Ahead of the Ashes, England start as firm believers irrespective of the fact whether their opponents agree or not.
Bazball has made England believers ahead of the Ashes, whether Australia buy into it or not.
Is Bazball able to operate in Australia? The meaning of this word and its ramifications varies depending on who you ask and which end of the kaleidoscope you are looking down. It may signify more to the hosts who are angered by its existence than it does to the tourists who still hardly realise its existence, as last week’s insane headlines in the West Australian have already shown.
Do these kinds of semantics really matter? Given the uniquely absorbing nature of an Ashes trip and the possibility that off-field stories may ultimately fuel the on-field action, it’s probably more than you might imagine.
Bazball means a lot to them, and before you reach the core of their dislike, you’ll probably have to sift through a barrage of derogatory remarks. It symbolises “moral victories,” hubris, and becoming agitated over Spirit of Cricket discussions. As Brendon McCullum did following an agonising, agenda-swiping loss in the first Test of the 2023 Ashes, it entails becoming so high on your own supply that you can rally your troops around you and declare with a straight face that it “almost felt like a win.”
Essentially, it’s style over substance from an England squad that hasn’t defeated a “Big Three” opponent at home or away since 2018 and has lost 13 of its last 15 Test matches in Australia. The idea that the sport they created 20 years ago needs to be reinvented or even saved, as England’s evangelistic narrative has occasionally hinted, is obviously upsetting, especially to the Australian old guard.
The irony is that, in a sense, England has never embraced the Bazbollocks.
The term was first used on this website in May 2022 as a prediction rather than a response. At that point, McCullum was still weeks away from selecting his first Test team, let alone sharing any of the knowledge he had gained from his own incredible playing career.
As a result, Bazball initially had the same value as “X” in an algebraic equation when it first gained popularity during those intense early months of England’s Test comeback. It was an unknown quantity that awaited whatever interpretation Baz and his followers were ready to give it.
This is the backstory that supports the notion that England’s strategy for this Ashes campaign is faulty and pointless. A number of commentators, both domestically and internationally, have concurred with the narrative that was prevalent during the squad’s preparation at Lilac Hill: a week spent lolling by a bend in the Swan River, followed by a lone intra-squad beano on a pudding-like pitch, was no way to get ready for the biggest series of their lives. The local media hasn’t exactly changed their opinions despite spending more time on the golf course and taking boat trips to Rottnest Island.
Beneath all the fuss and outrage, however, Bazball still has a distinct and hard-nosed edge that will undoubtedly position this series as England’s most intriguing opportunity in Australia for the next fifteen painful and drawn-out years.
The loneliness, the anguish, the defeatism. It can all go hang. For the five survivors of this tour—Ben Stokes, Joe Root, Ollie Pope, Mark Wood, and Zak Crawley—just to enjoy the great outdoors this past week has been a step up from their preparations last time out, considering the foul conditions they were forced to endure in their Covid bio-bubbles. English cricket touched the void on that terrible 2021–22 campaign.
In the upcoming months, Stokes’ team may be expected to do much the same. If they can win this campaign, the errors and overreach of the previous several years—including, as they may eventually acknowledge, those crucial Test matches at Edgbaston and Lord’s in 2023—will be forgiven. The 40,000-strong Barmy Army, travelling with an optimism unseen in 15 years, will undoubtedly be available to chant it for them at the Optus to the tune of The Cranberries’ “Zombie,” regardless of if England calls it Bazball.