Buttler's successor will need right support: Brendon McCullum

England's white-ball cricket has entered a transition phase following Jos Buttler's resignation as captain after the side's early exit from the ICC Champions Trophy 2025. While Buttler cited his disappointment with the team's performance, head coach Brendon McCullum gave his support to the outgoing captain, revealing the challenging circumstances he faced.

Buttler took over as England's white-ball captain after Eoin Morgan's retirement in 2022, leading the team to victory in the T20 World Cup later that year. However, the Three Lions struggled to replicate that success in subsequent ICC events. Their three consecutive losses, which ended their Champions Trophy 2025 campaign, were the final setbacks that led to Buttler's decision to step down. The former New Zealand captain mentioned that Buttler's struggles were due to the tough environment he had to lead in.

McCullum pointed out that Buttler often had to lead teams that were not at full strength due to England’s rotational policy. Players like Joe Root and Mark Wood were rested for several white-ball series, which kept the side away from their best squad for key assignments. McCullum said that the next captain must be given the necessary support to avoid similar difficulties.

"That's something Keysy [Rob Key] and myself and the ECB are trying to ensure, that we give every format the most amount of attention that we possibly can. It's a tricky balancing act at times. Looking back even on these most recent series, you'd argue that you could rest some players for some Test series and try and balance things out across formats. Give us a couple of weeks to work things out and digest what's unfolded here, work out what areas we've been short in and done okay in, work out the structure of how we want to do things moving forward. We've got a couple of months before our next assignment, so there is a bit of time to work that out," he said as quoted by ESPNcricinfo.

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Despite England’s poor run, McCullum believes Buttler has made a strong base for his successor, much like Root did before stepping down as Test captain. 

"I said to the boys tonight in the team room, sometimes it's not necessarily the time that you're in the post and the results that you get during that time. The impact you have in leadership positions can be felt after you left the post, and I'm sure that'll be the case. I think Joe Root was a classic example of that with the Test captaincy. He was able to at least hold the fort to a degree under incredibly trying circumstances, and then the uplift of performance when Stokesy [Ben Stokes] took over sort of followed from that, and hopefully it'll be the same across the white-ball teams whenever we decide on who that person is going to be," he added.

While Harry Brook is seen as the front-runner for the role, McCullum revealed that no decision has been made yet. He praised Buttler for nurturing young leaders within the team, which will help in the transition.

"There's some really good leaders that have developed. That's the mark of Jos's captaincy, he brought on other leaders within the group. They're not necessarily seasoned players, but they are young guys who have got good cricketing knowledge, and he's encouraged them to learn and develop as leaders. Whoever we settle on, we've just got to make sure we're giving them the right support so that we can improve our performances," McCullum concluded.