Melbourne, Dec 23 (IANS) Rob Key, England cricket team’s managing director, has conceded that England’s current setup has fallen short when it has mattered most, pointing out that they have not won any of their last four five-Test series against Australia or India.

Australia have retained the Ashes with a dominant 82-run victory over England in the third Test in Adelaide on Sunday. With the Ashes already out of reach, England now face the task of limiting the damage, beginning with the Boxing Day Test at the MCG.

“Clearly, we’ve mucked up on the big occasions. Whether that was the home Ashes series or whether that was last summer against India, where we should have won the series, the big ones have eluded us,” Key told reporters at the MCG on Tuesday.

“The truth is we haven’t done that well enough for a while. There’s been some brilliant moments along the way and I still feel like there’s plenty of life in this whole thing, but we have to evolve. We have to make sure that we’re doing things better. You don’t mind losing, the regret is that you’ve not played anything like your best.

“That’s my view on it but, as you know, these things are taken out of people’s hands a lot of the time. The decision really for the ECB will be whether or not they want to rip it up and start again, or whether they want to evolve and whether we’re the right people to do that,” he said.

After England lost 4-0 four years ago, this has been the first away series loss of the Bazball era following the appointments of Brendon McCullum as head coach and Ben Stokes as captain in 2022.

Despite the scrutiny, Key continues to back McCullum, whom he appointed as Test coach in 2022 before broadening his remit to all formats at the start of this year.

McCullum has already indicated that he wants to continue in the role, and Key remains convinced he is the right man for the job.

“Brendon has been a bloody good coach and is a bloody good coach. We’re at this point where you can have dressing rooms that fracture and they lose faith in the people around, but I don’t think that’s the case.

“We’ve had three games here where they’re adapting slowly, and I don’t think personally that’s because we need a fresh voice or they’re not listening. Sometimes the opposition is just bloody good,” he said.

–IANS

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