As Australia’s men’s team steps up preparation for their maiden World Test Championship Final engagement against India, they could be excused for casting a wistful eye towards their Ashes rivals who kick off England’s international season later today.

Not that Pat Cummins’ squad would willingly forego their chance to be crowned the game’s pre-eminent Test outfit having finished atop the table after the two-year qualification period, or to trouser the $US1.6 million (almost $A2.5m) prize purse on offer to the winner.

But given the evidence tendered by more than 140 years of Test cricket in the United Kingdom, they might have fancied their chances of taking the title even more if the showpiece was staged at Lord’s rather than The Oval.

Australia’s record at the ‘home of cricket’ in St John’s Wood is quite remarkable, and lends credence to claims the famous venue inspires such deeds among touring teams from Down Under it has become something of a home far away from home.

From 39 matches at Lord’s since 1884, Australia have claimed 17 wins for a success rate of 43.59 per cent which is superior to England’s 39.72 from 141 games and South Africa’s 33.33 at the same venue.

By contrast, Australia’s record at The Oval – where the rivalry that became the Ashes was spawned in 1880 – is markedly worse, with just seven wins from 38 starts (18.42 per cent).

That ratio is also much leaner than their returns at other established England Test grounds Headingley (34.62), Trent Bridge (30.43), Old Trafford (29.03) and Edgbaston (26.67).

It’s therefore not unreasonable to speculate Australia might have preferred to mount their first assault on the ICC’s newest global showpiece at a venue where they have not only forged so many famous memories but proved pretty difficult to beat.

However, despite its almost mythical standing as Test cricket’s living embodiment, Lord’s has yet to host a WTC Final partly through unforeseen circumstance and partly due to commercial reality.

When the proposal for a Test Championship was first flagged by the ICC in 2010, it was initially to be fought out over a four-year qualifying period with the four top-ranked teams to then compete in a play-off tournament staged in England with the final to be held at Lord’s.

It took almost a decade for that vision to be realised, with the first iteration of the current WTC kicking off with the previous Ashes campaign in 2019 amid expectation the inaugural champion would be crowned at Lord’s two years later.

But the global COVID-19 pandemic scuppered that plan, with the final instead held at Southampton’s Rose Bowl where on-site accommodation ensured competing teams New Zealand and India could maintain a level of biosecurity isolation.

When venues for the 2023 final were discussed last year, it emerged that financial considerations – in particular, the ICC’s stipulation for a ‘clean’ stadium free from existing membership requirements and adorned in its own sponsors’ livery – meant Lord’s faced potential commercial conflicts.

And so the event was awarded to The Oval.

Under its Future Tours Program released last year, the ICC have guaranteed England will host the WTC Final again in 2025 which raises the prospect of Lord’s finally getting its chance.

But in the meantime, while Australia and India prepare for their historic first Test meeting on neutral turf, Lord’s will be playing host to England’s one-off home Test against Ireland that begins today.

And while skipper Ben Stokes gets his first look at a newly re-laid Lord’s wicket block having requested faster pitches for the subsequent Ashes campaign, Australia will undertake the first full training session of their UK sojourn on Kent’s quaintly bucolic out-ground at Beckenham, 20km from central London.

It is expected the only similarity between that low-rise venue that adjoins the training facility for Premier League football club Crystal Palace and The Oval is their geographic location south of the River Thames.

Whereas The Oval pitch is tipped to favour pace bowling given next week’s unprecedentedly early start date – the first time in more than 140 years the ground has hosted a Test starting in June – the auxiliary county field is renowned for favouring batters.

It’s the place where former Australia allrounder Andrew Symonds clubbed an unbeaten 156 (from 167 balls) for Kent in a 2004 first-class fixture, with a fair helping of those runs coming off Symonds’ World Cup-winning teammate Brad Hogg who was playing for Warwickshire.

And in 2017 – on one of the ground’s traditional ‘flat, white wickets’ – Kent piled on their second-highest county total of 7(dec)-701 (to which South Africa-born opener Sean Dickson contributed 318) before Northamptonshire replied with 568 and a draw was mercifully called.

Beckenham, which will host Australia’s pre-WTC Final training sessions today, tomorrow and across the weekend before they and India are granted access to facilities at The Oval two days prior to the decider starting, should therefore provide friendly conditions for batters to become acclimatised.

But whether those centre-wicket and practice nets sessions offer sufficient preparation for The Oval where Australia have won just twice in the past 50 years – as opposed to Lord’s, where they’ve suffered only two defeats across the same time span (2009 and 2013) – will be known less than a week before the Ashes begins.

Main Image: TCM Simpson

2023 Qantas Tour of the UK

World Test Championship Final: Wednesday June 7-Sunday June 11, The Oval

First Test: Friday June 16-Tuesday June 20, Edgbaston

Second Test: Wednesday June 28-Sunday July 2, Lord’s

Third Test: Thursday July 6-Monday July 10, Headingley

Fourth Test: Wednesday July 19-Sunday July 23, Old Trafford

Fifth Test: Thursday July 27-Monday 31, The Oval

Australia squad: Pat Cummins (c), Scott Boland, Alex Carey (wk), Cameron Green, Marcus Harris, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Josh Inglis (wk), Usman Khawaja, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Mitch Marsh, Todd Murphy, Matthew Renshaw, Steve Smith (vc), Mitchell Starc, David Warner