{"id":916957,"date":"2026-10-05T12:18:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-05T12:18:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/916957\/"},"modified":"2026-10-05T12:18:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-05T12:18:12","slug":"england-to-play-warm-up-in-australia-before-november-series-after-criticism-for-lack-of-preparation-ahead-of-ashes-cricket-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/916957\/","title":{"rendered":"England to play warm-up in Australia before November series after criticism for lack of preparation ahead of Ashes | Cricket News"},"content":{"rendered":"

England will play a Western Australia XI in a 50-over warm-up game at the WACA ahead of their ODI series against Australia in November – having been criticised for not facing any local opposition prior to their Ashes humbling last winter.<\/p>\n

England’s sole Test match warm-up before being thrashed 4-1 was an intra-squad fixture held at club ground Lilac Hill, which in no way replicated the bouncy conditions they ultimately came up against in the series opener in Perth, a contest they lost inside two days.<\/p>\n

White-ball coach Brendon McCullum, who was in charge of the Test side during the Ashes thrashing, had said last month that he was hoping to arrange some warm-up games this time around and his team will now take on the Western Australia XI on November 7.<\/p>\n

The first one-day international against Australia on November 13 is also in Perth, at Optus Stadium, followed by matches in Adelaide on November 15 and Hobart on November 18.<\/p>\n

McCullum’s side will then meet their hosts in five T20 internationals, across Melbourne, Carrara, Brisbane, Sydney and Canberra.<\/p>\n

\"Joe<\/p>\n

Image:
\n Joe Root is a key member of England’s ODI side<\/p>\n

England are yet to name their squads for the tour but hope Jacob Bethell will be fit to return having missed the back end of the home summer following a knee injury and subsequent surgery.<\/p>\n

Before that assignment, they will play an ODI tri-series in Pakistan, also featuring Sri Lanka, from October 20.<\/p>\n

‘Crane a better leg-spinner than Ahmed’<\/p>\n

Glamorgan leg-spinner Mason Crane has been called up<\/a>, in place of the dropped Rehan Ahmed, and is eyeing a first international appearance since the 2017-18 Ashes.<\/p>\n

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Crane recorded bowling figures of 1-193 from 48 overs on a trying red-ball debut in Sydney back then but has enjoyed a fine season domestically in 2026, playing all 14 County Championship games and backing up his 34 wickets with two hundreds.<\/p>\n

The former Hampshire bowler also claimed 15 Vitality Blast wickets.<\/p>\n

Speaking on the Sky Sports Cricket Podcast<\/a>, former England captain Michael Atherton said: “Crane’s call-up is a great story.<\/p>\n

\"Mason<\/p>\n

Image:
\n Mason Crane could play for England for the first time since 2018 after being named in the squad for the ODI tri-series in Pakistan<\/p>\n

“He had a hellish introduction to Test cricket but I thought he showed a lot of character in that game and didn’t bowl as badly as his figures suggested.<\/p>\n

“He has reaped the benefit of both a bit of experience – he is 29 now and been around the block – and being at a county where he is getting plenty of game time.<\/p>\n

“His batting has come on as well which is not going to harm his chances at all.<\/p>\n

\"Rehan<\/p>\n

Image:
\n Rehan Ahmed played two ODIs in the recent series win over Sri Lanka, recording figures of 1-46 from seven overs in Durham and 2-48 from eight at Headingley<\/p>\n

“I am happy England have moved on from Ahmed from a spin-bowling side as I feel there are better leg-spinners than him.<\/p>\n

“To my mind, Ahmed is principally a batter first who bowls leg-spin whereas I see Crane the other way.<\/p>\n

“There is time for Ahmed to come back but England have to work out how they see his role and he does, too.<\/p>\n

“Crane is definitely a better leg-spinner than him for me and England may be looking at him for the rest of the winter [with a Test series in Bangladesh in February].”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"England will play a Western Australia XI in a 50-over warm-up game at the WACA ahead of their…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":916958,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[564],"tags":[64,63,740,85],"class_list":["post-916957","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cricket","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/916957","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=916957"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/916957\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/916958"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=916957"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=916957"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=916957"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}