The Ashes | Joe Root blames bowlers for Adelaide loss, says they repeated same mistakes

England skipper Joe Root blamed bowlers for making the same mistakes in the second Ashes Test at Adelaide, which they had committed four years ago. Saying that his bowlers bowled pretty length and compromised on wickets by going for fewer runs, Root emphasised what actually went wrong for his team. 

“When we look at the ball in hand, I don't think we bowled the right lengths, we needed to bowl fuller. As soon as we did that in the second innings, we made it harder for them,” Root said in the post-match presentation.

“It’s disappointing because we made the same mistakes that we made four years ago. We could have bowled better and should have batted better,” he added. 

Talking about how he and the team can work on turning the tides around which look very difficult at the moment given that the English are already 0-2 down, Root said that they need to remain confident and take leaf out of Jos Buttler’s book who showed exactly what resistance means. 

“We have to be (confident) about turning things around. I’m confident that we have all that we need to win here. [We] Just need to stop repeating the same mistakes. We have to get through that first 20 minutes and then go greedy, need to leave better as well. Need to also manage certain passages of play better,” said the 30-year-old.  

The English captain, who is just short by 159 runs to become the highest run-scorer in Tests in a calendar year said that his team is certainly capable of turning things around they would have got a draw in this game itself, had they applied themselves more. 

"Yes, that's the attitude (Buttler's defiance) we needed to harness through the whole game. I feel we competed in patches, but we need to fight the whole game. That’s what is needed to win here. The attitude today was brilliant. We just need to do more of it. I expect us to have that mentality for the rest of the series,” he said. 

Root now has two innings in the Boxing Day Test to score the 159 runs and get past Mohammad Yusuf’s 1788 runs in a calendar year record. If he scores those runs, it is almost certain that England will remain alive in the series till at least the 4th Test.