A scathing look at England’s Ashes unraveling
As England slumped to a 4-1 Ashes defeat in Australia, one of cricket’s most revered voices, Sunil Gavaskar, offered no mercy in his brutally honest take. Writing in his column for Sportstar, the Indian legend dissected the collapse with sharp precision, calling out what he saw as a systemic and cultural rot within England’s Test setup.
The illusion vs. harsh reality
Gavaskar began his critique by taking aim not just at the team, but also at the English media’s long-standing habit of overhyping its national sides — a tendency that, in his view, creates greater disillusionment when reality strikes.
“England’s performances in most sports are a huge let-down when set against the write-ups their teams receive from people who have hardly, if ever, played any sport at the highest level. The disappointment, therefore, is far greater when the teams show that they are more paper tigers than real ones,” Sunil Gavaskar write in his column for Sportstar.
England managed a solitary Test win in Australia — their first in 14 years — but it came too late, after the Ashes had already been decided. Their fate was sealed in just 11 days of cricket, a collapse Gavaskar saw coming.
“England’s capitulation to Australia by a 4–1 margin was, therefore, not really a surprise for the non-English. It is extremely tough for visiting teams to win a Test series anywhere, especially in Australia and India. India themselves, however, were beaten comprehensively by New Zealand a couple of years ago and by South Africa late last year,” he added.
Bazball’s rise and unraveling
The column also addressed the evolution — and stagnation — of the much-talked-about “Bazball” philosophy introduced under coach Brendon McCullum and skipper Ben Stokes. Initially hailed as a revolution, Gavaskar noted how opposition teams soon decoded England’s predictable aggression.
“McCullum brought the same freshness to England’s cricket, and that took the rest of the cricketing world by surprise. Gone was the dreary, dull cricket they played, and suddenly, the opposition did not know how to counter it. However, as with so-called mystery bowlers, the surprise wore off. Once teams realised that England had little answer whenever the ball deviated, provided the pitches were not flat, the problems became evident,” he wrote.
A culture of comfort, not accountability
Gavaskar’s sharpest blows were reserved for the team’s mindset — and a perceived lack of accountability both from the players and management. He questioned the batters’ refusal to adapt and blamed the leadership for allowing repeated reckless performances to go unchecked.
“With their media making excuses for them about pitches when they were overseas, the batters refused to change their approach and bat according to the situation. With the management also ignoring some of the unforgivable and irresponsible shots played by the batters, the fear of being left out simply is not there. Valuing playing for your country and putting a minimum price of a century on your wicket is something only the great Joe Root does. The others could not be bothered, as they knew they were unlikely to be left out of the squad,” he stated.
He further tied England’s faltering commitment to the current professional ecosystem, suggesting that the comfort of central contracts and league riches may be dulling the hunger for Test match grit.
“What the media calls fearless cricket today often looks more like couldn’t-care-less cricket. With the guarantee of a central contract and the various T20 leagues around the cricketing world, there is no worry about how to put food on the table, which was the case when these facilities were not there and losing a Test place meant going back to mundane first-class cricket, where one hardly earned enough, let alone saved for a rainy day,” he continued.
A damning final question
Closing his essay, Gavaskar delivered one final punch — a rhetorical question that encapsulated his entire argument: that England’s Ashes effort lacked the fire, especially where it mattered most.
“How many in the England team that lost the Ashes series can put their hands on their hearts and say that they gave it everything, not just physically but, more crucially, temperamentally, in the series? You tell me,” he quizzed.
This wasn’t just a postmortem of a failed Ashes campaign. It was a fierce commentary on the gap between perception and performance — and a warning that unless England introspects beyond its headlines, results like these may continue to haunt them.
