Graham Gooch: Preparation is key and England's has been poor

Former England coach, opening batsman and captain Graham Gooch offers his best bets and opinions on the 2021-22 Ashes Series to FreeSuperTips.com

Best bets

J Root top England batsman
5-6 Coral, Ladbrokes

S Smith top Australia batsman
2-1bet365

O Robinson top England bowler
4-1 Betfair, Hills, Paddy Power

J Hazelwood top Australia bowler
3-1 general

Ashes preview

The ultimate test for any English cricketer is to win in Australia. The problem is I just don’t think Joe Root’s team have had the right preparation to do it.

An Ashes series is a massive mental test. You are not just playing the 11 guys on the field, you are playing the public as well, and that includes the guy at the hotel who serves your breakfast and the one who serves you drinks at the bar.

And then you have every sports news bulletin pumping the Australian’s tyres up as well.

It's not just about being able to face the cricket challenge - you’ve got to be up to the in-your-face challenge too.

We can all expect the Australians to play aggressively. They always have done and probably always will do.

But you can’t take a backward step. You need to score runs and take wickets and catches, but you have to stand up to that challenge, and I have my concerns.

Preparation is everything and I don’t think we’ve got it right.

The first thing you have to do is have the right warm-up matches and all we have been able to do is have England against the England Lions.

It’s not a serious match. They are all mates. It just hasn’t got that bite where your first-class international record is on the line.

If you are playing New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland or Western Australia, you become exposed to how they play cricket over there.

The last time we won over there in 2010-11, we had three good warm-ups and won two of them. This time the lack of action could be crucial.

The Australians will fancy themselves at the Gabba and it’s a long way back if you go 1-0 down.

Getting off to good starts will be crucial and, compared to players like Alastair Cook and Andrew Strauss, I’m not really confident about Zak Crawley, Rory Burns and Haseeb Hameed at the top of the order.

I believe Crawley is the best of the three because he has the most potential but I think he’s more likely to be challenging Dawid Malan for the number three spot.

I’m concerned with Burns and Hameed with regard to their technique and we desperately have to avoid being 20-2 and have Malan and Root exposed.

I’m not confident. I hope they can withstand the challenge and score big runs but there are questions over whether they are good enough.

You don’t take a backways step because Australia will come at you with the ball and verbally. They try to undermine you and they aren’t shy about saying something.

So you’ve got to stand up to that challenge, take a step forward and take the game to Australia.

You need to take it to them in every single session.

Root will particularly be on the receiving end and the bowling attack will be instructed to target him.

The captain’s performance will influence the rest of the team, so it’s a good tactic and they will get stuck into him.

He is a world-class player and has the skills and mentality to deal with that, but there will be extra pressure because he knows we do not have the strongest batting line-up.

Some people might think his position will be vulnerable if they don’t win but I still think he is the best man for the job.

He has to lead from the front and encourage his players to be aggressive. They need to play the Australians at their own game.

If they can get enough runs, then I think they have a chance because the bowling attack is not too bad.

We’d like to have another quickie like Jofra Archer, but some of the tall guys can get the ball to bounce.

The choice will come if they include Ben Stokes in a four-quicks attack with Joe Root doing the spinning, or if they bring in Jack Leach to do the spinning. If they do that then Chris Woakes will have to come in and boost the batting line-up.

Having Stokes back is obviously a huge boost because he’s one of the best all-rounders in the world and, technically, he’s our second-best batsman.

However, the warm-up programme will not have suited him and I would prefer him to bat at six so he can play a more active role in the bowling attack, perhaps in four or five-over spells.

On the bouncing pitches though, Ollie Robinson would be a definite starter for me.

He is tall and hits the pitch hard so he has the right attributes to be successful.

Woakes swings the ball and is decent with the bat so then it is one of James Anderson and Stuart Broad, because I’m not sure they will play together.

The Kookaburra ball will stay hard for one session and then you need people who can reverse the ball. I don’t think a spinner will take many wickets.

The Australians have had a few issues with Tim Paine stepping down so close to the series but I don’t think it will have that much of an impact if he stays in the team.

It might even galvanise them and bring the team together.

In terms of their batting line-up, Steve Smith has been a brilliant player and they then have Marnus Labuschagne, who looks a really good player, and David Warner, who tends to be one extreme or the other.

It’s not the greatest batting line-up but Smith is the key.

I would have to back Root to be England’s top runscorer. You can’t look past him really and while Labuschagne has plenty of promise, Smith still has a point to prove and has been in great form in the past few Ashes so it is hard to bet against him.

Two similar bowlers - England’s Robinson and Australia’s Josh Hazelwood - could be the top wicket-takers .

It’s difficult to give a score prediction because so much depends on what happens in the first match.

I just wish England’s preparations had been better.

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