Following Australia's resoundingwin in the second Ashes Test in Brisbane, England's captain Ben Stokes openly admitted that his team was not able to stand up to the pressure.
Ben Stokes acknowledges England's failure under pressure
Australia's clinical performance allowed them to secure a dominant eight-wicket win on the fourth day of the match, pushing them to a commanding 2-0 lead in the series. Stokes's candid admission the mental and competitive strain the team faced against a strong Australian side.
With the series now standing at 2-0 in Australia's favor, England face a monumental challenge to reclaim the Ashes urn. To salvage the series, the team now have a herculean task of winning all three remaining Test matches.
"Obviously very disappointing. I think a lot of it, to me, comes down to not being able to stand up to the pressure of this game, this format. When the game is on the line, in small passages we've been able to bring the game back into some kind of control and then we've let it slip away. We've done that again here this week," Stokes told TNT Sports.
"It's very, very disappointing, especially considering the ability of the players in that dressing room. I think we need to think a bit harder and a little bit deeper about those moments and what we're taking mentally into those, and yeah, overall just show a little bit more fight when it's needed," he added.
England's batting collapse
The match concluded swiftly as the hosts successfully chased down the meager target of 65 runs in just 10 overs. Fittingly, it was captain Steve Smith who secured the winning runs, pulling Gus Atkinson for a massive six over square leg. Although this defeat was not as quick or humiliating as their previous two-day loss in the first Test in Perth, England was nonetheless comprehensively outplayed across every facet of the game in Brisbane, confirming Australia's dominance.
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England fundamentally lost control of the game once they permitted Australia's tailenders to contribute significantly on Day 3. The lower-order resilience helped the home side compile a massive total of 511, handing them an overall first-innings lead of 177 runs. The subsequent struggle was evident when England's second innings collapsed under the lights, finishing Day Three at 134-6 and still trailing the Australian total by 43 runs.
Ben Stokes' bravado in vain
Despite widespread expectations that England would surrender meekly on the final day, Captain Stokes and all-rounder Jacks mounted a respectable, fighting rearguard action. Both players defied the Australian pace attack under fiercely hot conditions, ensuring Australia was forced to bat a second time. Stokes top-scored with 50, supported by Jacks' 41, as they managed to clear the initial deficit and begin setting a target. However, this effort merely delayed the inevitable, as Australia soon wrapped up the innings for just 241 before chasing down the 65-run target with effortless ease.
We're definitely not weak: Stokes
Stokes didn't shy away from saying that Australia isn't a place for weak men. However he made it clear that England isn't a weak side and very well knows how to make a comeback.
"They say Australia isn't a place for weak men. We're definitely not weak but we need to find something because we're 2-0 down now and we've got three more games to go, and yeah, we need to sort it. I absolutely believe in that dressing room, I have full belief in the players that are in there, the coaching staff and the people that are there to help make us better players. What else have we got to do? We know we've got to win these next three games, we have been 2-0 down before, so we know what we need to do and we ain't going to shy away from the battle that we've got front of us," Stokes further said.
"We do need to look at where things have gone wrong in these first two games and solve them out pretty quickly if we want to get these Ashes back to England," he concluded.
Meanwhile, the all-important third Test is scheduled to get underway on December 17 at the Adelaide Oval. For England to maintain any mathematical possibility of reclaiming the Ashes urn, a victory in this match is an absolute necessity.