Ricky Ponting says England ‘not being honest’ with themselves ahead of blockbuster Ashes series

England won’t die wondering in the Ashes.

If there’s one thing of which we can be certain this summer, it’s that.

WATCH THE VIDEO ABOVE: Ricky Ponting backs Australia in Ashes opener.

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Brendon McCullum’s Bazballers have arrived on Australian shores with the notorious reputation as arguably the most aggressive and unique team in English Test history.

They will attempt to score at blinding run-rates with unconventional shots in obscure parts of the ground, as they have since McCullum’s appointment as coach in 2022.

It’s yielded middling results for them with patches of fleeting dominance — but they’re consistent with it, if nothing else.

The team’s indoctrination to play that way under the leadership axis of McCullum and captain Ben Stokes has been a three-year journey whose destination climax is these next six weeks in Australia.

“They’re a side that have been together for two years (since the 2023 Ashes) building up to this,” Ricky Ponting told 7NEWS.

“Bazball, as far as I’m concerned — and I know Brendon reasonably well — was only designed for this one series.

“Forget about everything that’s happened over the past two years, it was all about having a group together and a style of play that can stand up and win Test matches in Australia.

Ben Stokes and Brendon McCullum’s Bazball era faces the ultimate test in the Ashes. Credit: Getty

“They’ve only done it (won a Test) four times in the past 25 years, and they’re going to need to do it at least three times this summer, so I can’t wait to see how they play.”

When McCullum first took over in 2022, the aggressive shift in England’s tactics was bordering on reckless.

Since the new game style failed to deliver an Ashes series victory at home in 2023, a marginal layer of caution has been added.

“I think it’s slightly changed a bit,” Ponting said.

“In its inception, it was a lot more reckless than it is now. I think now they’re identifying moments better.

“I don’t think Joe Root is taking it on as much as he did, I don’t think Ben Stokes is taking the whole Bazball thing as much as he probably once did at the start of it — but their openers do. And Ollie Pope tries to as well. That’s why I think their openers are so important to them.”

Australia famously started the first Test in 2023 at Edgbaston match with a deep backward point, and Zak Crawley still cracked the first ball through cover for four. If ever there was a motif for the enthralling series that would unfold between two different cricketing ideologies, that was it.

Ponting says he expects nothing different in terms of England’s attitude this time around.

Opener Zak Crawley made a polished 82 in England’s Ashes warm-up match in Perth. Credit: AAP

“I don’t think they’ll change. I’ve seen enough of them over the past two years to know that they’re going to play the same way,” he said.

“Ben Duckett and Zak Crawley are going to play the same way that they’ve always played.

“If they can, England, what they do, they win the toss and bowl, and back themselves to get more runs in the fourth innings of the game than what the opposition team gets in the first innings of the game. That’s not going to change.

“And when you talk about Bazball and the style of play as much as they have over the past couple of years, you can’t all of a sudden just not do it. You’ve got to continue to do it.

“I think that’s one area Australia can sort of target them a little bit. Knowing that they’ve got to come ultra-aggressive, you can set different fields and use different tactics to make them and their egos come to you during a Test match.”

Ponting’s longtime teammate Glenn McGrath last week told 7NEWS.com.au he likes “the concept of Bazball”, but slammed the self-absorbed off-field hubris that has evidently come with it.

“My only other issue with that is the people talking up Bazball and their performances are themselves, which is rubbish,” McGrath said.

“It’s not up to the current players to judge how they’re going; ‘Oh, we’re setting a new standard in the game, oh we’re so entertaining’ — that’s all bulls***.

Ricky Ponting has questioned England’s attitude ahead of the Ashes. Credit: Getty

Ponting says the English team’s rhetoric about themselves sounds to him like a defence mechanism.

“A lot of the stuff they say in the media is deflecting any negativity that comes their way,” he said.

“It’s almost like they’re trying to put up a forcefield between themselves and their record as a team.

“This whole thing, ‘Oh, we don’t care if we lose’ — that’s just rubbish. You don’t play not caring if you win or lose.

“That for me is almost like a barrier that they’re trying to create to keep any negativity away from that playing group.

“With the style of play that they’re trying to come up with, any negativity that comes back on them could potentially change the way they play, so it’s almost like this barrier’s being set up.

“Ashes series, you can talk as much as you want, you can say whatever you want, but it’s all about how you handle things once it starts.”

Ricky Ponting was one of Australia’s most successful captains ever. Credit: AAP

Comparing it with the champion teams that both he and McGrath starred in during the late 1990s and 2000s, Ponting said it’s frankly a dishonest attitude that wouldn’t fly in their successful dressing rooms of the past.

“We were just honest with ourselves, honest with one another — they’re not being that,” the former Aussie skipper said.

“Everyone makes mistakes and you lose some games sometimes because you’re not good enough and you’ve made the wrong choices at different times in games. I don’t see what’s wrong with talking about that.

“I think probably inside the dressing room they would be talking that way, but when they’re in the public, they’re not talking that way.

“Once again, I think that’s just trying to stop all the negative headlines coming back on top of them.

“They’ll get bowled out for 100 one day and they’ll say, ‘We’re going to go even harder again tomorrow’. Rightio, let’s see it then.”

Ricky Ponting and Aaron Finch return to lead Channel 7’s coverage. Credit: Supplied

Ponting will be joined in Channel 7’s commentary box by England villain Stuart Broad, who last month declared it as “fact” that Australia’s current team is their worst since 2010/11.

“There’s a bit of niggle. There’s a bit of niggle on-air, and there’s even more niggle when we’re off-air at the back of the box on certain things,” Ponting said.

“It’s really funny how the English get the perception of how hard the Australian media make it on them when they get here, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen a country’s media make it as hard as they do for the Australian team when they get to England.

“But he’s a ripper, he’s a really good guy. He’ll have a bit of a chip on his shoulder, but he’s going to have a whole lot of Aussies around him to pull him back into line pretty quickly in the back of the commentary box.”

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