Head’s command felt like a slap in the face. The English bowlers, who were so aggressive and disciplined in the first innings, were completely dismantled in the second. As they regrouped ahead of the next Test, England’s players kept a low profile on Sunday.
Many preferred to stay in their hotel rooms, both to cope with the humbling defeat and to avoid the streets full of jubilant Australian fans and frustrated England supporters. While further introspection lies ahead, Wood, whose 38th Test was his first competitive match in almost nine months after knee surgery in March, has called for the team to return with renewed fight.
“We know this is one of five. We need to think about what happened, we need to understand the disappointment, but we also need to know that we did some good things in this game. Can we take them into the other four games? This isn’t one, it’s one of five. We were hit quite hard in the first round but we’ve got other rounds to try to throw something back,” Wood told Stuart Broad on the For The Love Of Cricket podcast.
With the second test at the Gabba still 10 days away, Wood admitted he briefly considered driving from Perth to Brisbane. He even considered renting an RV before he was turned off the idea.
“I spoke to a local who said if you go across country it’s a big hazard. So you have to drive along the coast. But I did look into it,” Wood said.
The 35-year-old will instead make a much less glamorous run with the majority of the Ashes squad on Wednesday. Jacob Bethell, Josh Tongue and Matthew Potts are the only players set to join the England Lions for the Prime Minister’s XI match, which heads to Canberra on Tuesday. The priority within the camp has been to keep the group together until the shock of defeat begins to fade.
“When you have a loss like that you want to stick together. I think that’s very important. The emotions are going to be raw for everyone at home, when you get close and you start to believe in the team and you get that feeling of disappointment. There’s nothing I can say on a podcast that makes people think ‘oh they fixed it, I feel better now’. It’s going to hurt and it should hurt for a few days, the players feel that too. It’s hard but what can you do? We’re stuck here, It’s not like we can get up and head to Brisbane. If I could drive across the country I probably would just do it to keep my mind going, but we’re stuck here,” Wood said.
Wood bowled just 11 overs in the match, all at a high pace, confusing batters and even hitting Cameron Green on the grille. He finished wicketless for 44, suggesting he should be fit to go again for the day-night Test. He played in one of the two pink-ball matches on the previous Ashes tour, starring in the final Test in Hobart, where he claimed 6 for 37 in the second innings and nine wickets for the match.
In fact, the entire bowling attack could be retained. Despite being dismantled by Head in the second innings, England’s pacers had plenty to take heart from in the first, as they bowled Australia to 132 to secure what at the time looked like a match-making 40-run lead. The performance reinforced the belief that an attack can succeed at any pace on Australian surfaces, regardless of the color of the ball.
“I certainly feel we have 20 wickets. The team is designed to take 20 wickets in these conditions. [Brydon] Carse bowled beautifully this game, running in all the time. He made things happen, he was with people all the time. Guus [Atkinson] didn’t get any wickets but he nibbled at them and beat the bat a lot. Jofra [Archer]I thought we saw the best of him, especially that opening spell,” Wood said.
“As a group we can take a lot of confidence from that match. Because it’s a day-night Test we know it can rush around overnight. If it can happen so quickly it could be doubly difficult. Australia will be confident from that win. I know there’s only one guy who has played particularly well, but as a group it will give them a boost to win those kinds of matches. Their batsmen will be more confident – can any of them play an innings like that? It’s up to us to fight fire with fire, come on back and try to overthrow them again,” he concluded.
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