Brendon McCullum defends England's Noosa training break ahead of the third Ashes Test in Adelaide, saying the top seven batsmen will stay the same. He argues five days of intense preparation may have backfired and stresses the team needs mental toughness to mount a comeback from 2-0 down.
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You're listening to the TMS podcast from BBC Radio 5 live.
Hello, welcome to Adelaide Oval. This is Eleanor Aldroyd, refreshed from their much discussed trip to Noosa, England, have arrived in South Australia and are preparing for the must win third test that begins on Wednesday. So many questions after Perth and Brisbane. Have this side found any answers? We'll hear shortly from head coach Brendan McCullum and get the view of BBC Sports Stefan Shemelt who was in Noosa on the beach, plus the Press Association's Rory Dollard as we build towards one of England's biggest matches in many years.
You're listening to the TMS podcast from BBC Radio 5 live.
Yes, welcome to the Adelaide Oval. For the first time in this series we will be bringing you full ball by ball coverage of everything that happens here from Wednesday onwards. And it's always a pleasure to be in this ground. With its historic scoreboard, its backdrop of Moreton Bay figs, the cathedral just hidden away behind the new stands which have grown up over rich recent years, it's very much an Australian Rules football stadium as well as a cricket ground. But we love it for the historic associations, particularly with Don Bradman and also some quite good days in England's relatively recent cricket history as well. Rory. Stefan. Welcome up here, Stefan. Before we get stuck in, you want to take me to task on what happened in Noosa.
It's not often that you and I fall out, Ellie, but in the intro then you said that I'm fresh from the beach. I think in Noosa I can confirm that not once did my feet touch sand in Noosa. So, yeah, I, I wasn't on holiday, you know.
You were not in your trunks?
Absolutely not.
And rubbing sun cream into the backs of the England team.
Yeah, well, even if I'd wanted to, I don't think they would have let me.
He has got a straw hat on and a pina colada in his hand. I have to, I have to mention that.
But Rory, in, in contrast, we're sitting here at the moment watching the England squad go through their paces, doing some pretty full on fielding drills out there.
This, you know, you, you want to be careful about drawing too much from just a couple of minutes. But they've done some running on the outfield and sprints and shuttle runs and now they're whacking balls and fielding in sort of a circuit style. And I feel like I haven't seen them do this for quite a while. Quite a while. It feels like a bit of a throwback.
Do you know what? Anyone who's played club cricket will know the drill where basically someone stands by the square and whacks high, catches out towards a boundary where the players are in a line getting ready to take them. It is a bit like that, just at a much higher intensity. Yeah.
And they're keeping a few, keeping a few more in the hands than, than I would recognize from Club Creek.
Well, you've got a broken finger, haven't you?
And, and I suppose. And they're not doing it for us, are they? They're not doing it for the journalists who are lined up in the press box over there. But, but I, we're going to HEAR From Brendan McCullum in a moment and I kind of got the sense, Stefan, from his press conference, that they're quite focused now, this England team, they're not making any excuses for underperformance. They're embracing the underperformance in a way and saying they, this has got to change. We've got three tests to save this series and, and to try and win the Ashes back and everything has now got to happen.
And Anything else that Brendan McCollum could have said just wouldn't wash, would it? There's no way he could have turned up today in Adelaide and defended the way that England played in the first two test matches and said that they were anything other than up for the fight. Because some of the things that he did say after the Gabba, I think rubbed people up the wrong way, particularly saying that they were over prepared for that Brisbane Test match when there'd been so much debate around their preparation. And he. And he explained those comments as well. So, yeah, everything that would we would expect or you'd want England to be doing from this moment, hopefully they are doing.
Oh, Bethel's just taking a screamer.
Well, we will talk about whether we think that there'll be any changes, whether there might be a place for Jacob Bethel or Shoaib Bashir in a moment. But first, let's hear from the England. Kentucky. But first, let's hear from the England head coach, Brendan McCullum speaking to Steffen.
Brendan, this is a question I never thought I'd ask an England coach, but can you just give me your reaction to the scuffle in the airport yesterday, please?
Look, to be fair, I didn't see it. I don't know to what level it was. Obviously we've got security team which are trying to protect the players. I don't know where on the line that's at, but from our point of view, I felt our message when we came down here is we want to be really respectful of everything that goes on. Obviously, we operate in a, in a slightly different environment as well and we know the optics and the eyeballs which are on us here and the scrutiny which is on us. And I think we've dealt with it pretty well over the last few weeks and we'll continue to try and do so.
Talk me through last week. What happened in the airport came at what you guys hope was a productive week off the field.
Really good week. Yeah, really good week. We'd planned that trip to Noosa a year ago and I think if anything it could have even more importance for us. I think where we've been in the series so far is we've not been up to the standard which we expect of ourselves with bat ball war in the field. I think, you know, to be able to head away, get away from cricket for a couple of days, you're still having cricket conversations, right? In a more relaxed environment, to be able to sort of dissect what had been, but not be. Not be too bound by but start to plot and plan our way forward and our way back into the series and to do so in a relaxed setting. The boys have now turned up here and are fizzing to get into the training and start prepping for the conditions that we've got and the tasks that we've got in front of us.
Just before we look ahead to this week, maybe clear up a couple of things from the end of the Brisbane Test that could have been misinterpreted from the outside world. You mentioned about maybe being over prepared for the Gabba. Was that something you thought ahead of time or you looked at in hindsight and why you thought that?
Well, first of all, I mean there's things that you say and there's things that you do which in the jobs that you're in, sometimes it's better for the scrutiny to be on yourself. And with nine days in between games we felt that was quite important. The over prepared nature of things, there is no perfect preparation, right? If There was just 4,000 balls you hit and it guarantees you average 92 of your bowl however many balls and you guarantee 10 wickets and we'll do it, don't worry, it doesn't exist. And for me there's training smart, there's being able to identify what's going to give you your best chance of succeeding in the conditions that you're coming up against and then there's just hitting or bowling for the sake of it. I kind it to running past the principal's office. You're doing it for everyone else but you should just be doing your running on your own and that's what we expect. And I felt five intense days of preparation, it may have just tapered us off a little bit where we ended up. We didn't play the conditions in front of us as well as what we could have done. Was that because we physically weren't as fresh as we needed to be? Was it because we weren't mentally as fresh as we needed to be? All I know is we weren't quite at the level we needed to be and I stand by those comments. I think five intense days leading into a test match is not the best way to prepare. We'll be working out our next three days making sure that we and we get ourselves in the right frame of mind and the right skill level to be able to go out there and perform. I think for us as we look towards this test match it's trying to identify and this is probably where we missed it at Brisbane is identify on this pitch what Is the risk level that I need to negate? How am I able to take that risk out of play? How am I able to transfer that pressure back on? What areas do I need to hit with the ball? How do I evaluate the game, the conditions and the situation and then make a game plan to be able to be successful in that. Sometimes if you train on flat wickets the whole time and you train, you train, you train, all you're seeking is that level of perfection. This is not a perfect game. This is a level of. This is a game which is incredibly inconsistent and you need to be able to play what's in front of you. And I don't think we did that as well as we could have in the last.
There's a couple of things that you and Ben said as well. After the gabba, I think people took up and sat up and took notice. You said about you can't have a glass draw in Australia. Ben said that the dressing room is no place for weak men. What did you mean by those things? Is it about, I don't know, guys collectively getting in the battle, not shying away from the fight, making good decisions in pressure moments?
Yep, all of those things. I think when you come here, you need to expect that you're going to have to wear a few to get on the inside, if that makes sense in a boxing parlance. I think, you know, Australia is a tough country. It's. They play tough cricket, tough country, they're full of tough people. And if you want to go toe to toe and earn the respect of Australians and to be successful against Australia, you need to be prepared to stand up and wear a few to get on the inside. I think you can't feel sorry for yourself. You can't bemoan bad luck or worry about what's been. You just gotta keep getting up and going again. And that's what we meant by those comments. Both Ben in his language and myself in my language, I think they're very similar messages. And as has been the case right throughout, we work incredibly closely, we have very similar beliefs. I do feel like there's a feeling that we go about our work in a very casual manner. It couldn't be further from the truth, to be honest. The level of intensity which we try and operate with and the hard edge that we try and bring to this team is all encompassing. It's not just in team meetings and things. It's how we try and live our lives and how we try and said about this cricket team. And I think over the past we've done that at times and that's what's going to be needed in the next little while. Then it's a matter of having the freedom in your mind to go out there and not be worried about. Not be worried, but to be able to handle the expectation of performance. And I guess that's how we try to set things up. And I think that's what both Stokesley and I were trying to allude to last week when we made those comments.
Cheng, those messages have landed with the players from the conversations that you've had with them in Noosa?
Yeah, I think so.
Yeah.
We know we haven't been at our best. Right. And that's. You gotta admit that you can't walk away from that. You can't start pointing fingers elsewhere. How do you remain tight as a group? What do you need to do to be successful in the conditions and the situation you're coming up against and get out there and have another go? You do that and then you give yourself a chance. If you don't, 2 nil becomes 5 nil real quick. And that doesn't work for anyone. I think there's not many teams that have come down here and won and particularly teams which have been behind the eight ball and have gone on to win. And that's because. For numerous reasons. But our team will come down here and we'll try and make sure we stay level, honest with ourselves, put the work in, but then go out there and have another go.
Right.
A few half volleys about the team which you might smash into the stand, but I know you've been on this side of the microphone before, so I'm going to ask them anyway.
Very good.
Right, so imagine the same top seven this week. I would say so roll for show at Bashir.
Not sure. We need to have a look at the conditions. We've got a squad of 15 here which, you know, over five Test series, we know that we're going to have to call upon all, if not, well, majority, if not all of those, we'll work out what we think's the best option for us to be successful in these conditions.
I guess similar answer if I'm. Are you going to refresh the pace? Attack maybe with a Josh Tong coming.
In somewhere else here.
Two years ago you said, you know, two nil down, three two had a nice ring to it. Similar feeling now.
Yeah.
What's the alternative? I think. I mean, we've been here before. We held the fort last time. When all those around you are losing your head, it pays to keep yours. And that's the job of a leader. As a coach, as a captain, that is our job, is to be able to get the team to believe that we can come back from being 20 down. When we turned up in Australia, we knew we were going to have to win three test matches. Nothing's changed. It's just how we handle the fact that we're 20 down. How do we iron out some of the areas where we've been poor and how we start to put some pressure back on Australia and see what they're made of? At the moment, they've been outplaying us in those key moments and this is a team which that hurts.
Right?
We come here with high hopes and high ambitions and at the moment we're not living up to it. So we need to recalibrate some of those things. And it's not throwing out what's been successful in the past. It's just making sure we drill down on a couple of areas that we can be successful which will give us our better chance. And I firmly believe it's adapting to conditions. We know what Australia's going to bring at us now. Well, we knew beforehand, but we've been too slow to adapt to it and this surface should suit us more as well. If we win this game after what's been a long nine days with lots of different narratives being talked about, if we find a way to be at our best and to win this game, then I think things shift around a little bit. And that's what wants in front of us over the coming days is to hold the fort and keep moving towards the target.
And just as a last one. Is it different this time, though, to being 20 down? Because a lot has been built into this series about, I don't know, defining the time that you and Ben have had in charge this week are jobs, careers, reputation's on the line.
That's professional sport, right? You know that when you take on jobs like this, you can't worry about any stuff like that. It's certainly not how I. I don't do jobs and I don't make calls to hold on to jobs.
Is that easier for you, though, than the players can? You have that mentality, but it's hard for the players to think like that.
Maybe that's your job is to protect the players. And I'll never shy away from protecting the players because they've got to go out there with bat in their hand or ball in their hand and they've got to try and execute their skill in front of millions of people around the world. So I will always protect them. And if that means putting yourself in the firing line, then so be it. You're a big boy, you can handle it. You don't get to feel sorry for yourself. That's why you took these jobs, for these moments where your niche is to be able to handle the pressure at its highest and, and to keep everyone connected and together and not be jumping as shadows. Just refocus things a little bit, recalibrate things a touch and keep moving forwards. If we do that, then you got a chance to come back for 2 0. If not, you do what every other team that's come down here before has gone down two zero do and they spend the next month or so feeling sorry for themselves and walking away with the result you don't want. And there are some very fine cricketers that have come down here. It doesn't pay to to lose your environment. It doesn't pay to lose faith. It doesn't pay to lose belief in what you're doing. That's my firm belief. That's how I've tried to live my life and it's how I've tried to coach this cricket team as well. And that's not going to change just because there's more on the line.
Thanks for your time. Good, Lisu.
Thank you.
Well, that was Brendan McCallum chatting to Steffen and in a moment we'll talk through what he had to say. But let me remind you to subscribe to the Test Match Special podcast and if you search Ashes on BBC Sounds, you'll find all all of our content from the ongoing tour. The next Test starts at 11:30 on Tuesday evening with Test match special live on 5 Sports Extra and on BBC Sounds from 10:55 in the evening. Your time and every day's play in the series will have highlights on the BBC iPlayer as well as the daily Ashes debrief with Alex Harley.
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Listen on BBC. Sounds well. Sitting here high in the press box at the Adelaide Oval are BBC's chief cricket reporter, Stefan Shemelt, and the Press Association's Rory Dollard. He got into a lot, Rory, didn't he? Chatting to us all a little bit earlier on. Brendan McCollum. There is a lot on his to do list, not least, bat better, bowl better, feel better.
That would be a good start, wouldn't it? He. He doesn't often do these previews, so it's interesting. He's made a habit in the past of only speaking at the end of series or at the start of series, occasionally at the end of a test match for him to do a big 20, 30 minutes of question fielding and, and fronting up for the team is. Is a little bit unusual and it maybe says a little bit about the fact that the team's under the pump and they're in a bit of a trench and he's taken it on himself to sort of be the man to sort of field those first batch of questions post Noosa. And there was plenty in it, you know, there was. He had to talk for the first time. I don't remember him ever being asked about his job, being on the line. He was asked that today by one of the Australian journalists and that's sort of an antennae moment in sports journalism. The first time a coach is asked, are you the right man for this job? Is the sort of, often the start of a road, but he was prepared for that and sort of he fronts everything with a smile. Brendan. But it does feel like this week has cranked up a bit. And you described it, I think, as one of the biggest test matches of England's recent history. And it feels like that for quite a lot of people, him being one of them.
He was quite, I mean, you know, he said that's part of the job, isn't it? Part of the pressure of the job is answering questions like that is being the focus of attention in the way that they have been this England team over the last ten days or so. And actually, interestingly, when he was talking to the assembled media earlier on, he said, actually you kind of miss those moments when they stop. You actually quite think, well, that was, that was, you know, you're doing an important job.
Do you know what? That was the only question about his future, I thought he didn't answer well. And the reason I thought that was he was talking about, I'm not here to save my job, that you don't think about the pressure. And one of the things I've always thought about Brendan McCollum is he doesn't need this job. His legacy is assured, certainly as a cricketer, as a New Zealander, of everything that he's achieved on the field. If Brendan McCollum was to lose his job after this tour, he would get another one. Is it the same for the players? That's why I asked him that question in the interview. Is it easy for you to say that now, but how do the players feel? And maybe that is the reason why he, he was doing the fronting up, that he is trying to shield the players from that pressure because some of them will know that these next three test matches, and if we're being realistic, it's this test match that might shape their immediate international futures. I think it's okay for Brendan McCollum to say that he's not feeling the pressure. I bet some of the players are.
Well, you described it just now, Rory, as basically doing a mourinho.
Yeah, he, he sort of said, because I think a lot of people, I'm sure a lot of your listeners were wound up by the over prepared line. It seemed to take on a life of its own. There are, there are words and lines that get used in sport, aren't there, that, that seem to typify or, or embody an entire period of time. And over prepared, after going 2 nil down in 6 days of cricket, seemed like one of Them and he moved to sort of suggest he with a nod and a wink that he was, he was doing a Mourinho, that he was keen to steer the heat and steer the attention away from his players and, and suck it up himself. So I think there's a chance that that's, that's sort of an explanation partially that he was willing to be a bit provocative and, and, and take a bit of heat for, for himself. But the thing that he knows and everyone who's out there training right now in front of us will know is that that's fine for a day or two in between games but as soon as they walk out over that line, the heat's on them.
Well, the thing about lines coming back to haunt England coaches while we're at a venue where a line where Peter Moore's may or may not have said we will look at the data when England went out of the World cup in 2015. I think to your point Rory, about the, the Mourinho, I wonder if in, in the moment he meant what he said and actually a few days later that is quite a good explanation for it because if Brendan McCollum genuinely thought they were over prepared and I think he said five days intense training is not the way to prepare for a test match, well who's signing off on that? Because he's the head coach. So who, who is deciding that they are having, that they're training for five days and I know when we're looking back here rather than, than looking forward. So if he, if his explanation is now while I was just taking the heat off the players and he doesn't mind looking, I don't know, a bit silly or whatever. Well, someone still said that they were going to train for five days. Who was it?
But it's, but you can see why he would say that, can't you? In a way because it was really hot in Brisbane. It was baking. It was, you know, they were putting long, long hours into the net and you know, I've covered enough sport around the world in international Olympic sport and that kind of thing and you know that there has to be a taper period that if you've over trained, if you, if you, you know, you train well or you train and you train smart but you don't train. It's easier to train too much.
Yeah. And I think, listen, there's almost certainly they would have liked to do things slightly differently over these last few weeks whether they could have got hold of the wacker, made that arrangement a bit more Firm with cricket Australia, we gather that's a conversation that's being had right now about, about warm up periods in the Ashes in future. But it's a little bit un. Unfashionable or something to say it. But England aren't 2 nil down because of what happened in Lilac Hill and they're not two nil down because of what happened in Canberra or didn't happen in Canberra. The 2 nil down because of some bad decisions out in the middle. And I know you can be battle hardened but there's nothing tells me about a practice match that Harry Brooke wouldn't have gone and chased one. There's nothing that tells me they wouldn't be playing some of those shots. The, the, the results have been achieved out in the middle. Not, not in those practice days.
Well, it's, I mean I think the message that I got from Brendan McCullum was, you know, you got to bat bowl field better, but you've also got to think better. You've got to just use those pressure situations better, just make better decisions out there. And, and actually if he's the coach sitting up in the stands and to some extent, well, I mean Ben Stokes will be sitting in the dressing room as well but the majority of the time, you know, they, they've got to, they've just got to get that into their heads somehow.
And, and again this is what was addressed I think with the. My dressing room is no place for weak men in Australia you can't have a glass jaw. I, I never took that, that Stokes or McCollum in the aftermath of the Gabber were calling out individual players. I took that to be a collective attitude that England have shown on this tour so far. And I'll use the comparison of. Can you remember Lords against India this summer when we were all getting quite giddy about the needle between the two teams. You know, Zach Crawley and Mohamed Siraj going at it. Duckett and Siraj with the, with the shoulder barge. Shman Gill was in there as well. England were, were at it throughout that summer. We haven't seen any of that yet on, on this tour apart from in.
The, in that final Australian innings.
When the game was gone. And so I do wonder if, if there was a time, particularly in Australia's first innings at Brisbane when, when Australia, when England couldn't get through the tail and it looked quite easy for Mitchell Stark and Scott Boland to be pushing the ball back and England were walking around in the heat and there wasn't a lot of buzzing around I did think if Ben Stokes was looking around, going, where? Where is everyone here? And I think that is what Ben Stokes was getting at. In the weak men comment, I don't think there was a particular, you are pointing a finger, you are weak because you have. You have done this, that or the other.
Well, I'm sure that these will have been conversations that they will have had a chance to have over the last ten days or so. So, Stefan, what actually happened in Noosa? What can you tell us?
Well, I think in Noosa, it was difficult for England to do anything other than what you saw in the press. So Noosa is a very small place. There is one strip of shops, bars and restaurants and there is a beach and. And that is it. So if England wanted to go and sit in a bar and have a drink, everyone would see them. If they wanted to buy an. A cobra hat, like Crocodile Dundee. Yes, I wish I was. And six of them are all walking around Noosa wearing a hat while they're going to be seen. And if they're going to go and play golf, well, we know they've been seen playing golf in other parts in Australia, but they're going to be seen. And all their time in Noosa, England embraced that. They knew it was coming. They knew there was going to be attention from the locals, they knew there was going to be particularly handsome journalists following them to Noosa and they would be seen by them.
And I wasn't there, by the way.
And they were absolutely fine with that. And, you know, park the car up on, what was it, Tuesday afternoon? Walk around the corner. First person I run to, Ben Stokes, and he says, how great is this? He was happy. Oh, whether he was happy or not to see me, I don't know. But he was more than happy to be there. Happy to be there more, you know, happy to have a conversation. Walk back down the street on the other side of the road. Who's there? Brendan McCollum, looking for a convenience store, telling us that this is the place that he's been to quite often because he played for Brisbane Heat in the big bash. He's got an Australian wife. It's one of his favorite holiday destinations. If you want to drink, lads, there's the pub over there. There's my favourite fish and chip shop. They were relaxed about all those sorts of things. The only thing that obviously didn't relax them, and it was only a member of the security staff, is what happened in the airport yesterday.
Yeah. Well, just remind us of exactly how that incident unfolded.
Yeah. England were traveling through Brisbane Airport, come to Adelaide yesterday afternoon. They had to drive from Noosa to Brisbane to fly here. And then just as they were trying to move through Brisbane Airport, there was a reporter and a cameraman from the Australian TV channel 7. One of the England security staff tried to put himself in between the cameraman and the squad. And then there was, I think I'd call it a back and forth that continued through the terminal and ultimately Seven broadcast on TV and on their social media channels. Seven released a statement last night to say that they thought it was a physical confrontation between the cameraman and the. The member of the security staff. England have said nothing until today when Brendan McCollum addressed it. Cricket Australia have said nothing either. I think one, a couple of things to sort of. I think for context. Cricket Australia earlier in the series had said to all media to keep a respectful distance was their way of putting it from players during their. Their transit through airports. And I think that had to be reiterated because players from both teams do get it. Internal flights are a way of getting around this country. So often Australian players get doorsteps, if you will, in airports. It's one of the things actually that Australia like about touring England. They don't have to take internal flights, they just drive around the country. And actually last year, Virat Kohli got into a. A confrontation with a reporter as well at Melbourne Airport because he thought that some of the. The filming at the airport had crossed the line. I think it was six of one and half a dozen of the other. It didn't look great from either side and Brendan McCollum has drawn a line under it today and I think we move on.
Yeah, I mean, it's a pattern of behavior, though, from the media, from the headlines, the POMI idiots, the E Scooters.
Listen with the media as well.
Apologize.
Yeah.
But apologising to people of Queensland, they're on the wind up out here, no doubt about it. And if you're close enough to be touched physically by the security guard, you.
Might be too close, actually. And England have dealt with it pretty well, actually, all the way. If you think all those things being followed through Perth Airport, the E Scooters being followed to the golf course in Perth, they got followed to an aquarium. And all the time they have done pretty well with that.
And this is the way that the media works in Australia as well, isn't it? Because it's very much regionalised. It's this different states have their own local newspapers, local TV crews and the Channel 7 TV crew who were involved in this coming together. I think to call it an altercation is slightly excessive, but, you know, they, they led the breakfast news bulletins this morning on Channel seven nationally.
It's also the star power of cricketers in this country. I think if we were to say the similar situation of, if there was access in the UK to filming, I don't know, Harry Kane on, on or Jude Bellingham or, or whoever, walking through an airport or playing golf or visiting the aquarium. Rory, you've covered England.
You wouldn't get anywhere near that close to them. No chance. They have a perimeter way bigger than these guys get.
Well, and interestingly, as I was walking to the ground a little bit earlier on, I walked across the Riverbank bridge and coming in the other direction were Usman Khawaja, Pat Cummins, Michael Nisa, the whole Australian squad pretty much walking back from training, very relaxed, wearing their kit. And let's hear from one of that Australian team. Here's what all rounder Cam Green had to say this morning on all the intensity surrounding the tour.
I don't think you're ever used to it. I think, yeah, especially on your. On your off days, you pretty much want to forget about cricket and just be a normal person for a few hours. Yeah, I can understand it can be quite frustrating to be photographed when you just want some downtime. So, yeah, I don't think you ever get used to that.
Did you guys ever feel like, I don't know, it was intrusion on you when you were in England? Obviously there was a time when there was a lot of attention on you, particularly after the Lord's testimony. Did you feel like the heather got too hot?
No, I don't think so. I think most of the time people are quite respectful. So I think you always don't think it's as bad as it is when you're not in that situation. So I can't quite remember what it was like a couple years ago, but yeah, to answer your question, you don't quite get used to it.
But from a fellow professional's point of.
View, do you have any, I don't.
Know, sympathy with the way that England.
Have been followed around this country?
Oh, oh, certainly. I think, yeah. You never like getting filmed, especially when you want to get away from it. Yeah, there's always sympathy for. For anyone in life that's getting filmed in public or in a private space. Yeah, it's never a nice feeling where high profile people and that just comes with it. Unfortunately, when you're going really well, you like the extra Attention. When you're not, you don't enjoy it. So.
Yeah, it's just.
Just part of the job, unfortunately.
Well, that was Cam Green. I mean, he's very sympathetic, isn't he? And as. As was Alex Carey the other day when he was asked about noos. So they all know how this works, really. But the thing is that if you're winning, it's great. If you're losing, you're getting all that focus, aren't you? You're an easy target.
Yeah.
Listen, also, to be really, really simplistic about it, the more people talk about what happened while Steph was wearing his fake mustache and pointy Harding bushes, hiding in bushes, the less we're talking about England's cricket. And that's probably doing them a bit of a favour, really. I think more. More on the cricket, less on the. Less on the bodyboarding.
I mean, you, you gave me an interesting quote yesterday, Steph, about the way England have handled themselves off the field on this tour. And, and you said those moments, the scooter, the aquarium, the beach, the acubra hats, you know, it has been. They've been in the firing line a lot or in the public eye a lot, but they don't seem to have shied away from it.
No. And what we spoke about yesterday, the only thing they haven't done well in this country so far is play cricket. That's the thing. That's the only thing they can do now to improve their tour of Australia. And realistically, as a combination of things that would get them to improve their cricket. Well, they've got it here. The conditions in Adelaide, even Brendan McCollum even alluded to it, that this should be the place that England would play at their best. It's probably going to be the best batting service that they've encountered so far. The boundaries on the. The square side certainly are much shorter. So I don't know if Jamie Smith's taking on those hooks or pull shots. They'll go for six, rather into the hands of a fielder. And maybe, just maybe, for as much as they will brush off what happened yesterday, as, as a. As a non event, maybe there's something that, that, that that's galvanized them. And of course, they've had their, their week together in Noosa. And in terms of, you know, what might happen this week, we had Brendan McCollum saying to us, I don't think we're going to change the top seven. Well, as they go through their slip fielding drills right now, I think we're getting Confirmation of that with Root brook Crawley at 1, 2, 3, Ben Ducket at sort of the, the first goie and most interestingly Ollie Pope at the second gully. Because if it, it, if there was going to be a change, you'd think it would be Pope and therefore you would expect right now to see someone else in that position.
So does that surprise you, Rory?
It does a little to be honest. I think for Ben Storks to come out with the comments he did after the match that Stefan's offered a reading of it. It does. Even with that being said, it strikes me as a bit of a surprise to come out with such strong comments and basically not make the gamble. These lot of made quite a big thing about the fact that ultimately they're gamblers. When they pick players out of county cricket with hardly any first class wickets or runs, they do so and it's a punt, it's following a hunch and I expected after Brisbane that they would, they would flip the switch on that while the series was definitely alive. I think if they, if they make a big selection change, a big switch and it's at 3 nil down with the series gone, it almost doesn't mean a great deal. Like I thought, I thought this, this team, this management team would have taken the risk sooner rather than later.
Do you think I was wrong on that, on what I'm reading of as a, as a collective rather than individuals?
I, I did a few, I would have, I would have said that a few hours ago, but the fact that they haven't swapped out Ollie Pope suggests that you might be right.
And bowling wise, could we see show Bashir appearing here or will they be happy with Will Jacks as their spin option with a bit of Joe Root on the side?
Well, McCollum didn't rule it out. I think he, the way that he described it was go away and look at the, look, look at the stats on this ground. You know the, the bowlers that perform, the way that wickets are taken, the pitch maps and all those sorts of things. I thought that was a pretty reasonable endorsement actually of showing Bashir's. From what my personal view is that England should stick with, with Will Jackson number eight and play their frontline seamers. To me that would be their best attack at the moment, not least because of the way we've seen Bashir Bolton in the tour games. But it seemed to me that McCollum really did leave the door open for Bashir to play.
He did leave the door open, but it, it's definitely now One of the most interesting things you're going to see on this tour is whether they pick Bashir because it's the most obvious sort of project that they've had in selection terms. They've picked people here and there. Bethel's played, Josh Hull, played things like that. Bethel's been the consistent one. They put 19 games into him over a couple of years with an eye on, particularly this game. You know, the Bashir, the. The first two games were always going to be pace dominated. If Bashir doesn't play this game, what was that? You know, what was the. What was that all about? Is this kind of the takeaway? Because this should be a spinner's pitch. The only thing is the way that England players have played him. When they played the Lilac Hill match, he played for England and the Lions and bowled against both the teams. He went at six and over in that game. They attacked him. People who are boosting him up for the last two years bashed him over the top. These are short boundaries. He went north for 115. I think, in the Australia A game, this is a real test of their. Their instincts and their gut feelings that they've really followed to the ends of the earth. This lot. They've followed their gut and they've got 48 hours or so to. To decide how far they're going to follow it. Now with Bashir and I thought about Australia.
We know that Pat Cummins will be back. We haven't had it, haven't seen the squad, but we assumed that he will be back.
He's got a seat next to his. Next to his name in the squad.
And he's on all the publicity now, isn't he? So. So Pat Cummins will be back. Nathan Lyon again, you'd have thought good record at this ground. Usman Khawaja.
I think there's a wild card to throw into this decision. So it. I think there's a lot of people who think it is Kawaja or Inglis. I'm going to throw Bo Webster into the conversation just because if Australia are bringing back Pat Cummins and aren't 100% sure about the bowling of Cameron Green, then Webster just offers them a little bit of bowling cover. And if it is going to turn, can bowl spin as well, I'm just going to throw that out there as a possibility.
Okay, you're Ben Stokes, Roy Dollard, you're standing out there on Wednesday morning.
Y.
It's hot. It's considerably hotter than it is today.
You batting or are you bowling really good question. So I think he's obviously chosen to bat first both times. He won both tosses. Logic suggests he shouldn't win the toss again. At least his looks got to run out at some point. I know that isn't how probability works, but he might just not get the choice. Do you know what I think? I think this England team, with all the overthinking and all the time for reflection that they've had, I think they might need to go back to we'll have a chase, please, which was in those heady early days of basball, where they used to win the toss. Decide to. They made a joke out of the fact that batting off, you know, batting second meant chasing. I think if you take this team back to first principles, it's give us a number on a board and we'll go chase it. And that's what I'd probably like to see them have a go at.
I agree with that. And just as a final thought on the whole week, really, in terms of the enormity of it and what it means to this team and this regime and this philosophy of how, in what day is it today? Sunday, so the Test match could finish a week tomorrow, a week on Monday, how we judge everything we've seen over the past three years in hindsight. Because in a week's time, or a bit more than a week's time, we are going to have a lot of hindsight on England's philosophy, England's selection and even their trip to Noosa. And it is all going to be framed by what happens on the field. And that is why it's brilliant to sit here to watch and talk about cricket and the decisions other people make. And it's really hard to be the person in the dressing room making those decisions and playing the game well.
That crunch Test match starts at 11:30pm on Tuesday evening. Your time to Test Match Special will be live on 5 Sports Extra and BBC Sounds from 1055. Every day's play in the series. We'll have highlights on the iplayer as well as the daily Ashes debrief with Alex Hartley. Thank you so much to Stefan Chemult and to Rory Dollard and we'll see you soon.
This winter, cricket's oldest rivalry is reignited. England and Australia do battle to compete for the Ashes.
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Here, live ball by ball commentary on 5 Sports Extra and get analysis and reaction of every day's play with the Test Match Special podcast.
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