Former England captain Michael Vaughan has slammed the current England side as “amateurish” as they skip a pink-ball tour game following their humiliating two-day defeat in the first Ashes Test in Perth.
England will face the Prime Minister’s XI, including the likes of recent Test players Sam Konstas and Nathan McSweeney, in a two-day, day/night pink ball affair in Canberra on November 29 and 30.
But the tourists confirmed on Monday night they had only released three players unused in the first Test – Jacob Bethell, Matthew Potts and Josh Tongue – to join the England Lions for the fixture.
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England’s main squad will instead travel to Brisbane on Wednesday, only beginning training there on the weekend.
With the second Test at the Gabba, which will be a day/night, pink ball match, not starting until December 4 England coach Brendon McCullum and his hierarchy had been urged to rethink their plans.
“If this England side don’t think that it is good preparation to go and play a pink ball game, they are absolutely stupid,” Vaughan said on Fox Cricket.
“Now, I’m not unreasonable and not a dinosaur to suggest that England should play a pink ball game, just two days, it’s not a four-day game, it’s two days in Canberra.
“Go and play those two days. Just get the view of the pink ball under lights. It might just give them a better chance of coming back.
“If they go and play golf for seven or eight days and go on the beaches, they can do that over the course of the next few days – they’ve got three days off that they never thought they were going to have.”
England has lost five of seven pink-ball Tests including two on the previous Ashes tour.
Their preparation in Perth was widely ridiculed as they played just one warm up match, and it was a glorified centre wicket practice against the England Lions on a surface at Lilac Hill that bounced nowhere near as high as the Perth Stadium track.
They were urged by many greats of the game to undergo a more rigorous lead-up, but those calls fell on deaf ears, and Vaughan fears it is about to happen again – leading to further backlash from a nation hurting after being 105 runs in front for the loss of just one wicket in the second innings, only to lose the first Test later that same day.
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“They are about to make things worse,” Vaughan wrote in The Telegraph.
“All the noises are that they are not going to send many, or even any, first team players to Canberra to play the tour match against the Prime Minister’s XI. It’ll be the Lions instead.
“That staggers me. I’m sorry, but it’s amateurish. You have 11 days between Tests, are 1-0 down in the Ashes, and have the opportunity to get accustomed to a pink ball they do not play with much, and with which Mitchell Starc is an absolute wizard. They are an international cricket team. They are cricketers. I can’t get my head around why they all wouldn’t want to just play. What is the downside?
“I worry that they are fearful to ask the captain and coach for some game-time, because that’s not their method. If they wouldn’t let them, I’d be on Skyscanner booking my own flights to Canberra.”
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Vaughan, who captained England’s unforgettable 2005 Ashes triumph and topped the run charts in the 2002/03 series in Australia with 633 runs at 63.3, received strong support from fellow former England skipper Alastair Cook.
The former opening batter, who scored a series high 766 runs at 127.66 when England last won down under 2010/11, urged the Bazballers to front up and faces the likes of veteran seamer Peter Siddle and U19 World Cup winning quick Charlie Anderson at Manuka Oval.
“In this situation, I would want to go and play in the pink-ball game against the Prime Minister’s XI in Canberra, not just leave it to the Lions players,” he wrote in his Sunday Times column.
“It can be an uncomfortable decision as you are opening yourself up to failing again, but putting yourself under pressure can have long-term benefits. However much you practise in the nets, you cannot replicate the feeling of time in the middle.”
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Another former England captain in Michael Atherton agreed too, saying on the Sky Sports Cricket podcast after the tourists lasted 32.5 and 34.4 overs respectively in their two innings in Perth: “I’d certainly be asking some of the batters if they want a game!”
The England hierarchy themselves are yet to change their tune, however.
McCullum avoided giving a firm answer immediately after the first Test, telling the BBC’s Test Match Special that the Prime Minister’s XI game was yet to cross his mind.
“I haven’t even thought about it just yet, to be honest, because I planned on us being a little bit longer than two days,” the former New Zealand captain said.
“We’ll let the dust settle tonight and then we’ll have a good think about it tomorrow.”
The Prime Minister’s XI match has been an annual tradition since 1984, and started in 1951.
With the Lions to play the match, it will be the first time it has not been contested by an international team.
“We’ve got to work out whether that extra cricket is the key, or it’s making sure that camaraderie is tight and morale doesn’t drop, because that’s a big mantra of me and Stokesy throughout this tenure,” McCullum said.
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England captain Ben Stokes on the other hand was far more forthright when asked if his team should look to play the Prime Minister’s XI in the wake of a heavy loss.
“That’s how it was done a long time ago,” he replied.
“We prepare incredibly well. We work incredibly hard every single day that we get the opportunity to work on our game, and that’s what we’ll keep on doing because we believe and we trust in our process.
“If the results don’t go the way in our favour, that’s not going to differ from that (sic) because, hand on heart, we know that we put every little bit or ounce of ourselves into our training, and we know and believe that this is the best way for this team to operate.”
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