You still have to enjoy the tour games. If you go out there and just go through the motions, you can easily get into bad habits, you lose a bit of rhythm or a bit of form and then things can go pretty bad pretty quickly.
— Glenn McGrath
I had always had the same pre-match routine that I went through every day - get up, go down for a swim and a stretch, back to the room for a shower, then down for brekkie - the same routine every game, and it got me ready.
Umpiring is a tough job. Don't get me wrong - I wouldn't want to be an umpire. You've got a split second to make a decision.
Sometimes when things are happening outside the team, when forces are at work to try to break the team apart or cause issues, it can actually have a different effect - it can bring the boys closer together. They become more of a unit and they start to protect each other.
To win Test matches consistently you've got to take 20 wickets - yes, you've got to score runs but if you can't bowl a team out it doesn't matter how many runs you score.
That was how we categorised ourselves in the dressing room - you were either a nerd or a Julio. Julios have got to look perfect - the hair has got to be perfect, they've got to have the right gear on, it's all about their appearance. The nerds weren't bothered about how they looked.
As a bowler it's a strange feeling when you start running through a team. You get that one wicket under your belt and suddenly you start running in feeling loose, feeling relaxed and thinking about what you want to bowl rather than focusing on trying to force that wicket.
I used to come out and say I was targeting certain players in the opposition team, particularly players I had had success against in the past: Gary Kirsten, Brian Lara and Michael Atherton, for example. It is a mental part of the game.
But if you have got a batsman out three or four times in the same series then you are in business - all of a sudden you have got yourself a bit of a bunny.
The Australian approach to playing cricket in general is quite an aggressive one.
My experience with Australia in the 1997 Ashes series taught me that fighting back is a combination of technique and mindset.
If you've got one bowler - particularly a fast bowler - who is really aggressive, all over the opposition, he brings the rest of the team along with him.
Is there a secret to bowling at the Waca? In a way the secret is that there is no secret. Like any ground in the world, it's all about feel.
You can come up with all the gameplans that you want but the guys in the middle have to execute those plans. If Jimmy Anderson or Stuart Broad serves up a leg-stump half-volley, you can't turn round and blame Andy Flower.
It's incredible what the Sydney Test has become - it's now iconically the pink Sydney Test. It's the sixth year that the McGrath Foundation has been involved and the support from everyone in cricket - right across the board, supporters, teams, you name it - has been absolutely incredible.
When I made my debut in 1994-95 I bowled big outswingers pretty much every ball, because people had told me you should bowl consistent outties to take wickets.
Big wins in the first Test of an Ashes series polarise everything moving forward.
When I was playing that was the main focus - you knew what you had to achieve but you want to have fun doing it, otherwise there's no point in doing it.
You know there is something a little bit special about an Ashes.
The best thing about Lord's isn't the slope, it's just being there.
You're always going to get different personalities within a team.
If the batsmen can give the bowlers a day and half of rest then that is going to work in the team's favour.
When I played in the Australia team the captains were all nerds. Allan Border was a nerd, Mark Taylor was a nerd, Steve Waugh was definitely a nerd and Ricky Ponting too.
When you're playing in a good team where you're confident in yourself and your team-mates, when you've done the business before, it makes it so much easier.
The more you get a batsman out the more it becomes psychological. A batsman starts thinking about it and making something of it in his head.
Consistency in selection is great but it's a whole lot easier if you've got players who warrant that consistency through their performances.
When things aren't going well it can feel like the world is against you and there's nowhere to turn.
The difference between first-class cricket and international cricket isn't skill, it's attitude and the way you go about things.
As a fast bowler if you're not going to bowl well on a Perth wicket you're going to struggle in Australia.
Have a little protection if that helps your bowler - Brett Lee always wanted a cover and a midwicket because they helped him bowl his natural length and made him more effective as a result.
A coach these days is more of a manager than a coach. At this level, you shouldn't really need a coach. You need someone to organise, to come up with gameplans and tactics, rather than someone who is going to do much actual coaching.
The Sydney Cricket Ground is my favourite ground in the world, my home ground, and growing up in the bush all I wanted was to play at the SCG.
It's the games you lose or struggle in that you learn most from in Test cricket.
I bowled in tandem with Brett Lee, who produced some fast, fiery spells. When you've got someone bowling up above 90mph, it has a fear factor that not many people really enjoy.
There's always a little bit of anticipation - some people call it nerves - the night before, and although I always slept pretty well before big matches, you want to be on edge a little bit to get the best out of yourself.
Standing at the end of your run with the ball in your hand preparing to bowl the first ball of an Ashes series is an amazing feeling.
I loved playing at Lord's - I ended up with 26 wickets at 11.50 from three Tests there. Maybe the wicket, because of the slope, was perfect for my style of bowling.
One of the great things about cricket, and certainly something that I found helpful, was that as soon as you step over the boundary rope you can switch off everything that is happening off the field and focus solely on what is happening out on the pitch.
An Australian prime minister once said that his job was the second most important job in the country - behind being captain of the cricket team. It's not a job you take on lightly.
If you get on a roll - good or bad - it's hard to get out of it, but it's not impossible.
The Australian team that I was lucky enough to play in had a certain aura and sometimes you had teams beaten before you even walked on the field.
If you have knocked over a batsman once - fine, it happens. Twice, OK. But more than that in the space of a few Tests then there is definitely something to work with.
When you've got a team who are making a concerted effort to make a batsman feel uncomfortable it can look pretty ordinary.
Test cricket tests you physically and skill-wise, but also mentally. And you have to be solid on all three to do well.
Australia play best when they've got a bit of mongrel about them, when they play hard out in the middle, when they don't give an inch, when they play an aggressive brand of cricket.
The one thing you can't do is get carried away with that pace and bounce. There's a temptation to charge in and just slam the ball into the pitch and you can end up bowling too short. You still have to bowl the right length so that you threaten to take wickets.
If they don't execute well enough then there's nothing much a coach can do. But if they do execute those plans correctly and they don't work, then you need to be able to adapt and come up with something different.
The support for the McGrath Foundation and what it has allowed the Foundation to achieve and grow into has been unbelievable.
Back in 2006-07 when we completed the first Ashes whitewash in 86 years, the historical significance didn't really filter in to our thinking. We didn't realise it at the time - we were just making amends for 2005.
I was part of the Australia team that lost the first Test at Edgbaston in 1997 and yet came back to win the series quite comfortably in the end.
