England captain Joe Root was “absolutely gutted” after his side suffered a new low on Tuesday as they went down by an innings and 14 runs in the third Test against Australia in Melbourne and now trail 0-3 in The Ashes.
“I’m absolutely gutted,” Root told reporters at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.
“It is what it is. We have come to dealing with this sort of an environment for a while now. Credit to Australia, they blew us away last night, and they have outplayed us in this Test match, in fact the series so far.
“We have a lot of hard work to do now and come back strong in the last two games,” he added.
England suffered their 9th Test defeat in 2021 to equal Australia’s record for the most losses in the format in a calendar year.
Root meanwhile, has now lost 7 of the 8 Tests he has captained in Australia and also failed to wrest the urn back from their great rivals on home soil in 2019 when the series was drawn 2-2.
“We’re bitterly disappointed to find ourselves in this position. We need to put some pride back into the badge and we need to give people back home something to celebrate and look fondly back on from this tour.
“It’s bitterly disappointing to be 3-0 down but there are two Tests to go,” Root said.
Australia were bowled out for 267 on Monday as the home side grabbed a first-innings advantage of 82 runs. England could not even reach that figure to make Australia bat a second time.
The fourth Test is scheduled to begin on January 5 in Sydney, with the fifth from January 14 in Hobart.
