England batting coach Marcus Trescothick has defended his team’s limited build-up for the upcoming Ashes series, saying not playing multiple warm-up games against local sides was the “way of the modern game”.

The tourists have slowly arrived in Perth over the last week, with their full squad — including several players coming off a limited overs tour of New Zealand — assembled for a more-than two-hour training session at Lilac Hill in Perth’s eastern suburbs on Tuesday.

They will start a three-day game against their ‘A’ side the England Lions at the venue from Thursday but their build-up to the first Test of the series will not include a game against a WA side, as it did in both 2013 and 2017.

Legendary all-rounder Ian Botham has been among the English voices to express concern over the

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