BETFAIR and The Overlap proudly present “Stick to Cricket,” a captivating new show featuring renowned England cricket legends Michael Vaughan, Sir Alastair Cook, David ‘Bumble’ Lloyd, and Phil ‘Tuffers’ Tufnell.

The weekly show offers insights and discussions, with special guests joining the cricket icons to delve into the sport’s hottest topics.

In this episode, the team dissects the final Test of the five-match series at the Oval and looks ahead to what this means for England in the 2025 Ashes series in Australia…

Michael Vaughan: Harry Brook should be captain if Stokes is not playing, Ollie Pope is not a natural leader

I think Ollie Pope is a brilliant Vice Captain, but he is not a Captain and by giving him the captaincy I can see it a mile off he is not a natural leader in the middle. We saw it last year against Sri Lanka and I have seen it again this week.

Say you get to Perth and Ben Stokes – the shoulder, the body’s in bits, anything could happen with Ben. Fingers crossed he’s fine. Just say we get to Perth and Ben can’t play; I can’t have Ollie Pope walking out as skipper. But I can have Harry Brook because I see a natural leader.

If they’d gone to Ollie Pope to say, ‘you’re continuing as vice-captain’, I bet he would have been delighted.

Alastair Cook: I can’t have Ollie Pope walking out for the first test in the Ashes as skipper if Stokes is injured

If they’d have changed it at the beginning of that fifth Test match, I think it just throws everything – why’s Ollie Pope not doing it?

It would add so much story to it; do they not think Ollie Pope’s captain? Is his place under threat?

I agree that I don’t think that he should be captain in Perth – Harry Brook’s done a really good job with the one-dayers. But I think, just on a purely man-management thing, when Stokes went down, we can’t swap it now.

Alastair Cook: We need to be brave with Gus Atkinson and keep him fresh during the Ashes series

I think we know what the top seven for England is going to be, the bowlers – I think we know those bowlers are going to go, it is just how they’re going to rotate Archer, Wood, Atkison, whoever to fit each game.

They’ve got to be really bold, I looked at Gus Atkinson in that game. He was back to bowling 87mph, how effective he looked. If he has one really good game in Australia, you say right ‘don’t back him up’, we’ll swap someone else in.

We have got to be brave as him bowling at 83mph, he’s not the same bowler. At the end of last summer, he was down at 83mph, because he had played every game. I think they have got to be really brave.

Michael Vaughan: I felt sorry for Jacob Bethell – I thought it was diabolical to pick him in this situation in the fifth test

I felt sorry for him – he’s 21-years-of-age, I don’t care who you are; when Cooky was 21 you’d have got probably four or five first-class hundreds by then. You’d probably got your first Test hundred by then, but you played a lot of cricket.

When you get called into the England side, I know you got called into Nagpur and went out there straight away and did well; but you’d played a lot of cricket, so in your body, in your mind, you knew how to bat, and you knew your game.

Jacob Bethell this summer has faced 67 balls in red-ball cricket, he’s scored 32 runs.

I know you have to have players there for concussion nowadays, so you need a spare batter at the ground in case someone gets hit on the head.

But surely, if you’re trying to develop a young cricketer, you’ve got to give him time to go and play cricket; so if it does come that he has to play, at least he’s had a bit of game time.

To throw a kid, who’s 21, out at the Oval in front of 27,000 when the series is on the line on a pitch which is doing plenty, against Siraj – I thought it was diabolical.

I thought that it was unfair on the player. If you go back a year ago, against Sri Lanka at The Oval, they picked Josh Hull from nowhere – they just threw him out of County Cricket, Leicestershire to play for England.

The week before, Matt Potts had bowled great against Sri Lanka at Lord’s, and didn’t play at The Oval. So, they do get some tactical things wrong this England team.

I’d have gone for Rehan Ahmed, who’s in great form for Leicestershire, or you could have easily played Liam Dawson.

Liam Dawson has got eighteen first-class centuries, and Jamie Smith could have batted six. So, you had two options there, but you throw a kid in who just doesn’t play cricket – I think it was unreasonable to expect a player to perform under that pressure with no cricket.

David Lloyd: Jacob Bethell has been a victim of the England Test system

He’s a victim of the system, the lad, he’s just been carted around the lad, carrying drinks and so on. He should be playing at 21.

Phil Tufnell: The atmosphere panicked England on the final day of the Test

What game can you turn up to on a Monday morning, for 40 minutes, full-house and it delivers like that. I don’t think there’s another game in the world that can deliver like that.

It’s an amazing game, our game. We’re commentating on it and people just walk off when they want. We’re all going, what’s going on?

The atmosphere panicked England.

Michael Vaughan: We are a dinosaur game having no subs in test cricket – It cost England the series

We’re a dinosaur game when we see people break a foot, dislocate their shoulder and you can’t have a substitute.

It devalues the product for the next few days. That’s what it’s done, it’s cost England the series, because England got to within six runs of beating India with ten players. So, you could argue that it cost England the series.

Alastair Cook: Joe Root does not need to get a 100 down under to be considered England’s greatest ever batsman – He already is

I don’t think he does need that ton because he is England’s greatest batsman. He’s already there, but it would help and be nice.

It would also stop everyone talking about it.

Alastair Cook: I have no worries over Jamie Smith’s performances for the Ashes, he is learning how to play test cricket

I have no issue with Jamie Smith – that is just him learning Test cricket. A five-test series. He’ll be aware of it, how he prepares.

He doesn’t keep, that’s the first time he will have kept for five Test matches, he doesn’t keep much for Surrey.

David Lloyd: Dan Lawrence needs looking at for the Ashes

Can I just throw a name out – I’ve seen a bit of cricket this last week. And Dan Lawrence played beautifully up at Durham – he was number six and bowled some tidy off-spin.

He looked, in that particular game at Durham, against a decent attack with Matt Potts leading the attack. He looked a cut above this lad, and he was England’s spare batter.

David Lloyd: Rehan Ahmed and Haseeb Hameed would be in my team for the Ashes

Rehan Ahmed is in my team, in the top seven. I would also have Hameed at three. I think Hameed’s a really good player, there’s so many times that we’ve played three openers in the top three, I don’t think that’s a problem.

I think Hameed’s got enough ‘up here’ to bat in the top three. He’s expanded his game.

Stick to Cricket panel pick their 1-11 team of the England v India Test series

1. KL Rahul
2. Ben Duckett
3. Shubman Gill
4. Joe Root
5. Harry Brook
6. Ben Stokes
7. Rishabh Pant
8. Washington Sundar
9. Gus Atkinson
10. Jasprit Bumrah
11. Mohammed Siraj