Brendon McCullum has called on England fans rocked by the team’s calamitous two-day defeat by Australia in the first Ashes Test to “keep the faith”, insisting the team’s only chance of turning the series around was to double down on their methods. “You’ve got to block out the doubts and the insecurities that can creep in,” said the head coach, “because if that does happen then you literally have no chance.”
The speed at which the game unravelled has left the team with some unexpected time off – though a few of those who were not required at Perth Stadium spent their Sunday playing for the Lions against an Australia XI at Lilac Hill – with management now deciding whether the best preparation for the second Test, which starts in Brisbane on December 4th, will involve sending some squad members to play in the Lions’ next fixture, a day-nighter against a Prime Minister’s XI in Canberra, or taking the entire group away for some team bonding.
“We’ve got to work out whether that extra cricket is the key, or making sure that camaraderie is tight and morale doesn’t drop,” McCullum said. “We’ve just got to work out what the pros and cons of all that are.”
While the New Zealander admitted to being hurt by the manner of England’s defeat and their failure to stop Travis Head’s brutal sprint to a decisive century – “Some days you’ve just got to accept that someone was too good. It doesn’t mean it hurts any less” – he has no doubts about their approach. “There are times we don’t quite get it right, but we’ve just got to believe in what we believe in, because we know it gives us the best chance,” McCullum said.
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“Just because we’re 1-0 down doesn’t change what we believe in. We’ve just got to make sure we stay calm, stay together, and we start plotting and planning how we’re going to bounce back, as we have done before. Keep the faith. We know what our best game is, we know what gives us the greatest opportunity. We’ve been in this situation before, we’ve been insulating against the drop in camaraderie and morale for the past few years. We’ll head to Brisbane with high hopes and high expectations.”
McCullum continued: “I’m pretty confident how we go about things. The last few years we’ve built a set-up which is really connected, it’s tight, and it plays a style of cricket that we believe gives us our best chance. If we go away from that, then we’re in trouble. If we’re able to seize the key moments that separate the wins and the losses, then I have complete confidence that we’ll be a live chance in this series.
“This is the fun stuff, right? When you’re under the bat and things haven’t quite worked out, that’s when your methods are tested, and that’s when you’ve got to stay calm as a leader, you’ve got to keep plotting the path and the way forward, and keep the boys’ eyes on the prize.”
After going into lunch on the second day at 59 for one in their second innings, nursing a 99-run lead, England were “starting to work out how we could map our way to a position of strength”, McCullum said. Instead they allowed the match to unravel, completely and rapidly.
“I thought our bowling unit in the first innings was absolutely brilliant. We came here with a blueprint that we want to hit Australia with some hostility and high pace and that isn’t going to change, we believe in that mantra,” he said. “We will need to give our bowlers more time off, so they’re not having to go again [too quickly] when they are operating at that sort of high intensity.
“There were times with the bat where we were able to find ways to score, and then there were other times where we lost wickets in clumps. We played some decent cricket but when we lost sessions we lost them too badly. We’ve got to find ways to be able to hang in games when things aren’t quite with us. We know how to win games. We’ve just got to keep backing our approach and being strong, and believing what we’re doing.
“Sometimes we get beaten and sometimes it looks pretty ugly, but having that mentality allows us to still believe in our abilities next time we step out to play. We know how big this series is. We know how many eyeballs are on it, we know how disappointed all the fans will be, and we’re incredibly disappointed ourselves. We’re better than what we showed in the last four hours of Saturday, and we look forward to the next opportunity.” – Guardian
