England captain Joe Root has apologised for the drinking session shared between players from England and Australia following the Ashes series.
England travelled Down Under hoping to avoid an embarrassment but it wasn’t to be, with Australia retaining the urn in style as the hosts claimed a 4-0 series win.
However, the troubled tour spread and engulfed the squad both on and off the pitch, as footage emerged of a number of players having their session ended prematurely by police.
Root, Jimmy Anderson, Nathan Lyon, Alex Carey and Travis Head gathered around a table alongside an unidentified woman. Carey and Lyon were both still in their cricket whites, while Root wore a signed Lyon match shirt draped around his neck.
Root has since apologised for his actions and claimed there was nothing to celebrate, insisting it was merely a time to respect the opposition.
“Clearly it doesn’t look very good,” the 31-year-old told Sky Sports. “We were very respectful. We wanted to catch up with the opposition and talk through things. I was having a good, deep conversation with Nathan Lyon - someone I’ve known for a very long time and played a lot of cricket both with and against - and we wanted to talk through the series.
“We might have overstepped the mark slightly, I apologise if that was the case, but in no way did we mean any offence or want to show cricket in a bad light. It’s absolutely not what that was about. It was about learning from your opposition.
“For us, it wasn’t celebrating because it wasn’t a very successful tour personally but enjoying the company of the opposition having fought hard against each other for a long period of time.”
Root admitted he is ‘very grateful’ to still be England Test captain after the heavy defeat in Australia.
Head coach Chris Silverwood, director of cricket Ashley Giles and assistant coach Graham Thorpe all left their roles after the emphatic loss this winter.
Root kept his job and will lead England in a three-Test tour of the West Indies next month as his team look to become only the second England side since 1968 to win a Test series in the Caribbean.
The first Test in Antigua starts on 8 March.
