Last Updated on 3 weeks ago by Charbel Coorey
England came to Australia full of optimism. England had not won a Test down under since 2011, but there was growing confidence that this was their time due to a host of reasons.
Australia were ageing and on the decline, apparently. Ben Stokes’ team, on the other hand, were at their peak and ready to pounce.
“Jofra Archer will be licking his lips looking at this Dad’s Army Australia Ashes squad”, wrote Lawrence Booth in the Daily Mail.
However, what the bullish predictions failed to capture was whether England were capable of outlasting Australia. Teams who have enjoyed success down under – especially in the 21st century – have been willing to put in the hard yards, absorb pressure and remain patient.
Ashes predictions: From pre-series confidence to post-series agony for England
England didn’t possess those qualities coming into the series and it was brutally exposed over five Tests. It came as no surprise that the only Test England won was a shootout at the MCG as they fell short of the mark in the longer Brisbane, Adelaide and Sydney Tests.
Here are some of the biggest calls from before the series that came back to bite.
Piers Morgan: Genuinely think England will win 4 or 5-nil
Before
When it comes to predictions that aged poorly, it’s hard to go past Piers Morgan. Morgan, who was particularly vocal in the 2023 Ashes, predicted an England win by a huge margin in 2025/26.
“The Ashes is upon us… England has a better team, a better captain, and better management. The Urn is coming home, and I genuinely think we’ll beat Australia either 4-0 or 5-0. Good luck @benstokes38 and your team of swashbuckling Bazballers. No mercy – destroy!” wrote Morgan on the eve of the first Test in November.
After
Fast forward to January and it was a different story. However, Morgan, despite being so bullish, refused to go in hard on the current England management as he does in other sports. This is despite a poor England performance that went the complete opposite to what he was expecting.
“The @englandcricket performance has improved, and been way more entertaining, under @benstokes38 @Bazmccullum @robkey612 than their predecessors. We played badly in this series & got a deserved thumping by Australia, but they should be given the chance to win them back in 2027,” he wrote after Australia sealed the series 4-1.
Mark Ramprakash – England will win the Ashes and win them comfortably
Before:
Former England batsman Mark Ramprakash claimed if Ben Stokes played all five Tests, England would win the Ashes comfortably. In his column for The Guardian, Ramprakash believed England’s batsmen would take advantage of the injuries to Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood.
“Looking at how the two sides are shaping up before the opening game I feel punchy about England’s chances: the team are strong, settled, and I think that if Ben Stokes plays all five Tests they will win the Ashes and win them comfortably. I can’t remember ever being so confident before an away Ashes,” Ramprakash wrote.
“That confidence is based on a strong group of seamers and a top seven that have now played a lot of Test cricket and have a lot of runs under their belt. They will look at an opposition that will be without the injured Pat Cummins and Josh Hazlewood in Perth and fancy their chances of racking up runs. Once you do that, you’re bossing the game.”
After:
Those England seamers were not match-fit, as the damning report in The Telegraph revealed. Also, England’s top seven featured Zak Crawley and Ollie Pope who average in the 30s after 60-plus Tests, as well as Ben Duckett, Harry Brook and Jamie Smith who were all unproven in Australia.
In his column after the series, Ramprakash conceded England did not have the mix of players to beat Australia down under.
“The refrain since he took over has been: we’re playing this brand, we’ll pick players who suit it. That was a big change for cricket: in my experience most teams, even the best ones, have a mix of players with their own approaches. So the last time England won in Australia we had Alastair Cook with his rock-solid defence, batting periods of time, but we also had Kevin Pietersen trying to take the attack to the bowlers and score more quickly,” Ramprakash wrote post-Sydney.
“But McCullum’s rhetoric has been: play this way or you won’t play at all. Actually what has been really damning about this trip is that England’s best performances – Joe Root’s two centuries, Jacob Bethell in Sydney, even Stokes himself with his 83 in Adelaide – have not followed that method at all. Root backs his defence, shows good concentration, knocks balls into gaps. Not for him the macho, crash-bang-wallop, knock-the-bowler-off-his-length, run-towards-the-danger rubbish that led so many others to give their wickets away.”
Jonathan Agnew – England will win in Perth and go on to win the Ashes
Before
Former England fast bowler and current BBC chief cricket commentator Jonathan Agnew believed Ben Stokes’ team would win in Perth and then go on to lift the Urn.
“England haven’t won a Test in Australia for 14 years, but I do think they will win in Perth, and will therefore go on to win the series,” Agnew predicted.
After
Agnew was particularly scathing of the team’s lack of preparation. After the series, Agnew said he felt the Ashes were lost in July, despite predicting a series win for England.
“Forget the batting in Perth or bowling in Adelaide, I go back to 24 July 2025 as the moment England lost this series,” Agnew wrote in his post-series column for the BBC.
“I remember how furious I was that day – the day pre-series preparations of nets and one intra-squad warm-up were announced – because we all knew England’s plans were not sufficient to win an Ashes series here.
‘It beggars belief it was signed off by those at the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB). Whoever did so, whether director of cricket Rob Key, chief executive Richard Gould or someone else, should lose their job.”
Steve Harmison – England don’t fear Australia and Joe Root will average 150
Before:
Former fast bowler Steve Harmison was bullish about England’s chances and backed Joe Root to go past Alastair Cook’s monster effort in 2010/11.
“People have been telling me for two years that Joe Root is coming over to Australia to average 50. He’s not. I think he’s coming over to average 150. I really do,’’ Harmison said on TalkSPORT back in October.
“The way he is playing. The mindset he is in. You can have your mortgage on Joe Root scoring at least one hundred. It would not surprise me if he went past what Cook did in 2010-11.’’
Harmison then predicted England to win 3-1 with no Pat Cummins and no fear of Australia.
“I am backing England, maybe like 3-1 to come to Australia and sledge Australia and Joe Root to have the best series he has had for a long time. I am that confident England will win,” Harmison said.
“Where Joe is at with his mentality and the fact that Cummins is out, I mean Joe is vulnerable the first 15 to 20 balls in Australian conditions, but after that he just keeps accumulating.
“England don’t fear Australia. I don’t think there’s a fear in the world anymore the way the young players go.’’
After
It took just two Tests for Harmison to admit England’s limitations; the kind of limitations many Australians warned about Bazball in recent years.
“We have had a very insular group, a group of, whether you want to call them arrogant or not, or egotistical, whatever,” he said on TalkSPORT, as quoted by 7 News.
“The problem we’ve got yesterday and the day before, we’ve got a top seven brainwashed by Brendon McCullum, which will never ever work consistently because these players have never learned from their mistakes.”
Michael Atherton – England won’t fear Scott Boland because of 2023
Before
With Pat Cummins ruled out for at least one Test, Michael Atherton, among others, was even more optimistic of England’s chances. The former England captain said Scott Boland poses no fear to the England batters.
“The natural replacement [to Pat Cummins], and the man who has stepped into the breach whenever one of the big three is missing, is Scott Boland, who is 36 years of age himself,” Atherton wrote in The Times.
“Boland has a fine record, but holds no fear for a batting line-up that took him for almost five runs an over in the drawn series in 2023, when he took just two wickets in two matches.”
After
Boland finished the series with 20 wickets at 24.95. He was outstanding after a shaky first innings in Perth, targeting the England batsmen with relentless line and length plus movement both ways off the seam.
After the series, another former captain, Michael Vaughan, believes England underestimated Boland.
Stuart Broad – Worst Australian team since 2010/11
“It’s probably the worst Australian team since 2010 when England last won, and it’s the best English team since 2010,” said Stuart Broad on his BBC Podcast For The Love of Cricket hosted with Jos Buttler.
“It’s actually not an opinion, it’s fact. So those things match up to the fact it’s going to be a brilliant Ashes series.”
How could we not end with this? Now, Broad’s statement isn’t all wrong given this Australian team was the first to lose a home Ashes Test since 2010/11, but the fact that they sealed the Ashes in 11 days would have been extremely satisfying.
