Geoffrey Boycott didn’t dress England’s Boxing Day Test win up as a miracle. He framed it as a verdict, then turned his aim on modern batting and modern cricket’s priorities.
Writing for The Telegraph, Boycott argued England’s win came from basics done better, and he believes Australia’s batting is now paying the price.
The lost craft of defence and an ordinary Australia
“England won the Boxing Day Test because they played better cricket than Australia. It was no fluke,” Boycott wrote, before turning to what he sees as the deeper problem behind collapses on lively pitches.
“One-day matches are played on the flattest batting pitches the groundsmen can provide so the batsmen can dominate by hitting hard at the ball,” he said. “It is absolutely the opposite of learning to bat against the moving ball on seaming pitches.”
Geoffrey Boycott’s central complaint was blunt: England’s leading batters aren’t getting enough hard, repetitive exposure to movement. “Our top batsmen play very little County cricket and almost nothing on tours outside Test matches,” he wrote. “Nets alone will not help batsmen master the technique of playing the moving ball.”
And then came his criticism of the administration: “Sadly, the ECB suits have them playing more and more 50-over, T20 and Hundred cricket because it brings in lots of money.” Boycott added: “ And we know how money is their idea of success, not winning the Ashes or being the best team in the world.”
He also used Joe Root’s struggles as evidence that this is bigger than one player’s form. “Joe Root is England’s best technical batsman, but had two failures trying play in a normal style,” Boycott wrote. “It just goes to show how modern batsmen do not really have a clue how to defend on a seaming pitch.”
Boycott saved no sympathy for Australia’s second-inning shot selection either. “Some of us ex-player ‘has-beens’ have been saying before and during this tour that the Aussie batting is ordinary, dependent on Smith and Head,” he wrote. “That batting line-up in the second innings showed how poor some of them are.” Boycott even questioned whether Australia relaxed after holding a first innings lead, writing: “I don’t know, but what I did see was some awful batting.”
He then ran through a string of dismissals as self-inflicted, from batters caught in two minds to edged to the cordon, and finished with the kind of summary that makes for instant talkback fodder: “It was awful stuff.” Even while praising England’s attack, he concluded: “I take nothing away from the quality of the England seamers, but some of those dismissals were shockers.”
