Former England seamer Sir James Anderson says England do not have the characters for verbal exchanges with their Australian counterparts.
Speaking on the Tailenders podcast, Anderson said Ben Stokes’ side were not the type to engage in sledging with the opposition.
“You look at their slip cordon for example – Jamie Smith, Joe Root, Harry Brook, Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett. They’re quiet kind of people, they don’t want to get into a verbal battle with the batter,” said Anderson.
“Same as the bowlers even – Gus Atkinson, Brydon Carse, Jofra Archer, they’re generally quiet people. They’re not that type of character.
“It’s only towards the back end of the Test when we saw Jofra going at Steve Smith and Stokesy loves that sort of battle, but from being in that dressing room I know that Brendon McCullum isn’t a massive fan of that side of the game.
“He just wants England to go out there and focus on the cricket and perform your skill as best you can.”
Anderson also said captain Stokes requires more support from his senior players when England are in the field.
“It looked like Ben had a lot on his plate on the field, he was the one coming up with the ideas,” said Anderson, who has previously worked as a bowling consultant with the England side after retiring from Test cricket in 2024.
“I didn’t see many chats between Ben Stokes and Harry Brook, he’s vice captain. You’d expect that little bit more,” he added.
“Ollie Pope was vice-captain, I didn’t see him going up to Ben.
“I saw a little bit of Jofra chatting to Stokes, but generally it was Ben on his own, that’s how it looked from the outside.”