Stuart Broad knew the cameras were on him. What he didn’t expect was to become the viral face of England’s collapse in the first Ashes Test — a moment that left him exposed not just on-air, but across millions of screens.
According to Broad, the now-infamous footage of him closing his eyes and letting out a sigh as Joe Root chopped on wasn’t calculated. It was instinct. “(It was) a natural reaction for me to just close my eyes and pray it wasn’t actually happening,” Broad told Sky Sports, recalling the moment that turned him into a meme. “You know, if I close them, maybe this isn’t actually happening.”
The reaction exploded online. Viewers across the cricket world — particularly in Australia — shared, dissected, and delighted in his anguish. “The Aussies are revelling in it because they hate me so much,” Broad said with a wry grin on Channel Seven’s Test review show, referring to the viral footage of his reaction to Root’s dismissal. “They’re really feeling the pain that I was feeling when Rooty chopped it on. We (England fans) were all feeling that exact emotion at the same time.”
Broad was in the Channel 7 commentary box alongside Matthew Hayden and Alison Mitchell when England’s second-innings unravelled in Perth. “It was such a big moment in the game. We’d allowed ourselves to feel slightly comfortable and think ‘we’re doing alright here, we’re in the game still’ and Australia did what Australia did.”
Broad later revisited the moment on the Sky Sports Cricket Podcast, where he reflected on how the game unraveled so quickly while he sat helpless in the commentary box. “That’s what Test cricket does to you. It sort of brings all your emotions out and it was that period on commentary where we lost four in the blink of an eye.” Watching from the sidelines, he said it felt like time had collapsed. “Can we just soak up a little bit of pressure somehow?” he wondered aloud, recalling the disbelief that swept over him as Root’s dismissal triggered a full-blown collapse.
Broad was then pressed by former captain Mike Atherton about the viral footage. “That’s torture isn’t it,” Atherton joked. “Collapse happening — it was the Root wicket when you had to listen to Haydos calling it and your facial expressions told the story.”
Atherton, reflecting on Broad’s visible discomfort during England’s collapse, didn’t hold back in his teasing. The back-and-forth between the two highlighted just how much the moment had resonated with fans on both sides of the rivalry.
“I loved that. I was chuckling away seeing you next to Matthew Hayden and I thought, ‘If things go like they’ve gone in the last couple of days in Perth, it’s going to be a long summer in the Channel 7 commentary box’.”
“Is it ever,” Broad replied. “Although what I would say is it’s a lot easier losing from the commentary box than it is on the field.”
As the collapse intensified — from 1/65 to 4/76 — the weight of what England had squandered was unmistakable. Broad, no stranger to hostile Australian conditions, said the shift in momentum was instantly familiar. “I’ve been there countless times before in Australia where they just open that door slightly,” Broad reflected.
He pointed to the uniquely suffocating atmosphere that can take over when things start to go wrong for visiting teams. “When you talk about, you’re not just playing against the Australian cricket team, you’re playing against Australia, it’s that moment where that comes in.”
The emotional intensity was magnified by the energy in the stands. “Suddenly the crowd was erupting, everyone’s celebrating with their mates in the crowd,” he said. Watching a young player walk out to face the fire, Broad admitted the enormity of the occasion hit hard. “You just see Jamie Smith walking out to bat and I think, ‘you’ve never been in a situation like this before, you’ve never felt what is going on’.”
While the footage may have embarrassed him, Broad acknowledged that his response was part of what makes the Ashes so powerful. “I think that’s a genuine reaction and emotion, and that’s why we love Ashes cricket so much,” Broad told The Age.
Still, the defeat lingered. “That’s why we feel flat,” Broad admitted on Sky Sports Cricket Podcast. “This one was England’s best opportunity in Australia for a long, long time.” With Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood out injured and uncertainty at the top of the Australian order, the Perth Test felt like a rare opening. “Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood missing through injury, lot of confusion over what was happening at the top of the order.”
Instead, the moment slipped away. “Credit to Australia, they were absolutely superb, but England just opened that door.”
The second Test begins December 4 in Brisbane — and after what happened in Perth, Broad’s summer in the Channel 7 commentary box already feels long.
Two-day Test match leaves broadcasters and Cricket Australia counting the cost
While the match delivered explosive on-field drama and viral moments, its unexpectedly short duration proved a headache for broadcasters and Cricket Australia alike. With the game wrapping up inside two days, networks and event organizers lost out on valuable weekend programming and matchday revenue.
As Channel 9’s Karl Stefanovic quipped, as quoted by Yahoo News Australia, “You’d be filthy if you had the rights.”
Media analyst Steve Allen of Pearman Media told Yahoo Sport Australia that while broadcasters do plan for shorter Tests, this one was unusually abrupt. “I happen to know Seven factor potential 3-day Tests into their telecast schedule and sponsor schedule, however, a two-day first Test obviously would not have been expected nor planned for.”
Still, the networks didn’t walk away empty-handed. “Having said that, they had highly beneficial, bigger audiences particularly session 3 (on Saturday) and audience delivery was no doubt well over the odds and what everyone signed up for,” Allen added. “Most hurt from the early finish is Cricket Australia with, as I understand it, 50-55,000 refunds totalling millions and millions of dollars.”
The financial fallout from the two-day Test has sparked deeper questions about scheduling risks, commercial planning, and the volatile nature of live sports broadcasting. As Cricket Australia and its partners take stock of the losses, the unexpected drama in Perth has left lasting consequences well beyond the scoreboard.
