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Brendon McCullum detested the moniker Bazball from its inception, considering it reductive and perhaps anticipating how it could be weaponised in the future. Right now, trailing 2-0 in an away Ashes series that started with high hopes, it has become the butt of Australian jokes.

However McCullum has contributed to the problem either. After the crushing loss at the Gabba, his insistence that, if there was an issue, England were 'over-prepared' before the pink-ball match was like trying to put out a bin fire with petrol. It could become his epitaph as national coach if performances do not take an upturn.

In a way, one must admire his commitment to the bit. As much as he claims to ignore outside criticism, he will have been all too aware of an England team often described as freewheeling and underprepared.

The truth, as ever, is more nuanced. England play as much golf during their necessary down time as their rivals and they practice equally hard. Prior to the Gabba Test, they trained for longer, completing five days compared to Australia's three, due to their limited experience to the pink ball and the changes in seeing conditions.

The Question of Readiness and Practice

The coach's point about being "over-prepared" was that those additional training days were his call – the instance he blinked in his conviction that less is more. It meant a significant amount of focus was used up before they even took the field in the cauldron of Australia's fortress. While net practice are a chance to refine skills, they can also become a comfort zone; low-pressure work that mainly maintains the reactions quick.

Schedules are congested such that pre-series state games were unavailable (with no guarantee, as shown by England playing three before the whitewash in 2013-14). What is harder to square is the dismissal of county championship cricket as a worthwhile exercise more broadly, evidenced by Jacob Bethell's wasted summer.

Match Deficiencies and Philosophical Lack of Evolution

Match practice alone prepares cricketers for the many situations they encounter, and it is here where England have thus far fallen well short. The issue is not just with the bat – harrowing as some of the decision-making has been – but an bowling attack that seems leaderless. None has demonstrated the patience or discipline that the exceptional Australian paceman and his support cast have displayed.

The coach's unconventional outlook was freeing during its first 12 months, an excellent, apt remedy to shake off the lethargy that came before. The disappointment now comes in how it has apparently failed to move beyond that initial phase – an absence of an second phase to the original software that has seen results taper off to 14 wins and 14 losses from their last 30 Tests.

Squad Focus and Team Decisions

Among them is the wicketkeeper-batter, a gifted player, undoubtedly, but one who is being mercilessly targeted on each side of the bat and has dropped two crucial opportunities with the gloves. The situation is not aided when your opposite number, Alex Carey, has just delivered a virtuoso performance.

Going by the coach's words after the match, England appear set to keep the faith with Smith in Adelaide. The hope – similar to the broader situation – is that a switch to a traditional Test setting unleashes his top form, with Perth's bouncy pitch and the unfamiliar day-night format now out of the way.

Another option is to enact the plan stumbled across during the series win in New Zealand last year by moving Ollie Pope down to his more natural home as a busy No. 5 or 6, giving him the wicketkeeping duties, and picking a new No 3. Bethell scored runs for the Lions recently, or maybe an all-rounder could perform a similar role to Moeen Ali in 2023.

Ultimately, these changes is ideal, however Australia's better fundamentals having destroyed expectations and forced the team's entire approach into the harsh glare of scrutiny.