster, which went on to become Unsung Heroes, which continues as an active MUSH to this day.

For the whole season, Foster headed both batting and bowling averages for his county, and it was no surprise when he went to Australia for the 1911 / 1912 Ashes tour.

Wachter finally went to Stuttgart, where he painted " Cimon in Prison ", " Ulysses and the Sirens ", the " Boat of Life ", " Andromache standing at the Urn with Hector's Ashes ", the " Greek Muse mourning over the Ruins of Athens ", a " Virgin with St. John Sorrowing at the Grave of Christ ", etc.

Sutcliffe went on to make 161 and, in the end, England won the game comfortably, by 289 runs, and regained The Ashes.

They went on to draw the match, which was crucial in Australia's eventual retention of the Ashes.

Cricket writer, Colin Bateman, noted, " Higgs was a fine medium-fast bowler with an impressive pedigree, who suddenly went out of fashion with the selectors after one Test of the 1968 Ashes series ".

Cork later went on that winter's Ashes tour.