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England's Harry Brook walks from the field after he was dismissed during play on day four of the third Ashes cricket test between England and Australia in Adelaide, Australia, Saturday, Dec. 20, 2025. (AP Photo/James Elsby)
With England’s Harry Brook managing just a half century in the 6 innings he has played thus far in the Ashes, Australian legend Ricky Ponting advised the batter to adjust the way he plays Down Under or risk the prospect of more frustrating performances.
“Look, I love Harry Brook. He’s one of the best players in the world to watch, but I think with some of his dismissals, he’s almost selling himself a bit short on how good he is. He doesn’t need to do some of the stuff that he’s doing. And I guess, I’m sure it’s going to be frustrating for an English fan as well, or even some of his teammates. You know, he’s had a chance to sit back and watch Joe Root go about his cricket for the last 15 years. And to be fair, and this is no knock on Joe Root,” Ponting said on the latest episode of The ICC Review.
“Harry Brook’s got every bit as much talent as Joe Root has. You see him trying to play little lap shots off Scott Boland against a yorker that could have easily knocked his middle and leg stump out of the ground when his team needs him to make a hundred and chase down 435,” he added.
Brook has been dismissed at critical junctures during England’s batting which has led to the Three Lions collapsing and eventually surrendering the Ashes series to Australia with 2 matches in hand.
“I’ll be critical on that, but I don’t think I’ll be any more critical than what his teammates would be or what his coach would be, because they should be critical of those sort of mistakes, because it’s those sort of things that have cost them this Ashes series. They probably won’t admit it. They won’t talk about it. They won’t bring it up. They’re very defiant with that sort of criticism,” Ponting said.
“They’ll always come back and say, ‘oh, that’s the way that we play and we encourage them to play their natural games’. But you can’t do that in Australia and you can’t do it against Australia because if you give them an opportunity, you give them an inch, they’ll take a mile. And we’ve seen that right the way through the series,” he added.
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