Ashes: Ian Botham, David Gower, Bob Willis, Mike Atherton and Nasser Hussain on first tours

There's nothing sweeter than winning the Ashes - particularly in Australia.

As England prepare to defend the urn they regained in 2015 - and atone for their 5-0 whitewash in Australia in 2013/14 - former captains David Gower, Sir Ian Botham, Bob Willis, Michael Atherton and Nasser Hussain give an insight into the conditions and the challenges they encountered on their first Ashes tour, including plenty of flak from the Aussie fans...

Bob Willis, 1970-71: Australia 0-2 England

An extraordinary series as England, under Ray Illingworth (below right, with Bill Lawry), regained the Ashes after 12 years. It was an odd tour because we had the ultra-professional Illingworth as captain and the extreme amateurs Colin Cowdrey as the vice-captain and David Clarke, the farmer from Kent, as the manager. It's fair to say that those individuals didn't get on. The manager was quoted as saying after the second Test, which like the first was a draw, that he would rather we lost the series than have to sit through any more boring cricket!

The next match at Melbourne was washed out and then I got my opportunity in the fourth Test when Ken Shuttleworth got injured but it was John Snow's match - he won it by bowling fast on a pretty spicy pitch. He hit Terry Jenner on the head, which led to crowd trouble and Illingworth led England off the field, but to my mind it wasn't a bouncer at all - it was a short delivery that Jenner ducked into.

However the umpires, who were very biased against us (in six completed Tests they didn't give us a single lbw), made a great fuss and said it was intimidatory bowling; the crowd didn't like it and threw cans onto the field, while one spectator grabbed Snowy on the boundary. It all died down pretty quickly but umpire Lou Rowan, a retired policeman, behaved like he was still in active service and said he'd award the match to Australia if we didn't return to the field which we duly did once the outfield had been cleared.

Back then bay 13 at Melbourne was a pretty colourful place! They chanted 'Willis, weak as p***' all the time and when I got down to the boundary there were cries like "hey Willis, you take ugly pills - I think you're hooked on them!" To calm them down you took the proffered can of lager but you were never quite sure if it was beer inside...

Anyway, two more draws followed before we returned to Sydney for the seventh Test and this time the spinners did the damage in the second innings. The whole series depended on that last day, which began with Australia needing 100 with five wickets in hand to level the series and keep the Ashes, but Illingworth and Derek Underwood bowled them out fairly quickly on that morning and we enjoyed a fairly comfortable series win in the end.

David Gower, 1978-79: Australia 1-5 England

This wasn't the first time I'd played cricket in Australia because I had one season of club cricket with Perth behind me. That season introduced me to the Australian psyche, which was invaluable; in four months I learnt a lot about the atmosphere, the rivalry and the amount of sledging that I could expect in an Ashes series in Australia.

The first couple of State games we played on that 78/79 tour reinforced what an important experience that was and gave me more exposure to Australian pitches. The 1-5 result suggests it wasn't a classically close series - which is perhaps not surprising when you consider how many players Australia lost to World Series Cricket - but this was no ea