The Ashes 2025/26: Can England exploit Australia’s weaknesses or are hosts still a formidable foe? | Cricket News

A team in disarray or classy operators waiting to show their worth on home soil? Which version of Australia are England likely to be presented with when the talking stops and the cricket finally starts in one of the most highly-anticipated Ashes series in memory?

Are Ben Stokes’ England catching an ageing ‘Dad’s Army’ Australia at the right time with injuries aplenty or will they end up getting burnt if the Bazballers choose to fight fire with fire?

Whichever side of the coin you land, there is no escaping the bare statistic that winning Test series away from home is a hard ask, whoever you might be.

Wind the clock back 12 months and India’s much-vaunted side arrived down under and got off to a flying start with a comprehensive first Test win in Perth, the same venue as the Ashes curtain-raiser. Four Tests later, they were heading home on the wrong side of a 3-1 series defeat.

Since then, Australia have finished runners-up in the last World Test Championship cycle and won series away in Sri Lanka and West Indies. Yet the narrative for a while has appeared to be this is a side under pressure.

Where are the weaknesses England can exploit? Aside from Australia being without their talismanic captain Pat Cummins and seamer Josh Hazelwood for the first Test at least, what early exchanges can they win to put them on the right path to a first Ashes series win since 2015?

How big a miss are Cummins and Hazlewood?

Before England even touched down in Perth earlier this month, the news Cummins would miss the first Test with a back injury was already dramatically altering the dynamic of Australia’s side.

But the subsequent withdrawal of fellow seamer Hazlewood with a hamstring strain has amplified that along with the size of England’s golden opportunity to win down under.

“If England can’t capitalise on this opportunity, then they’re in all sorts, they’ll be a long road to go after the first Test,” Australian journalist Adam Collins told Sky Sports.

“Cummins’ absence we’ve known about for a couple of months, but Hazlewood was in terrific nick in the ODIs against India recently.

“At the final hurdle, when he was tuning up for this series, a bowler who’s been injury-prone for the past few years picked up a niggle. That’s a massive omission for Australia and it’s also unclear how long he’s going to be on the sidelines.

“England were already objectively very well placed to win the first Test with Cummins not there, but now they’re in with a great chance of getting their claws into Australia from the start.

“How often have we been able to say that in recent years? England won’t be presented with many better opportunities to regain the urn than this.

“England fans won’t want to hear that Cummins sounds like he’s ahead of schedule and probably a very good chance of returning in Brisbane with the pink ball (for the second Test). That would be a real challenge for England, so they’ve got to capitalise.

“There’s so much riding on how well England come out of the blocks.”

Not only will Scott Boland and another potential debutant in Brendan Doggett come in to fill Cummins and Hazlewood’s bowling boots, but their inclusions will also lengthen Australia’s tail from No 8 onwards.

That is unless Michael Neser, who has a useful first-class batting average of 28.31, including five centuries, gets the nod.

A vulnerable top-order?

There’s more than just a few problems with the ball to ponder for Australia. At the top of their batting order is a potential new opening partnership for England’s bowlers to put under pressure.

“Usman Khawaja is the big ‘under the radar story’ coming into this series,” Collins said.

“He missed out in the Caribbean, albeit scored a double ton in Galle against Sri Lanka, but last year on Australian pitches, it was Jasprit Bumrah who worked him over.

“High-pace bowling has been a concern for Khawaja for some time. If Mark Wood and Jofra Archer can get into him, I don’t think his lead time will be too much before he’s under the pump.”

Khawaja, who turns 39 midway through the series, will most likely walk out to the middle at Optus Stadium from Friday alongside a debutant in Jake Weatherald.

While the left-hander is no spring chicken himself at 31, his weight of runs in domestic first-class cricket are what have earned him the call-up.

“Weatherald’s a very conservative selection,” Collins added. “He’s the leading Sheffield Shield run scorer for the past two seasons, he averages in the mid-50s, he’s played for a couple of states and spent time living around Australia.

“It will look from the outside like he’s an inexperienced opener, but the other way of spinning it will be, ‘what better time to pick him than when he’s at the peak of his powers?’.

“Khawaja’s had many opening partners since David Warner retired. But if England can make those early inroads and get themselves well on the way to taking the 20 wickets they’ll need to win Tests in this series, then I really think we’ll have a ball game.”

Darwin-born Weatherald is the beneficiary of Australia abandoning their selection of flamboyant 19-year-old Sam Konstas. After his eye-catching debut half-century against India in front of a sold out Boxing Day crowd in Melbourne last year, Konstas found it much harder to express himself on spicy pitches against the West Indies.

Despite that change, there is still potential for some muddled thinking for Australia in their top order.

Will reinvigorated run machine Marnus Labuschagne be tasked with facing the new ball with Khawaja instead of Weatherald?

Much will largely depend on if Australia want to play both Cameron Green and Beau Webster in their top six and be largely dictated by Green’s fitness to bowl after his own long-running battle with back stress fractures.

That particular configuration was chosen in the World Test Championship final at Lord’s against South Africa in June, but ultimately resulted in a five-wicket defeat as Australia failed to capitalise on a first-innings lead.

Smith so much more than a stand-in captain

Steve Smith will skipper Australia in the first Test while Cummins’ return to bowling will be scrutinised and monitored across the nation in more detail than Wayne Rooney’s broken metatarsal pre-2006 World Cup.

Smith has been nothing short of a run machine himself in recent times and while perhaps in need of some coin-tossing practice after his fumbled effort for New South Wales last week, he will come into the series with little to worry about his own form with the bat.

“After a fallow period since that run-filled 2019 series for the next four years, Smith has been back to his best,” Collins said.

“He’s been prolific, he dominated against India and took that form into the series in Sri Lanka where he was also captain, while Cummins was on paternity leave, and scored two centuries.

“He’s already been back in the runs in the Sheffield Shield before this series, so the selectors will be thrilled with how he looks on the pitch.

“Off the pitch, he’s also much more at ease as well living out in New York these days to get away from the spotlight. When he captained Australia in the 2017/18 series, he was frantic.

“Australia comfortably won that series 4-0, but his communication was still off a bit.

“He confided in a few of us reporters that he’d been taking sleeping pills to get through the nights and was really struggling. That cascaded into the calamitous series that following in South Africa where he made an enormous error of judgement in the sandpaper debacle.

“These days he’s a far more chilled-out character. He’s still obsessive with the bat, but a few more miles on the clock have definitely helped him mature as a person and a cricketer.”

And a prediction?

So, are England fans in store for another soul-destroying 5-0 reverse like 2006/07 and 2013/14 or can England emulate the past heroics of Mike Gatting and Andrew Strauss’ teams of 1986/87 and 2010/11 and return home with the famous urn?

“All I’ll say is, I’m desperate for 2-2 going into (the final Test in) Sydney,” Collins remarked.

“All I want is an Ashes series being alive going into the new year. Test cricket needs this.

“We need a series that inspires, captures hearts and minds, gets children talking about and playing the game again.

“At a time when T20 franchise leagues are eating up even more of the schedule, we need a great Test series to talk about.

“I can’t think of two better teams to provide us with that and with so much hype across the past two or three years that’s being carried into it.”

Ashes series in Australia 2025-26

All times UK and Ireland

• First Test: Friday November 21 – Tuesday November 25 (2.30am) – Optus Stadium, Perth
• Second Test (day/night): Thursday December 4 – Monday December 8 (4.30am) – The Gabba, Brisbane
• Third Test: Wednesday December 17 – Sunday December 21 (12am) – Adelaide Oval
• Fourth Test: Thursday December 25 – Monday December 29 (11.30pm) – Melbourne Cricket Ground
• Fifth Test: Sunday January 4 – Thursday January 8 (11.30pm) – Sydney Cricket Ground