England white-ball captain Eoin Morgan said that blame of the national team’s embarrassing and abysmal performance in the Ashes 2021-22 shouldn’t be put on the domestic new format tournament, the Hundred. England was drubbed 0-4 by Australia in the recent Ashes down under.
It was not only the manner in which England lost the series, but the way they lost all the four matches in the series is what matters. England lost the first Test in Brisbane by 9 wickets, the second Test in Adelaide, a D/N one by 275 runs, the third Test in Melbourne by an innings and 14 runs despite Australia scoring just 276 runs in their only innings.
They managed to draw the Sydney Test by the skin of their teeth with James Anderson and Stuart Broad surviving the last four overs nervously. However, things came back to normal as they lost the final Test in Hobart, another D/N by 146 runs after collapsing from 68/0 to 124 all out chasing 271 to win.
Eoin Morgan On Fingers Being Pointed At The Hundred
Eoin Morgan, England’s limited-overs captain, has said that it is “laughable to point the finger at the Hundred” for England’s 4-0 Ashes drubbing in Australia.
“People that use that as an excuse don’t want cricket. Test match cricket has always been the priority: it’s the format for our elite players.
“Obviously times at the moment have been tough down in Australia during the Ashes [but] they always are: we’ve lost the last two series 5-0 [sic] and it’s no surprise that Australia are very, very good at home.
Given the prep the guys have had where since they’ve arrived in Australia, until the first Test match, it has hammered it down with rain… it’s laughable to point the finger at the Hundred.
“The Hundred is an unbelievable success. Our formats in county cricket and the Hundred, in the way they’re structured, it’s exactly the same as Australia’s,” Morgan said on talkSPORT’s Following On podcast.
Many former England cricketers have been blaming England players’ participation in the Indian Premier League and the Hundred for their poor performances in the Test arena and Morgan felt that people are finding something to blame in order to shift the responsibility.
“People need something to blame so they’ll point at probably the furthest point to reality, because nobody wants to say: ‘you know what, we haven’t had the prep we would have liked, we probably haven’t played as we’d have liked, and we’ve lost’. That happens in all formats, but I stress: Test match cricket has always been the priority,” he added.
England will now be preparing for the West Indies tour where after the five T20Is, the two teams will play three Tests as well, starting in March.