The Ashes: Steve Smith in form but question marks for Joe Root and Ben Duckett

‘We'll have no excuses come Australia’, promised England head coach Brendon McCullum on Saturday after his side were whitewashed 3-0 in the recent ODI series in New Zealand.

Despite only managing scores of 223, 175 and 222 across the series, McCullum believes many of his batsmen will be ‘better for the run’, arguing that ‘when we come across trickier conditions in Australia and Test cricket, we have a pretty good understanding of how we're going to go about it.’

Only time will tell if McCullum is right, but there is little doubt that batters on both sides have form concerns heading into the biggest series of their careers, with neither line-up looking anything like bombproof.

So right now, who's hot, and who's not?

Duckett short of runs ahead of Ashes

We’ll start, then, with England, right at the top after Ben Duckett endured another miserable series, mustering only 11 runs in three matches to add to his poor returns in the ODI series against South Africa at the end of the English summer.

Prior to that, Duckett struggled badly in The Hundred, meaning his last half-century came against India in late July. There is nothing quite like scoring runs, and Duckett hasn’t done much of that for some time.

A brilliant hundred in the series opener has Harry Brook primed to go, and as can so often be the case, Ollie Pope became a better player when not in the team. Jacob Bethell did little to enhance his Ashes credentials over the last week or so and would be a brave bet to take that number three spot now.

This Ashes series has always loomed as a career-defining one for Joe Root, with a Test hundred on Australian soil still missing from the Yorkshireman's CV. I don’t buy too much into that, but he would’ve clearly liked more than scores of 2, 25 and 2 in New Zealand.

Root is such an outstanding performer that judging him too harshly on three ODIs is dangerous, but the manner in which he was dismissed, twice to inswingers, was concerning when Australia have already made no secret of the fact they view him as a prime LBW candidate.

When you add three failures in that New Zealand series for Jamie Smith into the mix, McCullum’s apparent confidence could well be a bluff.

As I’ve argued many times before, the biggest concern for this England batting unit is not when the going is good and the pitches flat, but when there is swing and seam movement on offer for world-class opponents to exploit.

In the end, what the Australian curators serve up could well decide England’s fate in the coming weeks.

Smith warms up with century

That’s not to say everything is rosy in the Australian camp. It is not.

We’ll start with the good, and the utterly predictable, as Steve Smith returned to the Sheffield Shield last week and stroked another century. It was typical Smith: slow start, looked vulnerable, before taking control and scoring at will. Just a reminder that Smith averages 56.01 in Ashes cricket.

Marnus Labuschagne’s form will be another worry for England, the Queenslander notching his fifth century of the season overnight as the Bulls routed New South Wales in the Marsh One Day Cup.

Labuschagne is a wonderful player, an outstanding technician who was always likely to recapture his best form. He’ll return to Australia's starting XI, presumably at number three, though don’t rule out as opener given how badly Sam Konstas has fared in recent weeks.

I kicked off my Ashes betting by advising Labuschagne for top Australia series runscorer at 9/1, taking the view that his excellent form would see him returned to the fold in good touch and full confidence. That’s almost certainly job done, and he’s a 6/1 at the time of writing – still a couple of points too big in my view.

Scores of 69, 46 and 87 in the last three rounds of Sheffield Shield cricket sets veteran Usman Khawaja up for tougher tests ahead, but with Konstas struggling, Labuschagne isn’t the only option to join the former at the top of the order.

Who's the Ashes bolter for Australia

Jake Weatherald has made three fifties in three Sheffield Shield matches this season, and has impressed chairman of selectors George Bailey with his method and returns. Kurtis Patterson, who scored a hundred in one of two Test matches way back in 2019, is another potential bolter.

Elsewhere, Beau Webster, who has made a bright start to his Test career, looks likely to be squeezed out of the all-rounder spot should the highly-rated Cameron Green complete his expected recovery from side soreness in time for Perth.

Another left-field pick would be to return to Mitchell Marsh who was dropped from the side last winter following a horror run against India, but has dominated in the white-ball formats since. His form is very good and with the series beginning at his home ground in Perth, he must surely enter the conversation.

For what it’s worth, I’d go back to Marsh, irrespective of Green’s fitness and where you choose to fit him into the top six. Marsh is an archetypical Western Australian: a brilliant player of pace bowling and an animal against the short ball.

His most recent Test comeback came at Headingley in the Ashes series of 2023, Marsh entering the fray with his side in big trouble after Mark Wood had blown away Australia’s top order with one of the fastest spells ever delivered by an England bowler. Within a couple of hours, Marsh had brought up a brutal, counter-attacking century with the match turned on its head.

Headingley is a quick pitch by English standards, and it showed Marsh in his best light. Moreover, England’s squad selection and long-term planning has centred around having a cartel of tall, fast bowlers who can hit Australia hard on bouncy pitches. Marsh could be the perfect antidote to that.

Having aggressive options in the middle order is a tactic both sides clearly favour, but it’s here where Australia might have more concerns if choosing not to return to Marsh.

Can Head recapture his best form?

Travis Head has been a match-winner for Australia across formats, but a high score of 31 in his last nine international appearances tells the story of a player who hasn’t been at his best for a while now.

He was poor in the IPL, albeit in a different format, and I do wonder if the gloss is beginning to wear off a player who always looked to have his limitations technically, but for a while had proved hard for opposition bowlers and captains to work out.

If England get their tactics right to Head, and can use high pace to get at the ageing Khawaja, they will rightfully feel this is a vulnerable top six, one perhaps overly reliant on Smith and Labuschagne.

But recent events will mean Australia might be smelling weakness in England’s own batting. What is surely true is that neither batting line-up inspires a great deal of confidence.

There might be ‘no excises’ come November 19, but there is certainly plenty to ponder for both camps before then. I guess that all adds to the intrigue.

Roll on Perth.