The message of support from an old ally arrived in the days that appeared to be shaping up as Brendon McCullum’s last as England’s head coach.
‘I could empathise with him,’ Matthew Mott, who took on the white-ball coaching role alongside Test boss McCullum four years ago this week but lasted only two, tells Daily Mail Sport.
‘I just checked in to see how he was going. He’s a pretty resilient character, pretty philosophical, but, you know, he’s human as well and when you’re getting that sort of media attention for a long period of time, it can wear you down.’
A post-Ashes review was widely anticipated to coincide with McCullum’s tenure coming to an end. Instead, he has been tasked with refining the style which contributed to England slumping to a 4-1 defeat Down Under, and wresting the urn back next summer.
‘Going to Australia is never easy,’ Mott adds. ‘Not many teams have come away with success there. So, they’ll rebuild and it will suit his type of character.
‘It will affect him, and he wouldn’t be human if it didn’t, but this will galvanise him as a person and a leader. We will see a bit more balance between the freedom that they’re seeking and that little bit of mongrel that they were probably looking for in Australia.’
Matthew Mott led England to T20 World Cup glory in 2022 but was sacked two years later
Jos Buttler leads the celebrations after England win the T20 World Cup in Melbourne
Mott’s relationship with McCullum goes back to 2008-09, when he was assistant coach at the Indian Premier League franchise Kolkata Knight Riders, a period in which he says the New Zealander, who took over as captain from Sourav Ganguly, ‘continually fronted up, and took the hits for the boys’.
It has been a policy recognisable this week in McCullum’s domination of the airwaves ahead of England’s first Test action for 145 days.
The pair were identified by a panel including men’s director of cricket Rob Key, special adviser Andrew Strauss and then performance director Mo Bobat as the two unanimous choices to revitalise England’s performances in 2022.
Australian Mott committed to relocating to the UK upon his appointment but was dismissed due to England’s white-ball inconsistencies midway through 2024. But he continues to call Cardiff, where his family put down roots, home – although he spent 220 days out of the country last year due to various overseas franchise commitments.
Mott now has year-round work – as head coach of Sydney Sixers’ women and assistant to the men, and replicating that with Manchester Super Giants’ women and Lancashire’s men’s Twenty20 Blast team.
Mott’s time with England was hardly an abject failure either – they won a Twenty20 World Cup in Australia in 2022 and reached the last-four in their defence of the trophy in the Caribbean 18 months later. However, they flunked badly in between. They headed to India as reigning champions but won only three of nine 2023 World Cup matches. Bilateral series results, not helped by centrally-contracted players being rested and the next-best picks honouring franchise deals, were also on the wane.
And so when England returned from semi-final defeat by India in Guyana two Julys ago, only one of Mott and then captain Jos Buttler would be left standing. But there is not the slightest animosity towards Buttler, with whom he is now reunited at Old Trafford.
‘Look, if I’m being completely honest, I actually thought making the semi-final, and losing to India (in 2024), who obviously went on to be champions, wasn’t a pass mark, but it wasn’t a complete failure either,’ says Mott. ‘Post-tournament, there was a bit of silence for a while and that’s always a worry. And whenever the chairman comes out and says you’ve got the full support, you’re normally not too far away.’
Mott and Buttler now work together at Lancashire after their time together with England
England won just three of nine matches at the 2023 World Cup in India
Some of England’s problems were of their own making, like asking South Africa to bat first in scorching Mumbai heat
England won 23 of 44 T20s under Mott and 16 of 34 completed ODIs. But it was the 2023 World Cup in India, which began just nine days after a hectic home summer finished with a series against Ireland, leaving players fatigued from the start, that sticks in the craw.
‘Without a doubt, the toughest period in my coaching career was when we were in India. We were out of that World Cup halfway through, but we had to keep fronting up,’ Mott recalls. ‘Everyone’s got an opinion and they’re quite within their rights to have one, but it just felt like a bit of groundhog day. Here we go again, dust ourselves down and keep going.
‘Then there was talk that if we didn’t finish eighth, we wouldn’t qualify for the Champions Trophy. In many ways, I feel like that was when I’d probably lost my job. It was a poor performance, and there’s no hiding from that. No excuses, but there was a lot of factors going into it.’
Some of England’s problems were of their own making, like asking South Africa to bat first in scorching Mumbai heat.
‘I do love that because a lot of the pundits don’t say that stuff before the game starts. And it’s quite obvious when the game’s going on and blokes are going down with injuries,’ Mott adds. ‘But in that particular game, Reece Topley was on fire early and he bust his finger and had to go off, in what was a significant momentum shift.
‘That tournament, Marnus Labuschagne only knew he was playing in the final at 10pm the night before, so when he sees Australia to victory from three wickets down early on, people were saying, “Oh, that was genius” or whatever. When you lose, it’s like, “Oh, they were scatterbrain, they didn’t know what they were doing”.
‘I’ve been around the coaching game long enough to know you make a lot of mistakes that get papered over when you win, and get examined quite closely when you lose. Even the World Cup we won in Australia, we lost against Ireland and it was the end of the world at that point. That’s the nature of the game. Take the rough with the smooth. I have absolutely no regrets.’
‘Take the rough with the smooth. I have absolutely no regrets,’ says Mott of his England tenure
Having spent two spells as an international head coach – he won four Ashes and oversaw 26 consecutive ODI wins with Australia’s women before taking the England job – there is no desire for a third any time soon.
His wife and two children love life in Cardiff and Mott himself is enjoying the variety of his current consultancy gigs, particularly getting back to the ‘nuts and bolts’ coaching under Steven Croft with Lancashire.
‘When you’ve gone through the kind of intensity of a couple years I had with England, you do realise how important family is, being home and being present, and I’ve enjoyed that part of it. So, it’s not never, but there’s no great rush.’
