Last Updated on 10 hours by Charbel Coorey

The 2025/26 Australian cricket season promises to be one for the ages. The Ashes headlines a massive summer, with England seeking their first series win over Australia since 2015.

The Ben Stokes-led side would be desperate to regain the urn, especially given England’s struggles down under since 2010/11. On the other hand, the Aussies have no intentions of giving it away, as they’ve held the Ashes since 2017/18.

Australian legend Merv Hughes gave his view on the upcoming red-ball series. During an interview with Arvind Kalyana Krishnan for CricBlog at the MCG, Merv Hughes drew light on England’s Bazball approach and whether it will work against Australia away from home. He believes it won’t be simple for the English batters to intimidate the likes of Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood, Scott Boland, Pat Cummins, and Nathan Lyon.

Moreover, the legendary pacer also spoke about the pressure on Australia’s pace trio due to Boland’s consistent performances in international cricket whenever given a chance. He stated that there’s always pressure irrespective of the situation, as there are always other players who constantly perform in first-class cricket and wait for a chance to showcase their skills on the international stage.

Merv Hughes interview: Intimidating Aussie attack will be difficult for England

Below is the entire conversation between Arvind Kalyana Krishnan and Merv Hughes in audio and text format.

Arvind Kalyana Krishnan: With the way Scott Boland has been playing…..Whenever he plays, he plays well. So would there be any sort of pressure on Australia’s main pacers?

Merv Hughes: Well, there’s always pressure; doesn’t matter where you are in a team, whether you’re a batsman or a bowler. There’s pressure on your performance and if you’re not performing, then there’s guys performing at first-class level then…..Yeah…. And that’s where Australia have been so good and so reliable over the years. You have a look at what the guys have been doing in the team, and then you have a look at the guys outside the team knocking on the door, there’s plenty there. So the big thing is that the Australians have got depth.

Arvind Kalyana Krishnan: Yeah, and England’s aggressive intent  with Bazball against Australia’s bowlers, what do you think will happen?

Merv Hughes: Yeah, I think the big thing with that is they’ve been playing an aggressive brand of cricket and it’s no different to what Matthew Hayden, Justin Langer, and David Warner have done over the years so it’s not new to Test cricket. While England may be able to bully other teams, when you’ve got guys with the experience of Nathan Lyon, Mitch Starc, Hazlewood, Boland, Cummins, good luck trying to intimate those….So it’s going to be an interesting summer.

——–

Australian Test captain and star pacer Cummins is currently dealing with bone stress in his lower back, and is yet to recover from his injury. With less than 50 days to go for the Ashes, there’s still a huge question mark over the participation in the highly-anticipated series. In case Cummins is unable to feature in any of the five Tests, Australia have the option of going to Boland, who has been nothing short of sensational whenever given a chance to play a Test. Thus, it will be exciting to see which team ends up winning the five-match Test series. The Ashes 2025/26 starts on November 21, with the first Test scheduled to take place in Perth.