Why is England’s batting lineup failing? It’s easy – Zak Crawley, Ben Duckett and Ollie Pope all have this similar downside, and it is sinking their Ashes hopes, writes RICHARD GIBSON

England’s policy of selecting top-order batsmen intent on being around for a good time not a long time suggests they will have to produce the kind of performances not seen before on Australian soil if they are to pull off a historic Ashes heist.

While crease occupation has been at the heart of successful touring Test teams Down Under, an obsession with strike rate has seen a top three with the least staying power of any England team in memory asked to set a platform for a victory in Adelaide that would keep the series alive beyond Christmas.

According to the history books, the only way to beat Australia in their own backyard is to bat big. To grind out runs hour after hour.

Indeed, even in a 21st century of faster scoring, only one of Australia’s 15 most recent home defeats – a low-scoring thriller against New Zealand on a green seamer in Hobart 14 years ago – did not feature the opposition batting for at least 100 overs in an innings.

Success has come from tiring out the Aussie bowling attack via the demands of sending down multiple spells, not dizzying them with a session of swashbuckling stroke play.

Yet in Ben Duckett, Zak Crawley and Ollie Pope, England possess a top three that play their shots until that inevitable delivery embossed with their name arrives.

Ben Duckett and Zak Crawley are here for a good time, not necessarily a long time

Ollie Pope only lasts marginally longer when he follows the openers to the crease

The fact they score quickly has masked some of their deficiencies. For example, Duckett, with an average of 41.35 at close to a run a ball, is naturally viewed as the most successful of the trio, but is statistically the worst culprit, lasting an average of 46 balls per Test innings. Crawley’s mark is 47 while Pope sits at 52.

Sir Alastair Cook and Andrew Strauss, England’s most recent world-class opening pair, averaged 91 and 81 balls per innings respectively. More recent models like Dom Sibley, Haseeb Hameed and Rory Burns managed 78, 72 and 69. Even Alex Hales, an attack-minded pre-Bazballer who was the first player dropped by this regime, faced 10 more balls per innings with 62.

Thankfully, conditions will get easier from here following the pace of Perth and the capricious nature of Test match batting under floodlights in Brisbane, but Ben Stokes’ team will have to overcome their vulnerability against the new ball at a juncture when his opposite number Pat Cummins’ return increases the threat.

Duckett is renowned for not leaving deliveries, a policy that has served him handsomely on the flat surfaces produced for home Tests in recent years but fraught with danger in Australia where the bounce is much steeper, keeping wicketkeeper and slips interested for longer. He began this series in composed fashion in Perth, but failed to get out of the 20s.

Meanwhile, Crawley’s scores of 76 and 44 in the pink-ball Test have done little to dispel the theory that he is a bowling-machine batsman: able to access the boundary by lunging onto the front foot when the pitch is flat or the ball’s lateral movement is limited, but likely to offer chances when one of those variables changes.

Pope has a slightly better defence but does not trust it over lengthy stays at the crease, which is perhaps why he retains the frenetic image even when he is ‘in’. This is rare in itself in Ashes cricket – he averages 18.71 against Australia.

Of course, as the figureheads of a more aggressive style of Test cricket, it would be wrong for them to play differently now. They are part of a culture in which young players of promise have been told by managing director Rob Key to play more shots. Fulfilling roles to fit their strengths, in the face of numerical evidence that says they are incapable of playing the longer game.

But they have to be smarter within the confines of their limitations. Bazball, it is repeatedly said, is based upon absorbing pressure as well as putting it onto opponents. In Australia, this is done by increasing the length of time opponents are subjected to the limb-wearying and mind-tiring heat.

Pope has a slightly better defence but does not trust it over lengthy stays at the crease, which is perhaps why he retains a frenetic image even when he is ‘in’

Sir Alastair Cook ground Australia into the dirt in 2010-11, facing 1,438 balls across the series and hitting 766 runs

Cook was able to take this to extremes in England’s 3-1 win in 2010-11, facing 1,438 balls for his 766 runs across seven innings. During that series, Jonathan Trott faced 883 deliveries. Stokes cast doubt a couple of years ago as to whether either would merit a place in his side.

Others have thrived in Australia employing similar levels of resilience. During India’s 2-1 win in 2018-19, India’s No 3 Cheteshwar Pujara repelled more than twice as many deliveries (1,258) than any of the home batters, finishing with a tally of 521 runs including three hundreds. Virat Kohli matched his strike rate of 41, in an example of reduction of risk meeting rich reward.

Greats like Sachin Tendulkar and Brian Lara each struck double hundreds in Australia after modifying their games. Tendulkar’s unbeaten 241 in Sydney in 2004 came without the help of his signature cover drive because the stroke had caused him issues previously in the series, while Lara’s 277 on the same ground 11 years earlier saw him prefer to pierce gaps in the infield rather than the aerial route, reducing the probability of a wicket.

England do not play the percentages, though. Their disregard for the evidence of the past has empowered multiple record-breaking Test wins in three-and-a-half years of Stokes’ partnership with head coach Brendon McCullum.

How they need another of those good times this week. Otherwise, the fortnight that follows will feel like an awfully long time.