England, Australia
1905-08-21
Captaining England for the first time in 1905, Stanley Jackson won all five tosses against Joe Darling, topped both batting and bowling averages on either side (492 runs at 70.28; 13 wickets at 15.46), and led England to a 2-0 series win to retain the Ashes. He retired from Test cricket immediately afterwards, never having toured Australia.
Australia, England
1905-07-15
Albert 'Tibby' Cotter, a stocky 21-year-old fast bowler from Sydney, made his Test debut against England in 1903-04 but became famous on the 1905 Ashes tour. He bowled bouncers as a tactic when most Edwardian fast bowlers thought them ungentlemanly, set packed slip-cordons, and broke stumps. He died in October 1917 in a mounted charge at Beersheba — the only Australian Test cricketer killed in the Great War.
New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Queensland
1905-05-06
On 6 May 1905, at Wesley College in Melbourne, the New South Wales Cricket Association and the Victorian Cricket Association founded the Australian Board of Control for International Cricket — the body that would become Cricket Australia. South Australia refused to join because the constitution gave players no representation; the dispute would eventually trigger the 1912 Big Six walkout.
Australia, England
1905-08-31
Warwick Armstrong, Australia's 26-year-old all-rounder, scored 2,002 runs and took 130 wickets in first-class matches on the 1905 tour of England — one of the great all-rounder tour returns of all time. The 'Big Ship' was Joe Darling's most consistent player; he would go on to play 50 Tests and captain Australia to a 5-0 Ashes whitewash in 1920-21.
England, Australia
1905-07-24
Reginald Herbert Spooner made his Test debut for England v Australia at Old Trafford on 24 July 1905, having been one of the most-talked-about batsmen of the unbeaten Lancashire side of 1903-04. A stylist in the Trumper mould, he played 10 Tests, made 247 v Notts in 1903 (a Lancashire record), and shared a 368-run opening stand with Archie MacLaren the same year.
Australia
1905-08-15
Joe Darling led Australia in three separate Ashes series — 1899, 1902 and 1905 — and on the 1901-02 and 1902 tours commanded the Australian touring sides at the height of the country's Edwardian cricket. A left-handed batter from South Australia, he combined a measured tactical sense with the durability of the bush cricketer and was the first Australian captain to win an Ashes series in England since 1888.