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If they want a few tips on where to go with that review, a number of former England players turned commentators and journalists have dissected just where this series went so horribly wrong.<\/p>\n
Specifically, they pointed to a loose play style that was emblematic of culture inside the group \u2014 both on the field and off it \u2014 that needs to change, along with ill-advised preparation.<\/p>\n
While British media have reported that head of cricket Rob Key and head coach Brendon McCullum are both likely to survive this Ashes letdown, it came with the proviso they are both willing to make improvements to the current England set-up. <\/p>\n
What exactly that means may well determine if that ends up happening, with McCullum in particular seeming resistant to widespread changes when interviewed by former English cricket great Nasser Hussain<\/a> on Sky Sports UK. <\/p>\n The under-fire coach told Hussain<\/a> his team was better than it was when he took the job in 2022, and was not exactly sold on the idea of making major changes.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is not about ripping up our script completely. From when we took over to where we are now, we are a better cricket team,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cI take offence to (any suggestion I don\u2019t want to evolve). I am not against evolution, I welcome it. I am not rigid in my beliefs but I have conviction in my methods.<\/p>\n \u201cThat doesn\u2019t mean you are blind to progress but to throw everything out that has worked in pursuit of something completely unknown doesn\u2019t make any sense.\u201d<\/p>\n ‘Take offence to that’- McCullum | 06:26<\/p>\n That attitude, as expected, has not gone down well back in Blighty.<\/p>\n English Test great Sir Geoffrey Boycott declared<\/a> the side will not change \u201cunless this arrogant regime is ended\u201d, and said McCullum, Key and captain Ben Stokes \u201csold a lie for three years\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cEngland\u2019s three wise men turned out to be the three stooges,\u201d Boycott wrote.<\/p>\n \u201cMcCullum and Key said they had been planning for the Ashes all that time but this was a slapstick tour riddled with mistakes and they deserved to lose 4-1.<\/p>\n \u201cMcCullum\u2019s philosophy is do your own thing. Play without a care in the world. Express yourselves and if you get out, no problem, it\u2019s not your fault. Nobody tells them off, no accountability, and nobody gets dropped so they just keep doing the same daft things.<\/p>\n \u201cWhy should the players change, adapt or improve if the coach and captain are okay with it?\u201d<\/p>\n He added: \u201cOf course they don\u2019t want to lose their jobs. It\u2019s a cushy number and so well paid. How can we believe any of them when for three years they have all been so intractable in their views? Does a leopard change its spots? How do we know they won\u2019t just carry on as normal?<\/p>\n \u201cJoe Root has said it would be silly to change the management team. Really? After losing the Ashes so badly would any company or sporting entity say to their management team: \u2018the same again please\u2019?<\/p>\n \u201cSport is a results business. This trio would not last five minutes in football or the commercial world.<\/p>\n \u201cBrendon is a gambler who thinks he is always going to win his money back. That\u2019s how casinos always win in the end. How many hopefuls start well but finish in tears? The reason is they don\u2019t know when to stop or change their routine.<\/p>\n \u201cI just think Brendon has taken us as far as he can and we need someone else to take England to the next level.\u201d<\/p>\n MORE ASHES FALLOUT<\/p>\n TALKING POINTS: Inside Poms\u2019 act of self-sabotage; new holder of ugly Root burden<\/a><\/p>\n PRESS CONFERENCE: Stokes\u2019 confession as Bazball cracks blow wide open<\/a><\/p>\n Ben Stokes of England leaves the stage. (Photo by Cameron Spencer\/Getty Images)Source: Getty Images<\/p>\n Boycott was not the only one to feel that way, with The Daily Mail\u2019s Lawrence Booth<\/a> also calling for McCullum to be sacked.<\/p>\n \u201cThis was not England\u2019s worst Ashes tour among their many failures in Australia down the years. But it was arguably their most disappointing,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n \u201cOf the 15 players they used across the five Tests, only Jacob Bethell and Josh Tongue can leave knowing they enhanced their reputations. That\u2019s a ratio almost as miserable as England\u2019s record in Australia since their triumphant visit 15 years ago: one win, two draws, 17 defeats.<\/p>\n \u201cQuite simply, the position of head coach Brendon McCullum is no longer tenable.<\/p>\n \u201cThis should hurt more than the whitewashes of 2006-07 and 2013-14, more than the 4\u20130 hammerings of 2017-18 and 2021-22.\u201d<\/p>\n The lack of execution was blamed on McCullum\u2019s greatest failing; an unwillingness to add further expertise to a staff which was \u201cundermanned and overly compliant\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cThe absence of a fielding coach was reflected in the number of catches England put down \u2013 19, by some counts \u2013 and there was no one in the dressing-room to challenge McCullum\u2019s orthodoxies,\u201d Booth added.<\/p>\n \u201cEngland\u2019s coach needs to operate a tighter ship, possibly with a coaching staff not of his choosing, if he is to be in the job come the first Test against New Zealand at Lord\u2019s in June.<\/p>\n \u201cSoon after the Sydney Test was over, McCullum admitted: \u2018Am I for being told what I have to do? Of course I am not.\u2019 And it is his single-mindedness, his suspicion of corporate culture, that should now bring his working relationship with Stokes to a premature end.<\/p>\n \u201cThe start of the T20 World Cup is less than a month away, and there is little sense making a change before then. But it is hard to see how the Test team can function if it is overseen by a coach resentful at the straitjacket he is obliged to wear.\u201d<\/p>\n PLAYER RATINGS<\/p>\n AUSTRALIA: Cult hero\u2019s incredible redemption; who faces nervous wait <\/a><\/p>\n ENGLAND: The SIX Poms that failed, and captain blunders that can\u2019t be ignored<\/a><\/p>\n Stokes: We havent performed well!” | 21:00<\/p>\n The recently retired Stuart Broad, who finished up in 2023 as England\u2019s second most-capped Test cricketer, said on the Sky Sports Cricket Podcast<\/a> that if he was the CEO of English cricket he would invite McCullum over and ask him how he would run the team moving forward.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat are your different styles of play and what personnel would you like involved?\u201d Broad said he would ask. <\/p>\n \u201cIf they really didn\u2019t sit with how I believe the team should move forward, then there is no way of going forward. I would lay it on McCullum first, rather than say \u2018I want to see this\u2019 as I want to hear from him and what the adaptation will be.<\/p>\n \u201cI think it is important as a coach and player to do it your way. Then you are authentic to what you believe. But the best sports coaches adapt to the players they have.\u201d<\/p>\n To that effect, Broad said that when McCullum had players like himself, Jonny Bairstow, Joe Root, Stokes and Jimmy Anderson as the nucleus of the team he didn\u2019t have to worry too much about whether his message was getting through.<\/p>\n But now?<\/p>\n Uzzy bids a final farewell to the SCG | 01:46<\/p>\n \u201cWhen you are giving those messages to younger players who don\u2019t know their game as well and are still finding their feet, then maybe things are harder to implement,\u201d Broad added.<\/p>\n \u2018DISMALLY AMATEURISH\u2019<\/p>\n Beyond the messaging, the general consensus from the UK media on Friday was that both the team\u2019s culture and aggressive on-field approach needed to change moving forward.<\/p>\n The issue of England\u2019s culture had already been thrust into the spotlight earlier in the series after claims of a drinking session in Noosa, which was then exacerbated by vision appearing to show Ben Duckett drunk and slurring his words on a night out.<\/p>\n Then, on Thursday, Harry Brook issued an apology after news came out of an altercation at a New Zealand nightclub with a bouncer<\/a> ahead of the Ashes.<\/p>\n Writing in The Telegraph, chief sports writer Oliver Brown labelled the Ashes series as \u2018Bazballers go large\u2019, and said that McCullum likely needs to pay the price for allowing the creation of a \u201cdismally amateurish\u201d culture.<\/p>\n He added that McCullum\u2019s assertion that his players \u201chandled themselves pretty well across the board\u201d was a \u201cfinal, absurd statement from a tour full of them, and that he felt comfortable saying so beggars belief.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThe Bazball Kool-Aid is now an unpalatable potion, with the necessity for change self-evident,\u201d Brown wrote.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are not in the 1980s any longer, when drinking scrapes were an accepted part of tour tapestry. This is an era where the best teams throw everything possible at winning, from data analysts to watt bikes to cryotherapy chambers. <\/p>\n \u201cThe fact that McCullum neglected even the absolute basics, failing to appoint a fielding coach or to schedule proper dry runs of the conditions England would face in Australia, is unforgivable.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is painfully obvious that the incumbent cannot remain, with McCullum already talking about his resistance to change. If he refuses to change, then it is the man himself who must be changed.\u201d<\/p>\n Earlier, former England Test captain Michael Vaughan declared that the drinking culture \u201cmust be cleaned up\u201d in a column for The Telegraph UK<\/a>, while the BBC\u2019s Stephan Shemilt wrote<\/a> that the team\u2019s Bazball moniker could \u201cperhaps cruelly be renamed Boozeball\u201d considering recent events.<\/p>\n \u201cThis was supposed to be England\u2019s big opportunity to finally compete in Australia after a miserable run of one away series win in 40 years. But it has been a shambles of a tour,\u201d Shemilt added.<\/p>\n \u201cPreparation that many regard as not fit for purpose. Then awful shots, dropped catches and scattergun bowling when the series began. Meanwhile, off the field, there has been concern over England players drinking in bars.<\/p>\n \u201cIn what was supposed to be the crowning glory of the \u2018Bazball\u2019 project, England\u2019s moniker could be perhaps cruelly be renamed \u2018Boozeball\u2019 after the latest revelations.\u201d<\/p>\n Joe Root and Ben Stokes of England watch as Australia lift the Ashes crystal urn. (Photo by Gareth Copley\/Getty Images)Source: Getty Images<\/p>\n Shemilt was right to later point out that England is far from the only team \u201cwho like a drink\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cTravis Head turned up to Australia\u2019s training before the fourth Test a little dusty following the Adelaide celebrations,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n \u201cBut Australia had won the series and Head had made three centuries. These episodes combine to be a further damning indictment of the concern that there is a slack culture around the England team that has manifested itself in mediocre results and performances.<\/p>\n \u201cOnce, the \u2018Bazball\u2019 regime was about getting the best out of proven Test cricketers who had lost their way in a struggling team – Anderson, Stuart Broad, Chris Woakes, Bairstow and Mark Wood.<\/p>\n \u201cNow, a younger generation have been found wanting on the biggest stage, at least in part because they have not been given the right grounding at the highest level.<\/p>\n \u201cTo Brook and plenty of his team-mates, drinking, not bothering with fielding practice and a lack of accountability for awful batting is all they know.\u201d<\/p>\n The Telegraph\u2019s Nick Hoult declared<\/a> the series \u201cwill be remembered as English cricket\u2019s great missed opportunity\u201d and \u201ccause a lifetime of regret for some\u201d, writing that \u201cunderprepared England players shrivelled under pressure when it mattered, playing too many risky shots, bowling too short and dropping catches\u201d.<\/p>\n England\u2019s preparation, or lack thereof, will remain one of the biggest talking points to come out of the series and with that in mind, the BBC\u2019s Jonathan Agnew wrote<\/a> that the tourists \u201clost the series\u201d on July 24. <\/p>\n Carse CRACKS IT after dubious decision | 03:01<\/p>\n \u201cI remember how furious I was that day – the day pre-series preparations of nets and one intra-squad warm-up were announced – because we all knew England\u2019s plans were not sufficient to win an Ashes series here,\u201d Agnew added.<\/p>\n \u201cIt beggars belief it was signed off by those at the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB).\u201d<\/p>\n In fact, Agnew went on to argue that whoever gave that decision the green light \u201cshould lose their job\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cSelfishly, you never know how many more of these tours you are going to work on. That is why I was furious but also upset,\u201d the former England bowler and long-time BBC broadcaster added.<\/p>\n \u201cBut thousands of England fans, who I have spent most evenings talking to, have invested their life savings in coming out here.<\/p>\n \u201cTheir feeling is not disappointment. They are angry and deserve better.<\/p>\n \u201cWith the soft dismissals and dropped catches, they have watched a team that is so ill-disciplined it is embarrassing.\u201d<\/p>\n ‘Joe Root can’t believe it!’ | 00:47<\/p>\n