All posts tagged: Ashes series

SRH captain Pat Cummins mulls skipping IPL 2027 for Ashes: ‘Something has to give’

SRH captain Pat Cummins mulls skipping IPL 2027 for Ashes: ‘Something has to give’

Published by Webster

3 min readUpdated: Jun 3, 2026 11:09 AM IST Sunrisers Hyderabad captain Pat Cummins could have a limited role with the franchise in the Indian Premier League (IPL) season next year. Or perhaps none at all. With an intense international calendar set to peak in the 2027 calendar year, Cummins is open to cutting down on his franchise commitments over the season. “Something has to give,” he said. And it’s not going to be one of the 150th anniversary Test at MCG in March, the Border-Gavaskar Trophy series in India, a potential World Test Championship final or the ODI World Cup defence in late 2027. ALSO READ | 12 matches in 40 days: India set for biggest cricket tour to New Zealand in October Sandwiched between either end of a jam-packed international season will be the 20th edition of the IPL, running over two months between March and May and the Sunrisers skipper will be mindful of the workload that could hamper Australia’s star pace trio involving himself, Josh Hazlewood and Mitchell Starc. Ashes, WC …

Despite ‘bad for business’ pitches, Cricket Australia to continue allowing local curators to prepare home Test surfaces

Despite ‘bad for business’ pitches, Cricket Australia to continue allowing local curators to prepare home Test surfaces

Published by Webster

3 min readUpdated: Mar 23, 2026 04:22 PM IST Despite its recent home Test pitches in the 2025-26 Ashes series marking “bad for business”, Cricket Australia (CA) has decided against taking control over the playing surfaces across the country. Last year, the Ashes matches in Perth and Melbourne ended in two days, costing CA about AUD 15 million in revenue. Despite the monetary setbacks, the CA has maintained that a one-dimensional approach will not work for the varying conditions across the vast country. CA’s head of operations, Peter Roach, recently told the Australian Associated Press that it would be imprudent to overlook the pitches from a central standpoint. “It’s inconceivable that we could ever control much more than we do now,” Roach said. “In England, you could put in a central curator to go around or New Zealand, or South Africa, because the wickets and the clays and the climates are so similar.” “In Australia, because they’re so different, you could put the best curator in Australia to a different venue and all of a …

‘That’s your job’: James Anderson tears into Ben Stokes’ comments on England players’ efforts during Ashes | Cricket News

‘That’s your job’: James Anderson tears into Ben Stokes’ comments on England players’ efforts during Ashes | Cricket News

Published by Webster

Questions continue to be asked of the overall culture prevalent in the England cricket team after their 4-1 humbling at the hands of Australia in the Ashes. There was a considerable gulf in quality between the two sides, with England playing almost no warm-up games in the run-up to the series and consequently being accused of slacking off between the Tests in terms of discipline. Fast bowling great James Anderson has said that he was puzzled with captain Ben Stokes appreciating the efforts of the players in his squad. “When I saw Stokes come out and say, the way (Josh) Tongue and (Brydon) Carse have just run in like consistently, I had a Roy Keane moment,” said Anderson on BBC Radio. “I was like, that’s your job. If you’re not willing to run in all day for your team, don’t bother. You’re in the wrong sport.” Anderson took the example of Australia pacer Mitchell Starc, who was player of the series for taking 31 wickets and even scoring 163 runs. “Starc, for me, was the …

Shoaib Bashir, Matthew Potts included for fifth Ashes Test

Shoaib Bashir, Matthew Potts included for fifth Ashes Test

Published by Webster

The England Cricket Board have announced their playing XII for the fifth Test of the Ashes 2025-26 series against Australia, set to be played at Sydney Cricket Ground. England have included spinner Shoaib Bashir and fast bowler Matthew Potts for the Sydney Test. From the side that defeated Australia in the fourth Test in Melbourne, pacer Gus Atkinson is the only player missing, having been ruled out with a hamstring injury. Atkinson is the third England fast bowler who has been ruled out of the Ashes midway through the series. Mark Wood and Jofra Archer were also ruled out earlier owing to injuries. England pacers, led by Josh Tongue, helped the visitors pull back one game after a humiliating Ashes series loss in just 11 days of cricket that saw Australia dominate the Perth, Brisbane and Adelaide Tests to go 3-0 up in the five-match series. SCG is expected to have conditions suited for spinners as well, which prompted England to include Bashir in the 12-man playing squad, who hasn’t played a single Test in this …

‘Has done himself the world of good being on this Ashes trip’

‘Has done himself the world of good being on this Ashes trip’

Published by Webster

After a match-winning bowling performance in the fourth Ashes Test in Melbourne that saw host England win their first Test against Australia Down Under after 5468 days, fast bowler Josh Tongue’s stocks have gone up. A five-wicket haul in the first innings and two scalps in the second, Tongue was the pick of England’s pace attack, which led the way for a win after three humiliating losses. Having missed out on the first two Tests in Perth and Brisbane, Tongue made a serious impact ever since his inclusion in the playing XI in the Adelaide Test. A four-wicket haul in the second innings of the Adelaide game, followed by a total of seven wickets in Melbourne, Tongue has 12 wickets in two Tests of the series. Former England fast bowler Stuart Broad said Tongue should have played more Tests in the series, and England missed the trick by not including him in the Gabba Test. While evaluating England’s pace bowlers, Broad also said Tongue has done himself a world of good in this tour. ALSO …

‘Unacceptable batting’: Matthew Hayden blasts Australia’s batting coach after Ashes 4th Test | Cricket News

‘Unacceptable batting’: Matthew Hayden blasts Australia’s batting coach after Ashes 4th Test | Cricket News

Published by Webster

Australia’s batting great Matthew Hayden has caustically criticised batting coach and former Australia cricketer Michael di Venuto for the implosions in both innings of the MCG Test Australia lost to England. “That’s an unacceptable scorecard. I don’t care if it was 50 millimetres of grass. You need to be better than that,” Hayden fumed on the All Over Bar The Cricket podcast. “Head, Weatherald, Labuschagne, Khawaja, Carey, Green; they’re all at sea with their basic techniques. The only technical thing I see is coming from our bowlers, who look more technically sound than our batters. Why is that?” Di Venuto has stellar experience, with 25,200 first class runs. The Baggy Green eluded him only because his career coincided with one of Australia’s finest generation of batsmen and he had to be satisfied with nine ODI capa. Hayden emphasised that it was not a personal attack. “I’m not a fan of him. It’s not a personal thing,” Hayden said of Di Venuto. “I just think for too long there has been an influence in this group …

‘I’m pretty sure if that was somewhere else in the world, there’d be hell on…’ England skipper Ben Stokes declares his verdict on MCG pitch

‘I’m pretty sure if that was somewhere else in the world, there’d be hell on…’ England skipper Ben Stokes declares his verdict on MCG pitch

Published by Webster

With the Boxing Day Test at Melbourne Cricket Ground ending in less than two days, it was also the second time in this year’s Ashes that a Test ended in less than two days. While the Perth Test in this series was the 26th Test match in Test history to finish in two days, the Boxing Day Test this week too joined the list. The previous time an Ashes Test finished in two days was in 1921, the first of the Ashes series between the two countries at Nottingham. England skipper was critical of the pitch post the match and alsovinayakk questioned if the same Test was anywhere else in the world,  there would be ‘hell on’ “Being brutally honest, that’s not really what you want. Boxing Day Test match. You don’t want a game finishing in less than two days. Not ideal. But you can’t change it once you start the game and you’ve just got to play what’s in front of you. But I’m pretty sure if that was somewhere else in the world, …

‘Great Test match pitches don’t jag all over the place’

‘Great Test match pitches don’t jag all over the place’

Published by Webster

After 20 wickets fell on Day 1 of the fourth Ashes Test between Australia and England at the iconic Melbourne Cricket Ground, the pitch used for the Test has come under scrutiny, with multiple former cricketers criticising the strip for “doing too much.” Former England cricketer Stuart Broad joined the chorus and slammed the pitch, saying that “great Test match pitches don’t jag all over the place.” “The pitch is doing too much, if I’m brutally honest. Test match bowlers don’t need this amount of movement to look threatening. Great Test matches pitches, generally, they bounce, but they don’t jag all over the place,” Broad said while commentating on SEN Radio. After winning the toss, England opted to bowl first and bundled out Australia for just 152, where pacer Josh Tongue shone with the ball, registering a five-wicket haul. In return, the Australian pace trio of Mitchell Starc, Michael Neser and Scott Boland ripped through the English batting order, restricting them to just 110 runs to get a 42-run lead. Australia batted for just one …

fails pub test”… Australia’s tabloid tears into England’s beach jaunt

fails pub test”… Australia’s tabloid tears into England’s beach jaunt

Published by Webster

To restore their battered morale, Ben Stokes and his men hit Noosa, a beach on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast in between the Brisbane and Adelaide Tests. But shadows of defeat followed them to their four-day sandy retreat. Welcoming them on the beach were banners that read, “For sale, Moral Victories… : “Bazballers anonymous, free counselling. Some of England’s cricketers saw the funny side of it. Stokes even posed for pictures with them. Australia’s tabloid newspapers readily splashed pictures of them beach warming with headlines like “On back foot, England bails to the beach”, “Life’s a beach, even for the sinking Poms,” “Sun’s out, runs out”. The West Australian wrote a piece wherein it read: “After gallivanting around golf courses in Perth and joyriding without helmets on E-scooters in Brisbane, England favoured rest and relaxation for their latest mid-series break.” The headline of another piece went: “‘Overprepared’: fails pub test,” a jab at Brendon McCullum’s explanation for the defeat at the Gabba that “the players may have overtrained”. Australia cricketer Alex Carey empathised with them. “It’s a …

‘We laughed at age profile of Aus cricket….England would never have picked Weatherald at 31, but he looked so ready’

‘We laughed at age profile of Aus cricket….England would never have picked Weatherald at 31, but he looked so ready’

Published by Webster

Michael Vaughan who won the most memorable Ashes series in 2005 says they might’ve laughed at age profile of Australian squad at the outset of the 2025 series. But the Aussie system has delivered with its selections, rewarding Grade cricket performances. Writing for The Telegraph, Vaughan said England needed to reconsider how they picked teams, saying, “Right now, England are the opposite of Australia.” Admitting that English cricket fraternity had joked about Australia’s older age profile at the outset, he said they had been proven wrong. “We had a laugh at the age profile of Australia’s team, and there are some cracks that England have failed to open up. But the Australian system has always been about earning the right,” Vaughan wrote. High store was set on performances in the Sheffield Shield, he reminded. “To get in the state team, you need to perform in grade cricket on a Saturday. The whole system is connected in a way ours just is not, top to bottom. Sam Konstas was an outlier last year, almost an England-style …