As of about 4:30am on Saturday morning, England have lost the Ashes. This means they haven’t won the urn since 2015. Worse still, the net score from 18 Ashes Tests Down Under since the win in 2010/11 is a tight 16-0 and meagre two draws. Going back to find England’s last series win in Australia before 10/11 would take you all the way back to Mike Gatting’s victorious side of 1986/7.

Whilst England will invariably go into crisis mode after this winter’s humbling, getting thrashed in Australia isn’t a new low. It’s in keeping with a 40-year status quo of defeat.

Particularly frustrating about this serving of disappointment, however, is that the England squad has potential. In the build-up, it seemed that the stars were aligning for England. The injuries to Cummins and Hazelwood, the timely return of Archer and Wood, and the promise shown over the summer against India gave England fans, including myself, reasons to believe. In early November, you could have caught me defending Stuart Broad’s outlandish claim that this was the best England and the worst Australia since 2010/11.

“To hyper-fixate on these missed chances in the field would be to miss the far more fundamental problem”

For fleeting moments in the series, this potential has shone through. When England conduct the postmortem of the Adelaide Test, many will draw attention to the dropped catches and technological issues that went against them. In the first innings, Harry Brook dropped a relatively simple chance to dismiss Khawaja on five. All else being equal, this cost England a heavy 77 runs; runs which could have lowered the margin of defeat to a mere five. Even more will be made of Carey’s century, made possible by a Brydon Carse drop on 52 and a technological failing on 72 (an entirely different issue to be discussed). Dropped catches have squashed England’s momentum throughout the series.

That said, to hyper-fixate on these missed chances in the field would be to miss the far more fundamental problem: England have consistently squandered opportunities with the bat.

Over the series so far, England have made a good return of 21 scores of 30+. This should be the hardest part of the innings to survive. To make 30, you need to weather the momentum of the previous wicket, get yourself in, and start to put runs on the board. A high-class batter, having advanced to 30, should be looking to make a match-winning score.

By damning contrast however, England have made a meagre eight scores of 50+. That makes it 13 times out of 21 that a batter fought hard to get in, but was dismissed without remotely cashing in. Crucially, Joe Root remains the only English centurion this winter. Despite having made notably fewer starts of 30+, Australia have made 12 scores of 50+ and 3 centuries. This includes Travis Head’s monster 153, which ultimately won them the match in Adelaide. In short, the Aussies have been clinical.

Making the point on Test Match Special, Andy Zaltzman points out that this problem is most prevalent for England against Australia. He cites the pressure of the Ashes and the depth of the Australian bowling attack. While Australia have bowled well, this failure to convert big scores feels more like a mental barrier. Of the 20 wickets England lost at Adelaide, there was plenty of high-quality bowling removing batters early in their innings. But if you focus on the wickets England lost once the batter is established north of 30, it’s a tale of self-destruction.

In the second innings, Brook’s was probably the ugliest dismissal. He tried to hit the leather out of a reverse sweep, only to lose his leg stump to Nathan Lyon. Zak Crawley batted well for his 85 but inexplicably played all around a stock delivery from the off-spinner.

“Technically, Travis isn’t Head and shoulders above England’s leading lights”

Worst of all was Smith. Having dug in with Jacks on the last session of day 4, Smith looked comfortable for 20 overs on day five. When Australia took the new ball, he dispatched four boundaries in a row. Then he went for a fifth. Attempting to thump Starc over cow corner, Smith lobbed an easy catch to mid-wicket, and all reasonable hope was lost. Australia bowled well all match, but Smith, who looked on for one of the great counter-attacking Ashes centuries, ultimately got himself out.

Having lost the series in 11 days, it will be tempting to say that England just weren’t good enough, but a lack of ability isn’t an explanation in a team with such high potential. The batters have shown themselves to be technically good enough to get in, but not mentally strong enough to score game-changing runs.

Technically, Travis isn’t Head and shoulders above England’s leading lights, and his approach is comparable. But Head has a mental game that allowed him to make the difference in two out of three Tests, while Brook keeps getting out in the 30s. Darren Lehman, the man who coached Australia to a 5-0 whitewash of England in 2013/14, commented that Brook has all the technique but needs to develop the mental strength to bat for 6 hours. With the possible exceptions of Root and Ben Stokes, that applies to the whole team.

So then what now for Bazball? It shouldn’t be thrown out wholesale, and it seems unlikely that it will be, but a reckoning is needed.

The ultimate measure of a top Test side is how they fare home and away against the other big teams. This means India and Australia. Conveniently, England have played five-match series home and away against both sides in the Bazball era. In both cases, they’ve drawn at home and lost convincingly away. The net score against India is an unflattering 6-3, and Australia are 5-2 up with two to play.

“Playing like Baz is not to be unconditionally attacking, but to always play with the intent to attack.”

My simple contention is that to beat the top teams, England’s aggression must be more intentional. Bazball is modelled on head coach Brendon ‘Baz’ McCullum, a cricketer who always sought to be attacking, but was rarely naïve. Playing like Baz is not to be unconditionally attacking, but to always play with the intent to attack.

When England push the bowlers onto the back foot as a deliberate tactic, they create pressure-fuelled chaos that unlocks new possibilities. When they do so reactively, when it becomes one-dimensional, what pressure are the bowlers really under?

If England can develop the capacity to bat for a whole day, but always look to move through the gears, they can reframe Bazball as a deliberate strategy of playing with intent but doing so properly. This team can show flashes of brilliance and potential, but to compete against the best in the world, they must sustain it.

The question is then, are we just back to square one? Perhaps. Maybe playing with intent where possible and having the resolve to bat long when necessary is how Test cricket has always been played. But what we have learned from two Ashes series and ten Tests against India is that a one-dimensional approach doesn’t win a five-match series.

This England side, under the current leadership, has consistently shown the potential to be a far more successful team than it is. But just as they shouldn’t throw out everything that Bazball stands for after this disappointing series, they can’t also continue to neglect the long-studied art of Test cricket’s mentality.