“We’re married to that, we won’t back down” - Brendon McCullum backs ‘Bazball' approach after England’s eight-wicket defeat to Australia

England head coach Brendon McCullum has stated that the England team, led by Ben Stokes, will not back down from their Bazball approach in the remaining four Tests of the ongoing Ashes 2025-26 campaign. 

Notably, England suffered an eight-wicket defeat to Australia in the first Test in Perth, after being in a commanding position at the start of the second day of the game. Interestingly, the game got concluded in two days, thanks to Travis Head’s exceptional century.

“We’ve been trying to insulate against reacting to things too much for a little while. We know that this one’s going to hurt, and it’s going to hurt not just us, but all the English people that follow this cricket team as well,” McCullum said to TNT Sports.

“There’ll be a lot of chatter. For us, it’s a matter of making sure that we don’t allow our confidence and our camaraderie to dip too low. We know that at our best, we’re a very good cricket team. We have now got an extended amount of time off over the next 10 to 12 days to make sure that when we get to Brisbane, we bounce back,” he added.

While England was in a commanding position with more than a 100-run lead, losing only one wicket in the second innings, they could add only 100 more runs before getting bundled out, due to their aggressive batting approach. 

“One of my big beliefs is you’ve got to build that unity, that cohesion, the connectivity and that camaraderie within a team for when you are under the biggest pressure, and the brightest lights, and things haven’t worked out accordingly. To me, there is no other way other than to stay together, and keep backing one another, and keep heading towards the target. This is a marathon, not a sprint. We’ve had a very bad day, but we’ve done it before. That’s our blueprint. We’re married to that, and we won’t back down from that over the next four Tests,” the head coach concluded.

England will next take on Australia in the second Test, starting on Thursday, December 4, at The Gabba in Brisbane.

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