Next summer's Ashes series is heading for a record-breaking sell-out. Nottinghamshire, who will stage the first Test at Trent Bridge from 10 July, put their 23,500 remaining tickets on general sale on Monday morning, and they were snapped up within six hours in the busiest and most lucrative day in the club's history, ensuring a capacity 22,000 crowd for each of the first four days.

Lancashire had experienced a similar rush when they put tickets on general sale for the third Test of the series last week, with all 25,000 tickets for the redeveloped Old Trafford sold for the second and third days, and only limited availability remaining for the first. Both Old Trafford and Trent Bridge will be staging their first Ashes Tests since they hosted memorable matches in the classic 2005 series, having missed out in 2009.

Durham have also reported rapid sell-outs of all the tickets that have so far been released for the first Ashes Test in the north-east, and Surrey are already guaranteed to sell out The Oval for the last Test of the series later in August, with 26,500 people having signed up for the public ballot of the tickets that remain after they go on sale, initially to members only, on 1 December.

That will provide a timely boost to the finances of all four counties, and to English cricket as a whole. The MCC is also braced for a rush when their ticket application brochure is distributed to members at the end of the month for the ballot of tickets for all major matches at Lord's including the second Test against Australia which starts on 18 July.

There is no evidence yet that England's poor Test record in 2012 which has cost them their place at the top of the official world rankings, or the Kevin Pietersen saga, has eroded support for the national team, at least when the Ashes are at stake.

Pietersen took a major step back towards a recall on Tuesday when he held meetings with the team director, Andy Flower, and an unknown number of senior players as part of the reintegration process set up by the England and Wales Cricket Board.He had been due to arrive from South Africa on Monday in a break from his commitments in the Champions League Twenty20 with Delhi Daredevils, but his return was delayed by 24 hours because of a cancelled flight. Pietersen has to fly back to Johannesburg on Wednesday before Delhi face Auckland in their second Champions League match on Friday.

If the talks go well and Flower judges that the team are willing to welcome him back, England and Pietersen's new era could begin in the city previously known as New Bombay. The second of their three warm-up matches before the first Test is expected to be switched from the Bandra Kurla Complex Ground at the headquarters of the Mumbai Cricket Association to the DY Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai.

"The BKC ground does not have facilities like toilets for the spectators," explained Ravi Savant, the MCA president, also suggesting in the Indian press that security would be a concern. "There are no catering facilities around the ground. And the fence is not tall or strong enough to prevent the crowd from jumping on to the ground."