Australia have got problems.
A No 3 batter in Marnus Labuschagne who has gone 49 innings without a Test century and looks certain to be axed ahead of the impending home series against New Zealand.
Batting issues besides that, too, with the team rolled for 99 and 111 during the recent 2-1 loss in South Africa that saw their opponents displace them at the top of the Test rankings.
Selectors in the firing line after persisting with Labuschagne and also recalling Nic Maddinson, who had not played a first-class game since March 2025 and went on to total just 56 runs in four knocks in South Africa, including a 33-ball duck, before he was jettisoned.
A generational, certainly, but aging bowling attack that must cram in that four-match assignment versus New Zealand around Christmas, five Tests in India and the day-night 150th anniversary Test at home to England in March prior to the away Ashes next summer.
Michael Atherton can envisage an “implosion” before Australia arrive in the UK, telling the Sky Sports Cricket Podcast: “You could see it going horribly wrong, couldn’t you?”
Australia under the pump ahead of white-ball series
England’s Test team is not perfect – it could do with a frontline spinner as an option, for starters – but Joe Root’s men will surely be taking some encouragement from Australia’s travails in the longest format, even if they are unlikely to admit that publicly.
Now they have a chance to “keep the pressure on”, in Atherton’s words, as they embark on a white-ball tour of the country, a trip that comprises three one-day internationals – the first of which is on Friday November 13 (3.30am UK) – and five T20 internationals.
Australia have opted to rest pace stalwarts Josh Hazlewood, Mitchell Starc and Pat Cummins for all eight matches but a number of Test players could be involved in the ODIs, including Travis Head, Alex Carey, Cameron Green and Matt Renshaw.
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England beat Sri Lanka in their previous ODI in October, with batter Ben Duckett notching a second successive hundred
Atherton added: “Although some of the big guns are not playing, it is a chance to keep some pressure on Australia now – pressure on their selectors after the decisions around Labuschagne and what have you, pressure on some of their big-name players and pressure on them to keep their results modest.
“The past players will start to go at them as they started to do, actually, after about day one of the Ashes in Perth last year, before England then let them off the hook.”
One of those past players to have his say after the third-Test thrashing by South Africa was David Warner, who branded the capitulation with the bat in Cape Town as “terrible”, “disgraceful” and “un-Australian” while analysing the wreckage for Fox Sports.
Australia’s Marnus Labuschagne has gone 49 innings without a Test hundred
Will Australia bounce back again?
What would be very Australian is to come back fighting when people have written you off.
Before last winter’s Ashes they were told by many that they were too old but then promptly schooled a juvenile-at-times England en route to a 4-1 win that retained the urn.
Three years ago at the 50-over World Cup in India they were spanked by the hosts and then South Africa in their first two matches, only to win their next nine and claim a sixth title.
The point is that however much disarray Australia may seem to be in, they must not be taken lightly. If you do that, you are likely to get wounded. But, right now, England will feel they have a great chance to leave some pre-Ashes scars on their rivals.
Harry Brook’s England play three ODIs and five T20Is in Australia between November 13 and December 2
For all this talk of Australia “imploding”, though, let’s not forget that England did that in Perth at the start of 2025-26 Ashes when, with the first Test in the palm of their hand, they gifted wickets with brainless drives and ended up losing inside two days.
They never recovered.
This white-ball tour starts at the same venue and if England can avoid a repeat, then perhaps it will be Australia who cannot recover.
Schedule for England’s tour of Australia
ODIs 3.30am UK time, with T20s 8.15am UK time
- First ODI: Friday, November 13 (Perth)
- Second ODI: Sunday November 15 (Adelaide)
- Third ODI: Wednesday November 18 (Hobart)
- First T20I: Saturday November 21 (Melbourne)
- Second T20I: Tuesday November 24 (Carrara)
- Third T20I: Friday November 27 (Brisbane)
- Fourth T20I: Sunday November 29 (Sydney)
- Fifth T20I: Wednesday December 2 (Canberra)
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