"We shouldn't have gone to Australia" - Joe Root's shocking claim on the Ashes rivalry
Published - 14 Jul 2024, 10:38 AM | Updated - 23 Aug 2024, 01:15 AM
England batter Joe Root has claimed that England shouldn't have gone for the 2021-22 Ashes series in Australia. Root believes that the Covid restrictions and biosecurity protocols on their last tour of Australia didn't allow England to play their natural game.
In the 2021-22 Ashes, Australia thrashed England by a convincing margin of 4-0 and retained the Ashes. Joe Root was England's captain in that series. Australia captain Pat Cummins and England head coach Chris Silverwood also missed games due to being close contacts.
England lost all the games in the series except the Sydney Test in which they managed to sneak out a draw by just 1 wicket, thanks to a century from Jonny Bairstow in the first innings. Bairsow's century was the only century by an England batter in the series.
Joe Root's shocking statement on 2021-22 Ashes in Australia
While speaking to the reporters on Saturday (July 13), Root admitted that his team shouldn't have gone to Australia due to the Covid restrictions during the tour.
“Arguably we shouldn’t have gone last time, should we in retrospect? Thinking of Covid, it was about keeping the lights on last time we went,” Root said.
"It's a new opportunity for us. We did what we thought was the right thing at the time," he added.
The former England captain said that his team will be in a completely different frame of mind in the next Ashes series in Australia and will be aiming to produce result-oriented cricket
“We’ll be in a completely different place going into next time. I think the key is, you can plan and you can have all the best intentions of getting a result, but it still has to fall into place," Root stated.
Joe Root was England's highest run-scorer in the 2021-22 Ashes series in Australia. He scored 322 runs in 5 matches at an average of 32.20 with three half-centuries to his name. Root's record in Australia is something that he would like to improve. The 33-year-old has scored 892 runs in 14 matches at an average of 35.68 on Australian soil. Surprisingly, he is yet to score a hundred down under.
"You need all your bowlers fit and firing" - Joe Root for the next Ashes series
Root also added that England would need all the bowlers fit and expected the batters to be in good form. England is looking to build a squad and prepare for the Ashes series next year.
“You need all your bowlers fit and firing, and the guys in good form scoring runs, so that’s what we’ve got to build towards over the next couple of years,” Root said.
Among the English bowlers, Mark Wood was the most successful one with 17 wickets in 4 matches at an average of 26.64. England's bowlers have historically struggled in Australia but Wood's high pace will make him a vital option in the upcoming series.
England is currently playing a home Test series against West Indies. In the first Test, Ben Stokes and his men thrashed West Indies by an innings and 114 runs. The game was also the final international match of England's fast bowling legend James Anderson.
