READY,FREDDIE8230;GO?

After the Test match at Lords last week my knee was a bit sore but Ive been icing it and getting treatment from Lancashire physio Dave Roberts, the injury-prone Flintoff told radio station Talk Sport on Tuesday. Ive been in the gym and have to prove my fitness at training.

Ive been icing it and now I have this machine that I put on the knee every night. It gets in the way a little bit8230; It wraps around my knee and it compresses it,half an hour on,half an hour off,throughout the night.

A fit and firing Flintoff will be a massive boost for England who must make do without injured batsman Kevin Pietersen for the final three Tests after he had Achilles surgery.

Four to go

Flintoff,who will retire from Tests at the end of the Ashes series,said he expected to be able to play in the back-to-back Tests at Edgbaston and Headingley.

Last week I bowled in some discomfort. But I managed to bowl my overs and get through, he said. I said before the Lords Test that we had four matches to go and I intended to play every one of them. I played back-to-back Test matches last week and I fully intend doing the same this week.

Flintoff was an integral part of the England side that beat Australia in 2005 but experienced a 5-0 hammering in the 2006-07 series in Australia when he was stand-in captain.

This is massive, he said. For me to go out of Test cricket standing on the podium at the Oval with an Ashes medal in hand would probably the best thing thats happened in my career.