Head coach Brendon McCullum accepts England have “room to improve” ahead of the Ashes but believes the intensity of their dramatic drawn series against India will help them meet the challenge.
McCullum was honest enough to chalk up the 2-2 scoreline as a “fair reflection” on seven weeks of hard-fought, demanding cricket, with India snatching a share of the new Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy with a thrilling six-run win in the decider.
That meant England were one big hit away from claiming an outright victory that would have sent them to Australia this winter with the biggest scalp of the ‘Bazball’ era.
Instead, they will travel having last defeated one of their ‘big three’ rivals back in Sir Alastair Cook’s farewell series in 2018.
McCullum will soon begin the job of assessing how and where things could have gone better, with the aim of landing in Perth at the start of November with lessons learned.
Series Reflection
“It’s been a magnificent series, as good as I’ve been involved with or witnessed in my time. We played some excellent cricket and at times, with the pressure India put us under, we came up a little bit short,” he said.
“You’re always learning any time you get to see guys having to dig deep and go to places they’ve maybe not been before.
“We’ll let this one sit and we’ll digest it. We’ll be able to pick out what has gone well then start to work out how we can keep improving, so when we do arrive out in Australia we give ourselves a huge chance.
“We’re in the middle now, halfway through what we knew was going to be an unbelievable 12 months of Test cricket. We know we’ve got some room to improve.
“But to be involved in a series of such pressure over a period like this teaches you to be tough and builds resilience within you. A lot of our guys will have learnt a lot and that can only be a good thing.”
Jacob Bethell
One thing England may reflect on is their decision to keep the emerging talent of Jacob Bethell in camp for the most of the summer, rather than releasing him to play first-class cricket.
He has played just one County Championship match for Warwickshire this year, while travelling as a non-playing squad member with the Test team.
When he was called on as Ben Stokes’ injury replacement, he made 11 runs in two innings and was dismissed in a pressurised chase playing a wild slog.
McCullum refused to chide him for that, though.
“Beth will be back and better for the experience, I’m sure he’ll learn from it,” he said.
“The good thing was he took the positive option. The thing people want to be seen to be doing is getting out to a ball in an acceptable manner, but sometimes you’ve got to be brave enough to be able to try and put some pressure back on the opposition. He got out doing it, but no one ever regretted being positive, right?”
Ollie Pope
Bethell’s flat performance means Ollie Pope can breathe a little easier about hanging on to his number-three spot in Australia.
After starting the international season with successive hundreds – against Zimbabwe at Trent Bridge and India at Headingley – his numbers tailed off. He finished the series averaging 34 and sat a disappointing 10th on the run-scoring charts.
“There were too many 20s and a 40 in there. You always want more as a batter so it’s frustrating that I didn’t end up scoring more hundreds on some good surfaces,” said Pope.
“That’s probably the difference between a really good series and a so-so series. I feel like I’m a much better player now than I was on my first Ashes trip (in 2020/21).
“Mentally, I’m more equipped to deal with the challenges out there and I know how I want to go about building innings out there.
“Before I felt like I was kind of trying to tinker too much during games, in between games, and probably wasn’t quite ready for the challenge four years ago.”
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