WARREN Hegg and John Crawley were today selected for England's Ashes Tour of Australia this winter.

They will join Mike Atherton for the five-Test series with five more Lancashire players handed international recognitiion when the winter tour squads were announced at Lord's this morning.

Andy Flintoff will make a second consecutive A tour to South Africa and Zimbabwe after Christmas.

And Neil Fairbrother, Ian Austin, Graham Lloyd and Peter Martin will all go to Bangladesh for the one-day tournament next month - a sure sign that they are in the running both for the one-day series in Australia and the World Cup in England next year.

But it was the selection of Crawley and Hegg for the big trip which really delighted everyone at Lancashire.

Crawley has been in outstanding form all summer, but had to wait until the one-off Test against Sri Lanka for his chance. And even then, despite a magnificent unbeaten 156, he had to sweat on his selection.

For Hegg, the call-up is a dream come true. Although he has made three A tours in the past, he has never been given the senior international recognition which his consistency both as a batsman and wicket keeper for Lancashire has deserved.

He will be going as deputy keeper to Alec Stewart so will not be first choice in the Test matches. But he is still closer than ever to making an England debut.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.