Despite the first Ashes Test ending in two days and already facing criticism for not playing any warm-up fixtures in Australia, England have taken a call to not to send any of their regulars for the pink-ball fixture between their Lions side and Prime Minister’s XI at Canberra. Instead, Jacob Bethell, Matthew Potts and Josh Tongue will turn out for England Lions in the two-day match that begins on Saturday.
Having failed to make the cut at Perth, Bethell and Potts turned up for England Lions in their defeat against a Cricket Australia XI, which ended on Monday. With the first Test exposing England’s continued struggle Down Under, where they are without a win in the long format since 2010/11 tour. Having arrived in Australian shores with huge expectations thanks to the Bazball approach, which continues to divide opinions, England were in the game but lost the plot in the second innings with the bat before Travis Head floored them with a match-winning century at the top.
With the next Test at the Gabba starting on December 4 being a day-night affair there was a case for England’s first-choice players to feature in the fixture at Canberra. The day-night matches involving pink ball haven’t been England strongest suit having lost five of the seven such encounters. Australia, on the other hand, have won 13 out of 14 matches played under lights.
Since Bazball era began, England have not preferred to play warm-up fixtures in any of their tours. Instead, they have chosen to train elsewhere and use break days to play golf. Earlier this year, when their white-ball team was struggling against India, they didn’t turn up for any practice sessions with their former cricketers being highly critical of this approach. And their latest decision to not feature in the pink-ball warm-up match came under criticism from former captain Michael Vaughan who led them to famous Ashes triumph in 2005.
“It’s amateurish if they don’t go and play now,” Vaughan said. “What harm is playing two days of cricket with a pink ball under lights? It’s not being old-school to suggest that a pink ball is different to a red ball. Playing under the lights is different. Australia have won pretty much every pink-ball game in Australia: they’ve lost once. I’m not too old-school to suggest that they should play in that game… I’d like to know why they wouldn’t,” Vaughan added.
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