Source: Radio New Zealand
By Dean Bilton, ABC
Australia’s players celebrates with the Ashes trophy following their series win on day 5 of the fifth Ashes Test against England at the Sydney Cricket Ground, January 8, 2026 AAP / Photosport
Analysis: So 4-1 it is, a scoreline that does a proper job of reflecting Australia’s dominance in this Ashes series and spares no blushes in its appraisal of England.
Up for grabs in Sydney this week was control of the narrative. At 3-2, England would have been within its rights to claim a semblance of respect, and could have put the defeat down to a series of misfortunes, injustices and fine margins.
But 4-1 shuts the door on that. It puts this Australian team alongside its 2002/03 contemporary, which won convincingly by the same margin. 4-1 is a firm rebuttal of English rhetoric and a celebration of a number of Australian greats.
To England’s credit, it made Australia work for it here in Sydney. A run chase of 160 falls firmly in the category of ‘tricky’ and so it proved on day five, where the Aussie batters oozed a squirmy nervousness while the runs ticked down.
When Marnus Labuschagne was catastrophically run out with about 40-odd still needed, perhaps the English were within their rights to feel moderately hopeful. There is rarely a run chase choked away that doesn’t include a comedy run-out, so the Australian concern was not entirely misplaced.
Alex Carey was a fitting man to hit the winning runs, the personification of Australia’s professionalism and attention to detail throughout this series. With a blaze through the covers he finally put an end to any mystery surrounding the series.
Australia’s Cameron Green and teammate Alex Carey celebrate after hitting the winning runs on day five of the fifth Ashes Test. David Gray
For all that has come before and throughout, all that remains now is Australia four, England one.
So, what do we take from this series then? What will ping in the memory when the summer of 2025/26 is mentioned a decade from now? Who are the players and what are the moments that will survive the content dump and hold its own spot in Ashes history?
As good as player of the series Mitchell Starc was throughout – his performances in the first two games with everything still on the line were spectacular – it felt most tangibly like Travis Head’s summer.
It was the series in which he grew out of his cult hero status and fully became Australia’s best and most important batter. That he did it as an impromptu opener just adds to the legend.
One of the great sliding doors moments of the series was that Usman Khawaja back spasm on day two in Perth. Without it, he opens the batting in that second innings and Head’s masterful, paradigm-shifting knock never happens.
The entire series looks different without Head opening the batting for Australia. His runs in Perth, Adelaide and Sydney were match-winning, and his was the best of Australia’s resistance in Melbourne.
Head has not significantly changed his game for the role, but perhaps Test cricket has steadily bent itself into his preferred shape.
The tactical shift in Test batting most evident in this series was the move to make aggression a new form of pragmatism, and that suits Head down to the ground.
If the pitch has any demons at all, or the game state carries with it any sort of pressure or tension, the default is to counter-attack, come what may.
An agreement has been signed by all batters that seemingly allows them to do so fully free of responsibility or consequence, though word of that treaty has been slow in trickling out to the bemused public, who still confuses “putting pressure back on the bowler” for “throwing your wicket away recklessly”.
Such a philosophy has been at the heart of English cricket since the McCullum-Stokes joint was formed, but no player in this series mastered it as well as Head.
That is because Head batted with aggression and flair, sure, but also with a certain calculation, a knowledge of his own game and a total understanding of the conditions he was playing in. None of the English batters could say the same.
Contrasting captaincy styles
This series has also been an interesting survey in the role of leadership within a Test cricket team.
Australia has had to be fluid, losing regular captain Pat Cummins shortly before the first Test, getting him back for one game in the middle of the series that the stand-in captain then happened to miss, only to switch immediately back.
Injury also meant Australia had to dig deep into its bowling stocks, but still found success because each bowler operated to clear plans for each English batter and knew their individual roles in the side intimately.
It didn’t need a figurehead as such, as each player took ownership and accountability for his own job.
England by contrast, and the cult of personality it has fostered under Brendon McCullum and Ben Stokes, lacked such purpose in times of stability and flexibility when changes were forced.
The captain and coach have built a team in their own image, brash and full-throttled but one-dimensional. Stokes has always been a leader by example, rather than a considered tactician, but at crucial junctures in the series his words and actions appeared to muddy the waters.
England’s Ben Stokes leaves the field with a strain on day four of the fifth Ashes cricket Test against Australia in Sydney, January 7, 2026. AFP
His defensive rearguard in Brisbane earned praise but must have confused the top-order players who had been dismissed batting in the exact opposite manner, the manner publicised to all and sundry for four years as “the way we play”.
After that game he insinuated some members of the squad were weak – “Australia is no country for weak men,” he said – an insinuation that must have stung Gus Atkinson and Ollie Pope when they were dropped before the third and fourth Tests.
Stokes also lost favour when he called critical former English players “has-beens” before the series, and McCullum raised eyebrows by suggesting that the team was “over-prepared” after two poor defeats in the opening matches.
England’s issues on this tour began at the very top, but all current indications suggest the repercussions will be felt further down. It remains to be seen if anybody involved with the English set-up has learned very much from this defeat at all.
Big differences in fielding prowess
Any other business? Snicko is not fit for purpose and requires swift ejecting into the sun. Fielding was a massive separator of the two sides. Alex Carey can be credited for making wicketkeeping cool again. Next summer’s MCG pitch is going to be made out of reinforced concrete.
It has been a silly old series in truth, but enjoyable nonetheless. Two flawed teams offered up entertainment in spades with the occasional moments of transcendent quality.
As ever, the cricket’s greatest gift has been its role as connective tissue through an Australian summer, a shared point of reference for a nation in what has been a difficult and fractured period.
The Ashes and Test cricket still mean plenty, and long may that continue. We certainly need it.
– ABC
– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand