As Australia retained the Ashes2025-26, here is a look at their performance since 1999 under various captains/coaches.

In these 26 years they appointed six captains and six coaches.

Here is the order-

Steve Waugh, Ricky Ponting, Michael Clarke, Steve Smith, Tim Paine and Pat Cummins. In between there were 3 standby captains. In  2000 and 2004 Adam led them in  6 tests, in 2013 Shane Watson led them in 1, and in 2014 -15 S Smith led them in 4 tests.

Australia in same period had six full-time head coach. In 1999 John Buchanan took over from Geoff Marsh and became cricket’s most successful coach!.

He was followed by Tim Nielsen, Mickey Arthur, Darren Lehmann, Justin Langer and current coach Andrew McDonald

Partnerships 

• Table 1 : Below we look at Australia’s partnerships under various captains since 1999. In here i have measuring these in eras, for instance  in Steve Waugh’s captaincy era  Adam Gilchrist was appointed as stand-by captain. The same goes for other leadership eras. Interestingly under Ricky Ponting and Michael Clarke there were 2 other stand-by captains appointed. Hence performance produced under stand-by captains will be credited to those captains who were officially appointed by selectors. Hence i named it as leadership eras

– Table 2 : In below table we look at consistency in these partnerships under various captains. Althought 40+runs is not fair for tail-end batsmen and their partnerships, but for analysis purpose i have used 40+runs as benchmark for all wickets!.

And for calculation purpose i have totalled each wicket under various captains. For instance under Steve Waugh’s era Australia lost all 10 wkts in 58 inns out of 101 that they batted, hence all batsmen didnt bat in those 43 inns.

The result is quite remarkable when you look at various captains and how their tail wagged. The most amazing part is under Michael Clarke the tail-wagged the most, as we can see in the gfx below,  % 40+ is very high for 8th, 9th and 10th wkt!

Batting order

I am not a believer of batting order in any format, but firm believer in role-play. A role-play requires mental, technical and physical skills from a player. These are trained over a period of time. A cricketer might start his playing career as a bowler and end up as top order batsman, and vice versa, or fast bowler can eventually become a great spinner!. Hence there is no reason for one not to bat in certain position.

However teams and players are superstitious of their batting order, hence prefer to bat in particular position.

Under S Waugh and Ponting the top order performed exceptionally well, and interestingly under Clarke their lower order had most success.

Here is a brief stats of batting XI under various captains.

Table 2 – here is a consistency chart for each batting position. I have used 35+runs as benchmark for all position(seems unfair for tail). Its very clear under Ricky Ponting there is great deal of consistency