{"id":395945,"date":"2026-01-06T19:50:13","date_gmt":"2026-01-06T19:50:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/395945\/"},"modified":"2026-01-06T19:50:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-06T19:50:13","slug":"bethell-admits-tired-england-need-to-graft-after-hitting-ashes-wall-in-sydney-ashes-2025-26","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/395945\/","title":{"rendered":"Bethell admits \u2018tired\u2019 England need to \u2018graft\u2019 after hitting Ashes wall in Sydney | Ashes 2025-26"},"content":{"rendered":"

England hit the wall on day three at the Sydney Cricket<\/a> Ground, or at least the latest in a series of walls, at the end of which Jacob Bethell \u00adadmitted mental and physical fatigue was understandably, playing a part. There were dropped catches and some scattergun bowling lengths as Australia batted all day to reach 518 for seven, 134 runs ahead on first innings.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is proper Test cricket now in terms of the graft and the stuff that you have to put in,\u201d Bethell said afterwards. \u201cIt was a tough day, but that\u2019s what it\u2019s about. We\u2019ve got to come out tomorrow, take the three wickets early and get back in again.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think everyone\u2019s all right, as good as you can be. Everyone\u2019s still very driven to leave Australia 3-2. So I think that\u2019s the main thing that\u2019s keeping everyone fighting hard.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked about the drops, and also the effects of playing five Tests in less than two months, Bethell was realistic about the freshness of England\u2019s dressing room.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll the guys that have played the four or five Test matches will definitely be tired mentally, physically, but that\u2019s what comes with a five-match series. They\u2019ll be tired, but those guys have done it before and they know how to deal with it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bethell backed Will Jacks in particular to recover from a howler on the midwicket fence in the morning session. \u201cI don\u2019t think we\u2019ve had to lift him up. He\u2019s a very confident guy and yeah, everyone drops them. But he\u2019s someone that\u2019s going to just want to make an impact on the game in any way you can.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t see him dwelling on that too much and I thought he bowled very well after and I imagine that he\u2019s going to bat very well in the second innings as well. I don\u2019t think he\u2019ll take it to heart.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jacob Bethell celebrates taking the wicket of Australia\u2019s Travis Head on day three of the fifth Test. Photograph: Robbie Stephenson\/PA<\/p>\n

There was some slight consolation for Bethell himself as he took his first Ashes wicket, trapping Travis Head lbw for 163 when he tried to mow a sweep shot towards the harbour, although Bethell was clear there was no real plan at that stage to Head.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t factor in bowling at him on 160, to be honest. I didn\u2019t think he was going to sweep either. But yeah, just as straight as possible. He tried to sweep it and missed it. It\u2019s as simple as that. It was nice to get the wicket and the breakthrough.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bethell also suggested spin may now begin to play a part at the SCG, even if neither team has actually picked a specialist for this match. \u201cFrom straight there was a little bit of assistance, but definitely the wider you threw it out there, the more there was assistance, so that could bring Jacksy [Will Jacks] into the game for those right handers, especially in their second innings.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"England hit the wall on day three at the Sydney Cricket Ground, or at least the latest in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":395946,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[564],"tags":[64,63,740,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-395945","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cricket","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-cricket","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395945","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=395945"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395945\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/395946"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=395945"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=395945"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=395945"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}