Ashes 2025-26: ‘Australia isn’t a place for weak men’ – Stokes demands response ahead of Adelaide Test

England showed flashes of promise but once again struggled to sustain pressure when the contest tightened in the second Test in Brisbane. The defeat also pushed them down to seventh in the ICC World Test Championship 2025-27 standings. Since their fifth Test win in the 2010-11 Ashes series, England have now gone 17 consecutive Tests in Australia without a victory, losing 15 and drawing two.

While Australia celebrated another clinical performance, England captain Ben Stokes cut a frustrated figure as he reflected on yet another match in which his side faltered during decisive moments, allowing Australia to seize control whenever the pressure mounted.

“Very disappointing. A lot of it comes down to not being able to stand up to the pressure of this game, this format, when the game is on the line. In small passages, we’ve been able to bring the game back into some kind of control and then we’ve let us slip away,” said Stokes in the post-match presentation.

“We’ve done that again here this week, and it’s very, very disappointing, in particular, because of the ability of the players that we have in that dressing room. We need to think a bit harder and deeper about those moments and what we’re taking mentally into those, and overall show a bit more fight when it’s needed,” he added.

Despite Joe Root’s heroic unbeaten 138 in the first innings, which carried England to 334, Australia still carved out a formidable 177-run lead, with five of their batters registering fifty-plus scores. England’s bowlers had no answers to the hosts’ dominance, as Ben Stokes (3-113), Gus Atkinson (1-114), and Brydon Carse (4-152) all endured expensive spells.

“We sit there and watch what’s going on in front of us, what Australia are looking to throw at us, and what plans they’re trying to ball to. And then it’s up to us as players to be able to go out there with a plan and how to negate the threat. To me, it just seems to be a constant theme at the moment, that when you know the game is in a pressure moment, Australia keep outdoing us in those moments,” said Stokes.

“They say Australia isn’t a place for weak men. We’re definitely not weak, but we need to find something, because we’re two-nil down now, we’ve got three more games to go, and we need to sort it out,” he added.

Another crucial factor in England’s defeat was the five dropped catches in the first innings, with Jamie Smith, Ben Duckett, Brydon Carse, and Root all missing opportunities to apply pressure on the hosts.

“You can’t drop catches. They always come back to buy you. And I think it definitely showed there. If we were able to hold on to our chances, we shouldn’t have been batting last night. No one means to do that kind of stuff. No means to drop catches. No one means to not bowl in an area where you set plans to but, yeah, those kinds of things just can’t happen at this level,” said Stokes in TNT Sport.

Stokes added that England’s struggles went beyond the pressure moments, admitting that both the bowlers and batters failed to consistently execute the plans needed on a Gabba surface that demanded patience and discipline.

“Not being able to execute skill is something that you can live with, because no one means to bowl away from the plan that we’re trying to do. We knew exactly how we needed to bowl on that wicket, and we weren’t able to do it for a long enough period to put the Australian batters under pressure. And that was evident in the way that Australia were able to score so quickly and so easily against us,” said Stokes.

“I think Jofra and Gus set the tone very nicely, actually, when we first took the ball, but then myself and Brydon sort of let the game get away from us quite quickly. Just not being able to execute what’s needed, not only with batting and also with the ball. We’ll be having some conversations that I’ll be keeping in the dressing room,” he added.

The England skipper stood out as the lone warrior during his side’s second-innings collapse, compiling a vital 50 to keep them faintly in the contest. Despite his efforts, Australia cruised to an eight-wicket victory, chasing down 65 inside ten overs. The third Ashes Test gets underway on Wednesday, 17 December, in Adelaide.