'That's something we can look at and...' - Australia coach Andrew McDonald opens up on England's aggressive approach against Scott Boland

Australia’s coach Andrew McDonald expressed his surprise over the way England approached the game against Aussie pacer Scott Boland. He said that the Aussie camp expected England to be ultra-aggressive in The Ashes 2023 opener at Edgbaston. Boland also spoke about the future plans going ahead in the later part of The Ashes 2023.

Notably, Boland had some good numbers to his name before the ongoing Ashes 2023, he scalped 33 wickets in 8 Tests, and he played for England. In these matches, he conceded runs with an economy rate of only 2.32. But it things didn’t go in his favour during the Edgbaston Test against the Aussies and conceded runs with an economy rate of 5.65 runs per over.

"We'd seen the way they go about it; they are ultra-aggressive. But I think Scott Boland, that match-up probably surprised us with how aggressive they were against Scott. So that's something we can look at and find better ways through,” said McDonald to cricket.com.au.

"We feel as though the way we went about it was planned and we executed what we wanted. There were some different things thrown at us at different times that clearly surprised us, which is no doubt like any other game of cricket. And then you've got to factor in the surface. Day one was potentially the best day to bat, the sun was out and they put some pressure on us. We can no doubt learn from that,” he added later.

Here's what Andrew McDonald said further

Apart from this, McDonald also talked about the absence of the veteran pacer Mitchell Starc in the first Test of The Ashes 2023.

"It's conditions-based, and I've said that from the get-go. We feel as though, looking back on it, potentially Mitch could have played a role, there's no doubt about that. But line and length potentially over left-arm swing, and we didn’t feel as though we may have got swinging conditions (at Edgbaston),” stated McDonald.