Test Match Special - Pope seals Ashes place with century

Episode Date: November 14, 2025

Ollie Pope scored a hundred in England’s warm-up game against the Lions at Lilac Hill. There were also runs for Ben Stokes, Zak Crawley and Ben Duckett, but Joe Root, Harry Brook and Jamie Smith missed out.Chief Cricket reporter Stephan Shemilt rounds up the action in Perth and is joined by cricket author and Times journalist Simon Wilde We also get reaction from Zak Crawley and hear from multiple Ashes winner Sarah Taylor who’s part of the Lions coaching set-up,

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. The Dakar Rally is the ultimate off-road challenge. Perfect for the ultimate defender. The high-performance Defender Octa, 626 horsepower twin turbo V8 engine and intelligent 6D dynamics air suspension. Learn more at landrover.ca. You're listening to the TMS podcast from BBC Radio 5 Live. Hello, I'm Stefan Shemelt and welcome to the Test Match Special podcast from Lila Kill in Perth.

On the second day of England's only Ashes warm-up match against the England Lions, there was a century for Olly Pope and runs for Stokes, Crawley and Duckett, but Harry Brooke and Joe Root both missed out. To come, we'll hear from Zach Crawley on his 82. I'll be joined by cricket writer and journalist Simon Wilde. and we'll also hear from the England Lions Wicketkeeping coach and Women's World Cup and Ashes winner Sarah Taylor. You're listening to the TMS podcast from BBC Radio 5 Live.

While the shadows are just starting to creep across the outfield at Lila Kild there's a white sheet on that placid pitch where we've seen two days' worth of action. The breeze is just blowing through the trees and everyone's cleared out at the end of this second day. a day when the England team batted throughout. Yesterday, England lines made 375. We thought that was 382, but that was corrected by the scorers, and corrections to the score were a theme of the day.

England would respond with 426. The openers, Ben Duckett and Zach Crawley, well, they slipped straight back in to what we expect with them, an opening stand of 182. Just like the first day, the intense. of the cricket was at the highest in the morning session, particularly when Matthew Pott, who is in England's

Ash's squad, but playing for the England Lions, when he was opening the bowling for the Lions today, bowling to Duckett in particular, he really discomfited the England opener, and Duckett could have been caught at slip on only six. He was dropped by Ben McKinney. But Duckett and Crawley,

that stand of 182, almost or more than a runner ball, stretching through the morning session. But when Duckett and Crawley, were dismissed. England got themselves into a little bit of trouble. They lost four wickets for 16 runs, including Joe Root and Harry Brooke. Root was out for only one. He hooked pots into the hands of the Lions Captain Tom Haines at Shortman Wicket.

And Harry Brooke played a very skittish innings over 16 balls. He was running down the pitch. He was trying to scoop the seam as he was eventually bold running down the pitch to Nathan Gilchrist. And that left England, 198 for four. But then came another big stand between Olly Pope and the captain Ben Stokes. Pope was really measured for his 100 exactly, made off 113 deliveries. And Stokes, playing his first meaningful cricket since July. Remember he had that shoulder injury,

followed the six wickets he took yesterday by making 84, really patient first 50 runs. He opened his shoulders after that. After Stokes was out, the cricket meand. a little bit, particularly towards the end of the day. Bride and Kars returned for England. He was ill yesterday, but batted today in place of Mark Wood, who is going to have a scan on that hamstring injury. So eventually England, 426 all out.

And at the end of the day, I spoke to the opener, Zach Crawley, who made 82. Yeah, and I spent time in the middle. Obviously, quite a few of the boys got some runs there, so yeah, pleased with the day. First time you batted in a while, how was it? Yeah, I enjoyed it. It was a good wicket. bad and it's quite flat but yeah it was nice to spend time in the middle get some rhythm and yeah please of the day nice for you and ben ducky just to slip back into the groove as an opening

partnership yeah I always enjoy bat him with ducky and he looked in great touch there so always always enjoy bat him hopefully do it a bit over the next couple of months what the conditions like at there it's a good wicket to bat on but you know we're not too focused on that we're just trying to like you say get some rhythm and spend some time in the middle so yeah it's a flat wicket for sure how do you see it as preparation for playing a test match at the shopped us. You know, cricket's cricket, like I said, just time in the middle and, you know, we're doing everything we can with what we've got and yeah, I feel like we're going to be ready next week. You'll know about all the discussion that's gone around about your, the preparation.

How difficult is it to find something that suits all players, there were some players there who took it in a certain way, others who maybe tried to play a few shots? How difficult is it to find a sort of, I know, one size fits all when it comes to preparation? Yeah, luckily I don't have to worry about those sorts of things. I just try and turn up and play my role in the team. As far as I'm concerned, I think it's good prep. We're getting used to the weather, getting used to the flies. And, yeah, it's good prep, I think. And, yeah, like I say, I feel like we'll be ready next week.

A couple of years ago, you faced the first ball of an Ashes series and did something quite memorable. You thought about the prospect of facing the first ball again? Oh, I'm always, yeah, I think that a 50-50 chance of facing it. So, yeah, I'm looking forward to. Hopefully I'll just watch the ball and play on its merits. Do something similar as you did at Edgebaston? Oh, we'll see if it's a good ball, I'll block it.

And if it's a half-folly, I'll try and drive it. And that's just trying how I play. Just see the ball and hit the ball. You've got history in this city. What's it like to be back? I love this town, yeah. It's one of my favourite places in the world. So I love being back.

We've got a lot of friends here. My old batting coaches from here. And, yeah, no, I feel like I've got a connection with the place. So, yeah, I love Perth. Have you managed to catch up with anyone? Been to your old club at Wembley? I haven't yet. I'm going to try and catch up with them over the next week or so.

But, yeah, no, I've got a lot of fun memories and a lot of good friends out here. And how special would it be for you because of that to play an ashes test in Perth? Yeah, obviously we didn't get to last time with COVID so very special and I've played for the scorches here in that Optus Stadium I think it's an unbelievable ground a lot of English people there hopefully and it's going to be one of the most special moments of my career for sure Well that was the England opener Zach Crawley

I'm alongside Simon Wilde of the time Simon what did you make of what you've seen today Well I mean I suppose it's a good workout for England I'm not I can't believe it's going to have much bearing on what happens at the Optus next weekend pitch is going to be different a pretty good pitch here I think it's going to have more

pace and bounce in it at the optus you wouldn't choose you wouldn't really choose this ground as your preparation would you you'd rather be at the whacker if you can't be at the optus but England have got to make do with what

they've been given really and it's not much and the majority of the top order took the opportunity to spend time in the middle and like you say whether or not or how valuable that is

come the optus and the difference in the conditions we'll find out but I suppose for the likes of Crawley and Duckett and Pope and Stokes time in the middle is better than none yeah and we've you know those on the outside looking at have been saying that match practice is what these guys need may not be the same as a test match but

this is what we say they should be doing and they've been doing it and most of them took their opportunity the Aussies are playing shield cricket I don't know how good the bowling is that they're facing in some of those games but they've you know some of those guys have got run some of them haven't this is how you prepare for test matches these days isn't it it's not ideal really

but yeah the top three will be very happy with the runs they made today and we'll see how they go I thought it was quite similar to the first day in that the intensity was there or certainly higher in the morning session and then tailed off as the day

one on it got a little bit farcical actually towards the end of the day today with problems with the with the scoreboard and England using 12 batters and Jacob Bethel coming on and rolling through the tail with his left arm spin. But this morning it felt like a much higher level of intensity and actually Matthew Potts, I don't think he did himself any harm at all.

I thought he looked good with the new ball. I thought he was comfortably with the best seamer on show. And him bowling to Duckett and Zach Crawley was good hard cricket. And Potts really examined Duckett in particular, a few edges through the slips. Duckett was dropped. But then after that, Duckett and Crawley came through,

that and it was what we we've come to know to be used to from that opening pair yeah yeah no that was that was that was good hard cricket and um the openers will be very happy with how it went really they got a good good work and as you say potts is you know he's in the ashes squad he's he's a contender to play at some point and he justified his his sort of position in this in the main squad really so he'll be happy too i'm going to stick with the positives for now because there was a question about Olli Pope coming into this tour and maybe that question had already been answered by Jacob Bethel not taking his opportunity in New Zealand.

When we spoke to Marcus Strathic and Ben Strokes before this game started, Pope was given big endorsement and said he's the man in possession of the number three shirt. Jacob Bethel only made two yesterday, so Pope knew that really it was a little bit of a free hit today. But I thought he looked calm and actually quite, determined to take the opportunity to spend some time in the middle. Sometimes that Oli Pope is accused of not being calm enough as England's number three. And yes, the surroundings are very gentle.

But that's just what England want from him, isn't it, in the test arena? Yeah. And you can say it's sort of, you can dismiss these games as not important and it doesn't really matter, but it is important to grind out a hundred sometimes. And that's what he did. And that's what he's often criticised as not doing enough of in test. cricket. He scored the runs, you know, and this is what the sort of thing that Joe Root often does, he will make a hundred and you come away and you think, well, why did

he get a hundred and the others didn't? Well, it's because they're quality players and Olli Pope's shown that. And really, for the last few weeks, the traffic's been all one way about the number three spot, hasn't it really? Bethel hasn't made the runs in New Zealand. Pope has not been, not had a chance, but he's got it here and he's made runs and he's put the whole thing to bed, really. You know, he's going to start the series and Bethel's going to have to wait for someone to slip up where he to get it. the team at the moment. And actually now it's almost

my feeling that if we see Jacob Bethel in the ashes that something's gone wrong for England, either they've had an injury or results and form of taken such a dive that they've had to make a change. He's just made no case, has he, to be included in that top six?

I'm not unhappy about this development really in the last few weeks. I think, you know, Bethel's never made a test hundred. Obviously he's made one professional hundred, hasn't which has been talked about. Olly Pope has been sort of famed for being a heavy score throughout his, you know, throughout his early years and at Surrey,

it sort of makes sense that he should be the number three rather than Bethel. And, you know, Bethel's, the argument for Bethel is purely on potential rather than on reality of heavy run scoring. And I think this is actually the right way around, this is how it should be. And if he's going to get in, he'll do it by way to runs eventually or other people falling by the wayside. He hasn't really got the body of work to justify the hype that has gone with his elevation, really. People have got very excited on, not a lot really in substance, do you want to be.

Now, Ben Stokes, he doesn't normally play warm-up matches. And the day before this game started, he told us it was going to be balls to the wall from England. And he's done his bit, hasn't he? It has been from him, isn't he? He took his six wickets yesterday. 84 today and I thought you know again from Ben Stokes's point of view he's not played cricket for so long not since July

and he's such a rhythmical batter that he always takes his time actually in the better knocks that we've seen Ben Stokes play he often spends a lot of time in the early part of his innings before opening his shoulders and that's what he did today I think he spent 92 deliveries over his first 50 He then pushed on after he passed 50. And again, that's just what England need, isn't it?

Yeah, I mean, this is great. He looks completely focused on the case. And he will, you know, he's England's leader, and he knows he needs to lead with Batam ball, really. And the fact he bowled as many overs as he did yesterday was a very encouraging sign because there's been a lot of concern about whether he's actually going to be fit to play his part as an all-rounder.

And on this evidence, he looks like he can. and that's great really. England need him. England need him to have a big series really. He's got to, he's got to turn, you know, score the runs, take the wickets if England are going to have any chance, really. So let's think about the negatives

from that batting performance. And firstly, there's so much attention, isn't there on Joe Root? The Australian media have certainly latched onto that. You know, his record here, having never scored a century. and his record in Australia is far from poor. It's just not as good as what we'd expect from Joe Root,

a batter of his quality. And, you know, there was some cruel lines yesterday that he did make a century. He's just the runs that he conceded with the ball. And then today he was out for one. Quite uncharacteristically, he was fetching a pull or a hook from outside of his eyeline, outside of the off stump, into the hands of the midwicket fielder.

I thought he might have been slightly undone by the slow pace of the pitch. But he also, I think his high score in three knocks in New Zealand was 25. He'd like some more time in the middle one and he might not get another knock. Yeah. I can't be too worried about him, though, because he's such a quality performance and he's done it for so long. And the Aussie media and the rest of it latching onto him, we've seen this before. They like to pick on a sort of a big name player. Stokes has had a bit of flack already in the last week.

I remember a couple of tours ago when Kevin Peterson was I think he was batting at five and they were saying well if you're really England's best place you'd be four and I think it was the 06-7 series that went badly wrong for England and he did move up the order in the end

England sort of almost relented and said he should be going up the order they'll find something to latch on to with one of our star players they like to sort of niggle and I hope he and trusty will ignore all that stuff and it won't affect him.

In your experience, having covered as many ashes tours as you have, how difficult is it for players to ignore that scrutiny? Because I think Alistair Cook had it in 1314 when England lost 5-0. Michael Clark was pretty open about targeting the England captain. We've heard it. Other times, Glenn McGraugh and Mike Atherton, how have you seen some players cope well with it and other players crumble?

Yeah, I've seen it often. And I do remember with the 2010-11 tour that England won that one of the things that they worked on in the months leading up to the tour was to educate the players about the flack that was coming and the sort of off-the-field distractions there would be. This was very much like, this is going to happen to you. You've got to understand it's going to happen. There's nothing you do about it.

Don't get annoyed about it. Try and embrace it. And they told them to respond by saying, It's a lovely country. We love coming here. It's a great place to play cricket. Australia are great cricketers and just meet the hostility with sort of a welcome answer. Don't engage in the nonsense really because you'll never win. And I think that was good advice and it worked in 10-11. I mean the Aussies put the cricket Australia digital team got to put something on Big Bend, didn't it?

of a picture of Michael Clark and Ricky Ponting saying, you know, remember to pack the urn because we're going to, you know, you're going to be giving it back to us well, of course. That didn't happen. But you've just got to ignore that stuff. And England did it then. And I think the way, so when Joe Root in the summer was being criticised about, you know, he's got a surfboard on his front leg, all this sort of stuff, he just came back and said, you know, I love playing cricket in Australia.

It's a great tour. And I think that's what this group will do this time, I hope, is just keep meeting. it in a friendly manner and just don't get don't engage it's it won't pay so harry brooks innings then and we know that there are players who can see the value in this sort of cricket that it serves a purpose for them that they get benefit out of it and others who just can't get themselves up for warm-up matches they save themselves for the big occasion and we mentioned that stokes doesn't normally play in these games because you know he wants to save him for those for those other more important contests and there's been such a debate around the value

of this game and the merits of the way that england are preparing brook today in his first 15 deliveries he danced down the pitch to the seamers twice and also tried to play a you know his trademark scoop shot um off matt fisher and missed it and then from his 16th ball balled by nathan gilchrist brook danced down the pitch and ended up outside leg stump when he was bold off stump and it looked to me like harry brook was almost that was his way of telling us what he thought about this warm-up game yeah yeah i mean there's a it reminded me of the way uh david gow used to infuriate critics with uh his approach in these sort of games you know if he if the if he wasn't stimulated by the occasion then

he couldn't he couldn't do it you know he just could not engage and and and grind out a score it wasn't his way of doing things and I think Brooke is in that category as well and maybe KP to an extent you know he used to get out in silly ways and say well that's the way I play and I think Brooke would say the same thing it's quite annoying for us on the outside when they do that you think well you're good enough to you know you could you could easily got a hundred today if you'd put your mind to it but he couldn't he couldn't do it what do you do about it I don't know really I mean he's you know he's a phenomenal player and I it'll only matter if he

If he fails in the test match next week, really, and you think, well, why didn't you get your head down here and get ready? But I trust he'll be all right. It's vice captain now, though. You know, he's been given responsibility. It's not a great look, really, is it, to the others? Fortunately, Stokes did show the way.

Yeah, no, that's true. As a vice captain, it's not ideal, is it? I think what's interesting as well as how teams become an image of their leaders, don't they? And we know there are reasons why England are preparing in this way and why they've chosen to use this method for some of their previous overseas tours. But they are also led by Ben Stokes and Brendan McCollum, two big game players, two Mavericks almost,

who you can imagine. Of course, what we've seen from Stokes the past two days, he's taken this game seriously, mainly because of his injury comeback. But usually he wouldn't have had much truck with it. I can't imagine that Brendan McCollum could have got up for playing in this game. game. And, you know, if you think someone like Andrew Strauss, who was, you know, to the nth degree of his detail in England had their warm-up plans and everything was done seriously,

a completely different kind of leader. And it's so hard, isn't it, to find a one-size-fits-all preparation. Some players might want to play warm-up games till the cow's come home, others want to play none. And that is the difficulty, isn't it? It is. And the modern schedule doesn't allow for the kind of practice we used to have in, you know, on Tours Passage, you have to just do it in the nets almost and then with perhaps one game like this. It's not ideal at all, but I don't know what can be done about it. It's just not, it's not good. I don't know what to say, really.

I mean, you know, Zach Crawley hasn't played since, what is it, was it the beginning of September? Yeah, the T20 Blast quarterfinals. The Blast quarterfinals, correct, yeah. And, you know, Bashir, he was injured. He's not played since, I think, the Lord's tests. Is that right? Stokes injured, not since late July. You know, the list goes on.

I mean, it's incredible to think that these guys are about to play a test match next week, having done so little for so long, it's amazing. And good on them if they can get themselves up and put in a really big performance because that takes them doing on the back of... The old-time players,

reassurance from grinding out runs in county cricket well not grinding about scoring very fast maybe but you know they'd get ready and feel good about themselves because they'd got runs for their canters how do these guys feel good just from hitting a few balls in the net and feeling and feeling like it's coming out of the middle and that's a hard thing to do I want to touch on Sherry Bashir in a minute but we saw Mark Wood walking laps today that left hamstring heavily strapped now if you believe the scorecard he had a bat at one point he made 31 but there was a bit of a malfunction in the scoring system and actually I think while Wood was piling up the runs on the scorecard

he was having his scan to determine the severity of that hamstring tightness that he felt yesterday if it is bad news for Wood on that injury and we might not know until tomorrow it's a blow for England and really cruel on him isn't it yeah I mean I'm hoping just looking at his body language today he didn't look as crestfallen as he back in February when he got injured at the champion's trophy he knew he was on for a long haul before he'd be playing again.

I think realistically this means he won't play the first test because it's a gamble and why would England take that gamble when the whole point of having a battery fast bowlers is to sort of shuffle them through a series, rotate them. So why would you take a punt on him if you're not quite sure that he's okay? So I think hopefully what all this means is that he won't play the first

and that maybe he can come back later in the series in which case that's fine because he was never going to be playing five you know England I guess wanted to have Wood and Archer playing at the Optus

because we think it'll be a fast pitch and would suit him but all the pitches here will help him he showed on the last tour that he was effective throughout he played four I think didn't he out of the five last time and he was effective in all of them

so let's just hope that's it It doesn't feel like a tour-ending injury, just the vibes out of the camp at the moment. But we'll see. And I wonder if maybe he'll even go and get some overs in that game that the England Lions are playing against the Prime Minister's 11 in Canberra. We're told that the England squad just won't go to that game.

But it looks valuable to him now. The reason I ask about Wood before I come to Bashir and even Will Jacks is because it looked like, and I think it probably still will be, that England want to play five seamers at the optus and probably Josh Tongue is the man who will benefit from Mark Wood's injury and he would just slide into that fifth seam bowler's position. But the reason I think that Woods' absence is interesting

is because England would probably have expected him to bowl the fewest overs out of those five seamers that they probably wanted the four others around him to cover for him. And now that might open an opportunity for either Bashir and England just go with their normal formation of three specialists Seamus, Stokes

and Bashir as the spinner. Or even Will Jax, who made runs yesterday, because if England think, you know what, this is going to be a short test match, the Seamers will do the bulk of the bowling, Ben Stokes is fully fit, why don't we lengthen our batting with Jacks

at seven or eight, and he can bowl a few off-breaks if we need him to? But neither Jacks or Bashir, who are both recovering from injuries, Bashir from a longer term one and Jacks from that broken finger that kept him out of the New Zealand white series. Neither of them looked at the races with the ball today. No, they didn't. I mean, my feeling before the tour was that Jaxx might well play at Perth if

at all. He would be ahead of Bashir as a choice for Perth. And then, obviously, the second test at Brisbane is a pink ball test, isn't it? So I don't think Bashir is going to play there. So I don't think we'll see him till the third test. Yeah, I think Jacks has, has a chance of playing next week. And I think that would, that sort of makes sense in a way. And it's true, it gives them batting depth as well, which they'll like. And also, just looking at how Nathan Lyons has gone in Australia, tests in Australia in recent years, his, his workload has declined.

He doesn't bowl as many overs as he used to. So any spinner who does play here on this ground, at the opposite, I would suspect he's not going to be bowling 50 overs in the game he might bowl 25 or something so therefore maybe jacks can do the job so yeah I think that is a genuine possibility and as you say if Wood's not around then maybe that's what they pivot to so we've had two days we've got Saturday's third and final day coming up what could England get out of that tomorrow

I think one thing they probably will want is Briden Carr's to have a bowl because he missed the first day through illness. He emerged today is that the 12th batter. He was the one we weren't expecting to see. Yeah. After lunch. So that's one thing. Braden Carster get through a spell tomorrow is one thing that England will be looking out for. Yeah, I think they'd like cast a bowl

tomorrow in the game. I do. They'd like wood to bowl in the game as well. If he gets all clear with his scan, they'd like him to bowl as well. What else do they need? I don't know, really. Joe Root has another innings and gets some runs.

Yeah, Carson Wood are the main things, I would say. We never know, we might not even be here for the whole day. You wouldn't put it past England to pull the swimsite, would you? I'd go to the golf course. Well, I'll just say that they've had enough, but we'll see. And actually, now, you know, we're a week away from the first test. And I think, I don't know, from watching the cricket for the past two days, and, you know, like we said, it started out with a certain intensity,

but on both days it's just tailed off. We just won that first day of the first test to come around, don't we? England feel like they've got what they want out of the game, then in a way, what's the point? So they might cut off early, but they would want cast a ball, and if Wood's an option to bowl, then they'd want him to ball.

But after that, they might say, well, what are we doing now? I guess more overs for Bashir or Jax wouldn't be a bad thing. But yeah, that's possible. They might say, we've got what we wanted out of this game now. You're listening to the TMS podcast from BBC. Well, the England Lions team that England are playing against is coached by Andrew Flintoff, but he's not the only well-known figure in the backroom staff.

The former England women's wicketkeeper Sarah Taylor is also part of the setup. She was part of the England side that won the Ashes in Australia in 2008, and 10 years ago made history as the first woman to play men's first grade cricket in this country. I sat down with her on the boundary edge here at Lila Kill. How is this for you? Because I think your last experience of Ashes cricket might have been playing in it. And now here you are in this environment. With the England Lions, also part of the England men's senior Ashes Tour.

How's it been? It's been great. I mean, there's such a great bunch to be around, staff included. And we'd all just all just. enjoying almost the build-up really we appreciate that we're the lions but they're still a build-up for us as well and it's just being I mean weather's lovely can't complain families and stuff moaning that it's a bit miserable back home also makes it slightly better but yeah this is this is where we want to be

and we're working really hard when you when you finish playing did you know that you wanted to be a coach or were you sort of I'm not sure if that's what I want to do. No, I wanted to be the furthest thing from a coach. I wasn't actually sure. Why? Because I'd done that career. I thought, well, cricket was one career,

and then I wanted to see what other careers were out there. And I ended up, I fell into just, it was a very, very quick decision to actually go from coaching, from playing to into a school and just see what it was like working in a school. and there was obviously some cricket coaching in there but obviously not the level like it is here but I ended up falling back into coaching because some of the players that we were working with at the school were Sussex Academy players and there was a couple of keepers in there as well which I ended up working with that were on the academy and then it all of a sudden just went from

there and then I ended up at Sussex full time and it happened really organically and then it was okay this is when I was at Sussex I was thinking this actually I actually really enjoy this and I love working with the players and then all of a sudden seeing what they do out here and what they produce like knowing all the hard work that they've put in and I was like now that's

my enjoyment rather than the playing side now so but yeah no I wanted to be an archaeologist at one point and then when did you knock that on the head probably whilst I was playing in to but it was something that I just wanted to try out And I was like, during the summer, I'll give this a go, during that first year. But by that point, I was in the coaching and the thick of it.

And, yeah, it took off so quickly. I didn't really have time to stop and think. So fill in the gaps for me. So what does life look like now? How many different sort of coaching gigs are you in? And what's the day job? I actually work at school. I work at a different school now.

So I'm in London. I work at Dulwich College, which is a phenomenal. of school and itself the history there but they they allow me to come and and do the lion stuff whenever they're really happy with me to do that and very supportive and it's obviously got the hundreds in the summer there could be some potential franchise stuff which i won't mention throughout the winter this winter along with the lion stuff so it's but it's full time job obviously it's six days a week at Dalit's college so um and then we have lion stuff in the summer plus plus like I said the 100 so there's no real rest time for me it's pretty much a 12-month

of the year gig really and including all the school stuff when you when you got into coaching and you know it sounds like something you sort of fell into yeah was there any ambition to be coaching in in the men's world or again was that just a happy accident totally just just because of the the boys that I was coaching it that were in the Sussex Academy which was then Richard Houssel that asked if I had to come across and and went with him at Sussex and then like I say ended up in keeping kind of lending itself, keeping coaching lended itself into the men's game a little bit and it was absolutely organically but now I'm in the men's game you obviously want to see see how far you can go and just

enjoy enjoy it for what it is and yeah I'm still I'm still doing women stuff which is absolutely the right thing to do but obviously this is a little bit of a luxury for me at the minute how different is the two to coaching men and coaching women and you can be as brutal as you like here because there might skills well wise, it's the same. Obviously, if I'm slinging in the nets, I'll sling slightly quicker to the guys as I do to the girls. Girls will naturally are slightly more emotional, but I don't mean that in a negative way. I mean as in they want to understand a little bit more earlier. Does that mean you have to coach in a different way? Absolutely, yeah.

But again, there's different players are totally different as well, so you've got to learn to coach in different ways, but absolutely you'll probably explain it more as to why you're doing something in the women's game, whereas guys will probably trust you. you and then ask questions but it's probably slightly different but that's the beauty of coaching right you've got to learn different ways and different teams and different setups and like the two Rue brothers are obviously extremely different so you've got to learn that so that's yeah that's what you that's what I enjoy about the coaching side in terms of the skills that make up the game of cricket is keeping the one that

most lends itself to cross in the gender divide because I guess I guess I guess power is the thing that's leased, I guess, down the list of attributes for keepers compared to all the other different things you could do in the game? Yeah, I mean, I guess so, and that's probably me being a little bit biased towards keeping, but I definitely think the skills and what I deliver is exactly the same across both. I don't see why there would need to be any change. It is honestly literally speed. I still think there's female coaches that can help out with scene bowling, spin bowling,

and batting. It's more of a skill though, I guess, rather than the teaching of the skill. It's absolutely. I think keeping lens itself, it's a lot, I think it's a lot easier, I think to deliver those skills for keepers than it might be another facets of the game. But again, might be being biased towards keeping. And have you had to do anything differently, I don't know, physically to make sure that you can give the guys the things that they need, I'm hitting the ball a bit hard, having

that bit more power when you're, I don't know, hitting catchers or whatever. Yeah, I've had to, I can use, I've got different types of bats, so if I know I'm in the men's game and they obviously need balls that are slightly higher, then I've got a bat for that. But I had to learn that.

I had to learn that the hard way where you're hitting balls and you're thinking, God, that's just not high enough and you're feeling a little bit insecure or kind of not good enough and then someone just goes, try this. And then all of a sudden it's going absolutely where you need to go

and you go, oh, it's fine. Like, I'm absolutely fine. But at some days you need to know your limits and that's what's a beauty to coach. I know there's certain things that actually I might not be good at. So I ask for help and then I facilitate that because ultimately it's about the players at the end of then. It's not about me. So yeah, it's been a learning curve.

How are you finding this environment? Because sometimes I look out, you know, sitting here looking at on the field and there are, you know, a lot of people here and some of, I don't know, the biggest alphas I could have ever thought of in men's cricket, Andrew Flintoff, Ben Stokes, Brenda McCollum. And there's one moment as part of the coaching team. How are you finding that? completely normal? Is that a weird thing to say? No, not all. But they're just, I appreciate they are humongous names, but they are also extremely lovely people. And we're all singing the same hymn sheet of that we want to win the ashes.

That's why we're here, that's what we're doing. And ultimately you're just trying to prepare these boys to do the best that they can do. And I will learn as much as I can from pretty much every single word that they say. But I couldn't be more comfortable here. be more comfortable here. I feel at home with these guys. I will follow Fred to the ends of the earth. So yeah, it's been a wonderful experience so far. Why would you follow Freddy to the end of the earth? He's effectively your boss, isn't he? How do you find working for him? You just you don't follow him after he's spoken because he's so good. Like just the words that he says,

he's just so inspirational that there's no point in anyone else talking. Be how he speaks and the passion that he shows, you just want to follow him. you just want to go with him. Where are you going? Fred, we're coming with you. Like that's, and that is how all the boys are as well. And that's how he gets the best out of us. And yeah, we genuinely mean I would follow him to the ends of earth. I think having this conversation with you in Australia is interesting

because Australia was a country where you blaze another trail playing in first grade cricket. And when we've spoken in the past, you say you've told me that sometimes you find that difficult, that you want to push the boundaries but you're not always happy with the attention that that brings how are you balancing better I'm better now I still am not somebody that's wanting the limelight I just want to be good at my job do my job and kind of get out sort of thing but you totally forgot I did that by then yeah and that's how I kind of want to go about my coaching really I want to enjoy this especially I'm still 36 I need to remember that. I'm still pretty young when it comes to coaching. Who knows where I'll be in

10 years time. But I'll still be relatively young in coaching years at 46. So I am just taking this experience for what it is, just learning as much as I can, watching drills, watching how people operate. A lot of the time at this level, it's getting to know players and trying to get the best out of them. And I'm watching how, you know, the coaches around here, who are some of the best in the world just how they talk to players and how they get the best out of them so that's essentially what I'm trying to do you know you say you're you know so younger in terms of your coaching career where would you like it to go I do not I've been asked this this question a lot I don't know I love being a trailblazer

like you say without the attention which is wrong but I don't know I genuinely I want to see as far as I can go as far as I can go work with some of the best players I can see how far I can go in the men's game potentially but I think I did it in an ideal world travelling around the world being one of the best keeping coach in the world that would be my dream but you never know because you are a keeping geek I am because before we turn before we turn the recorder on here Tom Rood just dive down the leg side you said great take you know very I don't know I don't know how many people notice that sometimes in the game when they're

watching just the game of cricket and they pick out what keeper has done well. So what can you tell us about working with Tom Roo and with James Rue and other keepers that you've worked with? Yeah, I mean, obviously we've worked really hard and they train so hard, so that is a blessing as well. But we just worked on a couple of technical things with both of them. James was a little bit more last year,

so Tom is obviously slightly newer into the squad, so there's a bit more technical stuff going on. And quite annoyingly, when you fix one thing, something else kind of creeps up a little bit, So it's an ongoing process, but it's just nice to see, I don't think he's quite realised, but hopefully at some point they'll pinch himself and be like, I'm 17 and I'm keeping to these players here and playing against these. But it's just nice to see what we've done in training he's now putting into the game, which is what I enjoy the most. And more broadly, I know you don't work with necessarily with Jamie Smith, but he's going to be keeping in Australia for the first time in the Ashes series.

So what is the difference keeping in this country to keep in England in particular? I think Natuary as a whole is obviously bounces more over here. Obviously we have no idea what pitches they'll prepare but the way he keeps in his technique I think is absolutely perfect for out here. It's very simple in his technique and he's quite a tall guy which is perfect. But I honestly think that he'll succeed out here I think would be absolutely brilliant. Thank you very much. Thank you for talking to us.

You're listening to the TMS podcast from BBC Radio 5 Live. Well, that was England Lions assistant coach, Sarah Taylor. We'll be back with news of the final day of England's Ashes warm-up game in our next podcast. Remember, we'll have episodes every day during this Ashes tour. And next Friday, the series gets underway with full commentary on Test Match special, in-play highlights and clips. to watch during play on the BBC Sport website and app and a highlight show on BBC Eye Player.

That's it for now. We'll speak to you next time.