the times | Monday January 3 2022 51
Sport
health and asymptomatic. Graham
Thorpe is standing in as head coach
with temporary consultant coaches
Ant Botha and James Foster as his
assistants but yesterday’s training ses-
sion at the Sydney Cricket Ground was
further affected after England’s net
bowlers, mostly local club cricketers,
were forced to leave the session after
one of them returned a positive test.
Joe Root was forced to act as coach
for part of the session using the “dog
stick” to give throw downs.
Broad used his column in The Mail on
Sunday to give an insight into the im-
pact of Covid on the players, and to ex-
press disappointment and frustration
at his lack of action in the series.
Reflecting on the mood in camp, he
said: “We are the only team that has
played solid international cricketthroughout the pandemic and our mul-
ti-format guys had already done 50
days in a bubble before they turned up
here. We spent day two of the Boxing
Day Test testing for Covid and having
guys moving out of their hotel rooms,
away from their families, so they were
no longer classed as close contacts.
When you are faffing about with exter-
nal stuff like that, it drags your focus
from where it needs to be. The energy
and the mood in the camp is low.”
Broad was left out of both the first
and third Tests and said: “The biggest
frustration is losing the Ashes, being
3-0 down and feeling like I’ve not really
done anything.
“Not being able, as an experienced
player, to influence a series while it’s
live is tough. As a wobble-seam bowler,
I feel as though I missed out on two of
the best wobble-seam pitches in Aus-
tralia. Only playing once has made thisa very disappointing trip, one that has
not met my personal expectations.
“I would argue that I won’t get a
better chance to take wickets than at
Brisbane and Melbourne. There is a
long time between now and the tour of
the Caribbean in March and I have
never been one to make emotional
decisions, so I am not going to make any
spur of the moment calls on my future.”
It is believed that Broad will take up a
punditry role with Sky Sports once he
does hang up his boots.
The ECB has called home six En-
gland T20 squad members before their
tour of the West Indies this month, cut-
ting short their campaigns in the Big
Bash League, where Covid continues to
wreak havoc. Sam Billings, Saqib
Mahmood, James Vince, Reece Topley,
George Garton and Tymal Mills have
all been summoned while Chris Jordan
has already returned home.continued from back
Broad: I just feel so frustratedI
have been surprised by a number
of things that England have done
in this Ashes series but one that
stands out is the way senior
players have been left out of the
team. Apart from the individual
themselves, there is an impact on the
whole playing group which is not
helpful. I’ve never seen it work with
any team I’ve been involved in.
I was gobsmacked that Stuart
Broad didn’t play the first Test,
especially with David Warner being
one of the key Australia batsmen and
knowing the mental edge that Stuart
had over him.
Dave would have heaved a massive
sigh of relief not to have had to face
him until the second Test, where
Stuart bowled nicely. A lot of the
batters played and missed at him and
those balls could have taken the edge.
It’s not like he bowled badly. Because
of his height, Stuart doesn’t need to
bowl express pace to be effective. If he
continues to look after his body like
he has, he should have a few more
good years of cricket in front of him.
When you don’t pick someone like
him, it creates waves with the rest of
the players. Everyone else starts
looking over their shoulder. They’re
thinking: “If Stuart Broad doesn’t get
to play the first Test and then gets
dropped after the second, what about
me? I haven’t got all the wickets and
runs he has. If I don’t perform, I’m
going to be dropped.”
It’s a big issue when captains and
coaches feel that they have to make
changes to look like they are trying to
rectify situations. Panic changes like
that just cause even more problems.
You’ve got to pick players and stick
with them, no matter what. You might
make one change, but not three or
four, because then everyone starts
playing for themselves and no one
cares about the team or the result.
They just want to make sure they get
another game. That’s a disastrousbe captain - Root must stay
Shane
Wa t s o n59 Test caps
for AustraliaWhy drop Broad? Selection
policy has damaged morale
mentality to have within a team
environment.
I see no reason why Broad and
James Anderson should not be facing
Australia in 18 months’ time,
especially in English conditions with a
Dukes ball. Whether they play every
Test between now and then is
another matter. Mark Wood bowls
with pace and provides a different
element to the attack, but someone
like Ollie Robinson, he’s a bit more
like-for-like with Stuart — and I
know who I’d prefer to face.
For Jimmy, he’s such a great athlete
and it’s so effortless for him to roll out
the ball like he does and swing it both
ways — he can just keep going all day.
His pace is down a bit but when the
ball is moving around, he’s still
seriously good.
If they were holding back other
bowlers who are better, then that
might be an issue, but right now it
doesn’t seem like they are. Of course,
if Jofra Archer were fit, then it’s a
very different conversation.
I’ve also been amazed at how little
positive intent the English batsmen
have shown. You can see it in their
body language. It’s all to do with not
wanting to get out. When you have
that mentality, you’re nowhere near
your best. Look at the fearless way
England play their one-day and
T20 cricket — in this Test series,
it’s the opposite.
Jos Buttler and Jonny
Bairstow look like two guys who,
in Test cricket, are low on
confidence. A lot of it comes
down to the sort of mental
fatigue that happens when
you’re playing non-stop in
all formats.
When Jos is playing at
his best in one-day
cricket, he’s not
concerned whatsoever
about getting out.
Some of the innings
he played at the T20
World Cup were
outrageous. There’s
hardly anyone in
the world who
can bat like that.I’m surprised he’s not been able to
take that into Test cricket, because
not many have his hand-eye reflexes.
I know that towards the latter part
of my Test career, I never really found
the groove with my batting. It was
always much more of a challenge to
decipher batting in Test cricket
compared with one-day and T20
cricket. You’re more of a high risk-
taker in the shorter formats, but in
Test cricket if you get out in certain
ways then the public, coaching staff
and selectors don’t look at it fondly. I
never nailed Test cricket compared
with the other formats.
That’s why, for me, Dave Warner is
so extraordinary. He has had a couple
of lean spells here and there but he
has this ability to slot back into each
format. Jos has got the skills. He’s just
got to find the right method.
I do not know whether England
will soon be looking for a new coach.
But I do know that a new coach can
rejuvenate an environment almost
immediately — as long as it’s the
right coach with the right people
around them. Many different factors
can contribute to an environment
that is not successful, but if you get
the right coach taking over, like it was
for us with the Australia team
going from Mickey Arthur to
Darren Lehmann in 2013,
improvement can be
immediate.
Darren was given the
control he needed to make
adjustments straightaway. Going
back to more experienced players
was a big part of it. He knew
what he’d get from them. He
brought back Mitchell Johnson
and Peter Siddle. He had always
believed in me and told me I
would open. Hearing that makes
you feel 10ft tall.
Within a couple of weeks things
had shifted and even though we
didn’t win in England the way
we played changed. We went
back to enjoying playing for
our country. A good coach
knows how to unlock the
best in a player. Jos is as
skilful as anyone, so it
should not take much for
someone to unlock the skill-set
that he’s got in Test cricket.Buttler finds a
new way of
training in
the absence
of net bowlersPHILIP BROWN/POPPERFOTO/GETTY IMAGESBroad did not play
in two of the Testslong past its prime
in the same way as governments strip
resources and expertise from public
services then use their shortcomings
to argue for the efficacy of the private
sector. Closer observers than I am are
better equipped to judge, although its
decline would make sense as an
outcome of economic incentives.
What’s the point of local players
specialising in red-ball skills when
they are treated so cursorily for most
of the English season? How many
foreign players want the fag of four-
day cricket when so many fly-in, fly-
out white-ball contracts, including
from the Hundred, are on offer?
Where as recently as 15 years ago
England was the first and really only
choice for ambitious international
professionals, its attractiveness has
fallen far behind that of the numerous
franchise T20 leagues, with a
concomitant impact on standards.
Remember the Little Englander view
that overseas pros were “the enemy
within”? It looks as credible now as
the Brexit bus.
Of course, we’ve barely begun
prognosticating about the Ashes of
2021-22. But after three Tests without
an English century or five-for and
barely a session Australia have not
controlled, they are on course to
being possibly the least competitive of
all time. And even for the wretched
bean-counters, that will be...
deflating.Australian conditions by playing
tough cricket in Australian conditions,
not the pallid intra-squad simulation
England undertook in Brisbane. How
difficult is this to understand?
There will be claims that the lead-
in was compromised by Covid and
rain, but how different would the
regime have been even in normal
times? Before the Gabba Test in 2017,
England played two first-class
matches against third-string XIs, one
with a pink ball, one in Townsville —
the kind of preparation-lite that has
grown increasingly de rigueur.
It failed then. England were
smashed at the Gabba by ten wickets.
So this time, in keeping with the
managerialist fantasy that there are
always short cuts to success, they
tried getting by with preparation even
lite-r, albeit with lots of high-altitude
Project Ashes theorising, nutritionists
policing the breakfast buffet etc.
It failed again. England were beaten
by nine wickets. ECB management is
so perverse it will probably deem this
an improvement. James Anderson’s
comments during the Melbourne Test
were unconsciously revealing. He
professed disappointment at not
playing in Brisbane, rustiness in
Adelaide, and only feeling right in
Melbourne, reflected in his
performance.
The County Championship tends to
get it in the neck at times like these,