England's Ashes Campaign is Over – And It Barely Lasted 10 Days
England's Ashes Collapse: Why It Went So Wrong
This is why it went so horribly wrong for England down under.
The Build-Up: Expectation vs. Reality
This one was supposed to be different. Sure, Australia was still overwhelming favorites on home turf, but the general consensus was that England would be more competitive than on previous tours. Stuart Broad claimed that this was the best England team and worst Australia side since 2010/11. In issue 92 of Wisden Cricket Monthly, 12 journalists and pundits gave predictions. Nine of them predicted Australia series wins while another predicted a draw. That panel of 12 – which included two former Australia internationals – all predicted that England would win at least one Test.
So what happened?
Looking Back: The 2023 Ashes Aftermath
After England fought back from 2-0 down to level at 2-2, there was genuine optimism that England would be well placed to challenge Australia down under. Now let's look at the side that played the final Test of that Ashes. Five of the top seven remain, but almost the entire bowling attack has changed.
- Moeen Ali and Stuart Broad retired immediately after the 2023 Ashes.
- James Anderson was moved on one Test into the 2024 summer.
- Chris Woakes retired at the end of the 2025 season after injuring his shoulder in the Oval Test against India.
- Mark Wood made the tour to Australia but lasted just 11 overs before returning home with an injury. His inclusion was always a massive punt. The speedster, who turns 36 next month, hadn't played a competitive fixture of any kind in the nine months before the Perth Test.
Add in the fact that England moved on from Jack Leach and Ollie Robinson prior to the 2024 summer, England practically entered the 2025-26 Ashes with a completely new bowling attack – with Ben Stokes the sole constant from 2023.
Loss of Experience
That's a lot of experience gone in a very short space of time. Seven of England's 18 wicket-takers this century were no longer involved. A combined 582 appearances and 2,401 Test wickets lost in just over two years.
The Plan: A New, Faster Attack
But England were clear on what they wanted to build for the tour of Australia. In March 2024, the ECB's director of men's cricket, Rob Key, sent out a clear message to want-to-be England seamers. They were after bowlers with pace. "I don't care how many wickets you take," Key told the Telegraph. "I want to know how hard you're running in, how hard you're hitting the pitch, and are you able to sustain pace at 85 to 88 mph."
In 2024, Gus Atkinson and Brydon Carse were handed debuts. Neither are express pace, but both were a level speedier than the typical English seamer. Matt Potts, a regular in England XIs in 2022, was relegated to benchwarming status for all of 2025. Josh Tongue, the quickest of the new lot, was recalled once fit again for the 2025 summer, and the years-long plan to manage Jofra Archer's return to fitness came to fruition at Lord’s against India.
England had managed to assemble a new-look, faster-paced battery of quicks.
The Series: A Promising Start, Then Collapse
And it all started so well at Perth. An all-pace attack of Archer, Wood, Carse, Atkinson, and Stokes rolled Australia for just 132. But since then, their glaring lack of Test experience has shown. In fact, when Mark Wood went home injured after the first Test, Shoaib Bashir, aged 22 and with just 19 Tests to his name, was suddenly England's most experienced specialist bowler on the tour.
Alarming Economy Rates
Since the first Test at Perth, Australia have scored at a remarkably quick run rate: an eye-watering 4.53 runs per over across five innings. Australia have scored at more than four runs an over in all five of those innings. There have been memorably expensive patches of play:
- Travis Head's 69-ball 100 at Perth.
- Brydon Carse conceding 86 runs across 10 new-ball overs at Brisbane.
- Will Jacks conceding 212 runs at 5.43 runs per over at Adelaide.
A Wider Problem
Being expensive is not a brand-new issue for England. Since the start of the 2024 summer, they have gone at more than four runs an over 17 times in the 42 innings that they have bowled. And it's not an issue just against the best sides either. All seven teams they have played since May 2024 feature in that list of 17 innings, including West Indies and Zimbabwe, the sides ranked eighth and 11th respectively in the World Test Rankings.
In fact, England in 2025 are one of the most expensive sides in the history of Test cricket. Of teams to play eight or more Tests in a calendar year, only Zimbabwe this year, West Indies last year, and Pakistan in 2022 have had higher team-wide economy rates than England in 2025.
Unsurprisingly, this is reflected in individual numbers, too. Josh Tongue, Brydon Carse, and Shoaib Bashir this year all feature in the top six most expensive individual years by an English Test bowler ever (with a minimum of 1,000 deliveries bowled).
The Spin Debacle
The spin situation is illustrative of the muddle England have got themselves in. Shoaib Bashir was sensationally plucked from the periphery of the county game to tour India in early 2024. He started well and was England's standout spinner across the tour. At Ranchi, he bowled 70 overs across the Test, taking eight wickets going at less than three runs per over. A five-for at home to West Indies followed. A brave selection was reaping rewards.
But results started to fall from there. In New Zealand last year, Bashir was extremely expensive. At Wellington, he went at nearly a run a ball across the Test match, and it didn’t go much better at Hamilton. At the start of the 2025 summer, Bashir was unable to get into his county side, who preferred the man Bashir replaced in the England team, Jack Leach. Bashir was then farmed out on loan to second-division side Glamorgan, for whom he took 2-304 across three games at 4.23 runs per over.
Still, Bashir remained England's first-choice spinner. A six-for followed against West Indies, before two more expensive Tests against India. At Edgbaston, he conceded a whopping 286 runs across the Test. He had his moment at Lord’s, taking the winning wicket of Mohammed Siraj, before missing the rest of the series through injury.
Fast forward to Australia and Bashir wasn't picked for the first three Tests of the series after underwhelming in the tour games for both England and the England Lions. On a flatter deck at Adelaide under intense heat, spin was always going to play a prominent role. So little faith did England have in Bashir, they opted for the "hedging your bets" option – as Rob Key termed it – of Will Jacks: a bit of extra batting depth and a player whose spin bowling is very much his second suit.
After years of planning, England had gone into the Ashes Test where you most need your spinner without a frontline spinner. The decision to back Bashir so firmly up until the end of the India series – and not have a backup specialist within the squad – backfired. Ultimately, Bashir, whose non-Test first-class bowling average is 90 (yes, 90), was not deemed in a position to play.
Why Economy Rates Matter
At a very basic level, a high economy rate means the opposition score very quickly between wicket-taking opportunities. At Brisbane, Steve Smith and Cameron Green were able to add 95 runs in just 19 overs. At Adelaide, Travis Head and Usman Khawaja put on 86 runs in 18.4 overs. Partnerships that are taking the game away from England are happening in the blink of an eye.
The other side of this is that bad shots don't just happen in isolation. They are often the result of an accumulation of pressure. And generally speaking, England have not been able to build pressure with the ball. Australia have.
On a scorching second day at Adelaide where temperatures reached 40°C, Nathan Lyon bowled a 10-over spell that conceded just 19 runs, allowing Pat Cummins to rotate his seamers around his off-spinner in grueling physical conditions. Cummins later said he was surprised England did not put Australia under more pressure during that phase. Well, they weren't able to – in part because of how well Lyon was performing a role that his opposite number, Will Jacks, is just not qualified for.
Australia's Tactical Masterstroke: Alex Carey Standing Up
Alex Carey's wicketkeeping standing up to the stumps has also had a huge effect on the series. The plan was devised by Australia head coach Andrew McDonald, who thought the move would restrict England's batters, who like to use their feet to create boundary-scoring opportunities. Scott Boland was targeted during the 2023 Ashes and in the first Test at Perth, but has since enjoyed periods where he has been broadly unhittable – in part due to Carey standing up.
Boland is an extremely accurate bowler, but the flip side of accuracy is predictability. When Carey was standing back, England batters were able to use their feet to turn good-length balls into full ones. With Carey standing up, they didn't leave their crease. At Adelaide in the second innings, Boland went at under two runs an over. Lyon's late burst on the fourth evening came with Boland bowling economically at the other end.
Michael Neser performed a similar role at Brisbane, bowling a spell of five overs for four runs with Carey standing up most of the time – in the period immediately preceding the game-changing run-out of Ben Stokes by Josh Inglis. Again, the building up of pressure resulted in a wicket – something Australia have done regularly this series, but England have not.
Catches Win Matches – England Dropped Them
Another simple difference between the sides has been the catching. England dropped five catches in the Australia first innings at Brisbane, allowing the Aussies to build a first-innings lead of nearly 200. Similarly, at Adelaide, Harry Brook dropped two difficult chances that proved extremely costly:
- Usman Khawaja on 5 in the first innings. He went on to make 82.
- Travis Head in the second innings on 99. He went on to make 170.
Both were difficult – but no harder than the two screamers taken by Marnus Labuschagne in the first game.
The Batting Failure
England landed in Australia with a settled top seven, but three Tests in, one that has entirely underperformed. Joe Root scored his first Test ton in Australia at Brisbane, but he has passed 50 just once from six innings. While all of Ben Stokes, Harry Brook, Ollie Pope, Ben Duckett, and Jamie Smith have averaged under 30. Simply put, with a top seven out of runs like that, you're not winning many series.
Preparation: Undercooked?
England's sole pre-series warm-up fixture was against the England Lions at Lilac Hill – effectively a club ground with vastly different qualities to what they encountered at Perth and Brisbane, the two fastest and bounciest pitches in the country. England claimed they had little other option, but there are questions over whether England put in their pre-series requests to Australia early enough. Their batters certainly looked undercooked at Perth in particular. Up against an Australia side missing both Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood, they surrendered a position where they led by 105 with nine second-innings wickets remaining, as several top-order batters fell in quick succession looking to drive on the up – a cardinal sin in Australia, especially on a bouncy Perth pitch.
Conclusion
In all, Australia have out-bowled, out-batted, out-fielded, and out-thought England. What was supposed to be England's most realistic chance to win down under in 15 years has ended in a whimper.
This analysis was brought to you by Wisden.