Life for England’s Ashes-winning heroes was soon back to mundane normality. Four days after their golden evening at The Oval, they spent Thursday battling through a Duckworth-Lewis match against Ireland in rainy Belfast. “It was soggy and there were maybe 2,000 in the ground," says Matt Prior. “It felt a bit like a Pro40 Division One match with Sussex.” After they had scraped home by three runs, England’s return flight was delayed by a security scare.

For all the readiness to move on to new challenges, starting with a Twenty20 against Australia at Old Trafford today, Prior, who kept wicket in all five Tests and was England’s second-top runscorer behind Andrew Strauss, could not help looking back in wonderment on the twists and turns of an extraordinary series and how they played out in and around the winning dressing-room.

“When things went wrong we didn’t find it difficult to come back,” he says. “There is a huge amount of belief and trust among us, and right through the series we never doubted each other, whether it was that Jimmy Anderson and Monty Panesar could bat out the game in Cardiff or that Stuart Broad would come good. What happened in the past was irrelevant to us. It was a very black and white, very honest way of looking at things.”

Prior, with 261 runs at a strike-rate of 81.8, was the fastest-scoring frontline batsman on either side. “There were a couple of situations made for quick runs but playing the Aussies brings out the positive in you. If they sense weakness, they will be onto you. The only way to deal with that is to stick your chest out and go hard back. That’s what we did,” he said.

FIRST TEST, CARDIFF: England (435 and 252-9) drew with Australia (674-6d). Prior 56 and 14; three catches

WHEN PRIOR, one of 11 players making Ashes debuts, was fifth out 20 overs into the final day, England looked finished. “I felt frustrated and angry,” the wicketkeeper recalls. “The worst thing was that I was out of the game. I’m not a good watcher. At one point I thought, ‘Okay, we’re 1-0 down. What do we do next?’ But I never gave up hope because I knew everyone could bat. I sat on the balcony with Alastair Cook and Strauss, and we worked out how many overs everyone needed to survive.

“At nine down, I went into the changing-room and started bouncing a tennis ball against the wall. Then it got to the stage where we needed to find a clock that told the right time. I was still bouncing the ball. With almost 10 minutes to go, I went into the showers. Cook was sat in there and shouted at me to get out. So I went.

“When we got over the line, it was a strange emotion. We were chuffed but you can’t be too over the moon. It was only a draw and we were going to have to play a lot better.”

SECOND TEST, LORD’S: England (425 and 311-6d) beat Australia (215 and 406) by 115 runs. Prior 8 and 61; one catch

A FEROCIOUS spell from Andrew Flintoff, who announced before the game that this would be his last Test series, clinched England’s first Ashes victory at Lord’s for 75 years.

“Fred was always confident we’d do it, as though he alone knew what he was going to do,” Prior says. “He was relaxed. He just said we’d got a great chance to win. I admired him for that calmness. It was undoubtedly the quickest spell of bowling in the series. It wasn’t just the pace but where he was putting the ball. It was reverse swinging. They were having to play all the time.”

Flintoff’s retirement was greeted with little fuss. “We had agreed there were to be no distractions,” Prior adds. “Team objectives came before individuals.”

THIRD TEST, EDGBASTON: Australia (263 and 371-5) drew with England (376). Prior 41; six catches

SENSATIONAL bowling from James Anderson and Graham Onions on the second morning gave England a chance to force victory in a weather-blighted game. “Jimmy bowled even better than he did at Lord’s,” Prior recalls. “The ball did more for him. He bowled Graham Manou with one of the best balls I’ve seen.”

Prior assisted with two fine catches. One was a spectacular effort diving in front of slip to dismiss Marcus North but he was more pleased with the catch that accounted for Peter Siddle, who outside-edged an inswinger.

Australia easily batted their way to safety on the last day, but crucially Broad rediscovered his rhythm. “Stuart had seen others doing well and was striving too hard for wickets,” says Ottis Gibson, the England bowling coach. “His mindset was all wrong. I said, ‘It’s not what the ball does, it’s where it does it from’.”

FOURTH TEST, HEADINGLEY: England (102 and 263) lost to Australia (445) by an innings and 80 runs. Prior 37no and 22; no catches

ENGLAND's start was cataclysmic. Prior suffered a back spasm that almost ruled him out of the game and delayed the toss. This in turn disrupted Strauss’s preparations. His early dismissal triggered England’s worst collapse of the series; 72 for six at lunch was as good as terminal.

No sooner had England lost inside eight sessions than the team arranged a meeting at their hotel to make sense of what had happened. “It was a brilliant idea because it would have been dangerous to go away without talking about what went wrong,” Prior says. “I left the ground thinking, ‘Oh my God, what has happened?’ and I left the hotel two hours later and couldn’t wait for The Oval.

“Maybe we got ahead of ourselves. Our focus wasn’t strictly enough on winning the first session. We learnt a massive lesson.”

FIFTH TEST, THE OVAL: England (332 and 373-9d) beat Australia (160 and 348) by 197 runs. Prior 18 and 4; one catch, one stumping

HAVING got caught out at Headingley, England were determined not to look too far ahead at The Oval. Prior drove into the ground each morning with Broad and each morning they had the same conversation.

“‘This will be the biggest day,’ we said,” says Prior. “And we said that each day. At no stage did we dare think about the next day. Even when we got a big lead, it was all about winning the next hour. That was reiterated again and again.

“On the last afternoon, the big screen flashed up, ‘England need five wickets to win the Ashes’. I said to Straussy, ‘Look at that, mate.’ He said, ‘I’d prefer it if it was only one.’ That got me straight back into the game. Only at nine down did I think we could win the Ashes.”

England were guilty of over-celebrating after their 2005 win, with some players accused of becoming distracted by financial windfalls. Prior, who has sponsorship deals with batmaker Slazenger and Sussex law firm Thomas Eggar, is determined to avoid that and has quickly switched to the challenges ahead. “It’s a fantastic honour to win the Ashes but being part of one of the best England teams ever would be something special,” he says. “The only way to do that is to win consistently. We really want to keep improving and see how far we can go.”