Root: We must be resilient now

JOE ROOT urged England to show resilience and avoid a repeat of their last two Ashes tours, when a thrashing at Brisbane was followed by a 5-0 whitewash in 2013-14 and a 4-0 hammering four years later.

Root insisted England had to continue to be ‘brave’ – a reference to controversial moves to bat first and omit Jimmy Anderson and Stuart Broad, the leading wicket-takers in English Test history.

Asked if fans would be justified in thinking it was a case of ‘here we go again’, Root replied: ‘That’s enough of a motivation for us to make sure that isn’t the case. As you’ve seen, this team has generally responded to difficult defeats with some strong results.

‘We’ll have to do exactly the same here. If we go about things exactly as we have the last two tours, we’re going to get the same results. We have to be brave, look to do things differently.’

Root claimed he would have batted first again if he had the chance, despite his team’s surrender to 147, and argued the struggles of Jack Leach — hit for 102 runs in 13 overs — was a result of fields he was set.

‘I was slightly too aggressive with his fields early on,’ said Root. ‘It didn’t let him get into the series and made it very difficult for him.’

England’s captain justified the absence of Anderson by referencing the first Ashes Test at Edgbaston in 2019, when he left the field injured after bowling four overs, and didn’t play again all series.

On batting first, Root added: ‘It did quicken up, we showed we could create chances on that second day.

‘If we had got even 250, the game looks very different. So, no, I look back and think I would do the same thing. Speaking to Pat [Cummins], he would have done the same.’