Brendon McCullum has once again pushed the envelope on how international teams prepare and communicate — this time by using walkie-talkies to relay messages from the dressing room to players on the field during England’s T20 World Cup 2026 campaign. The tactic grabbed headlines because it feels novel in cricket, but England captain Jos Buttler says it has been a useful, controlled way to maintain “top-to-bottom” communication and keep the group aligned in high-pressure moments.
“I think so, there’s (been) walkie-talkies for a while to be fair. But then the communication from top to bottom has always been really good in the group,” Jos Buttler told reporters. “Baz can sit with his feet up and his sunglasses on and look very relaxed, but he’s as sharp a coach as I’ve ever worked with. He doesn’t miss a beat.”
Walkie-talkies are unusual in cricket, but they’re permitted provided messages are encrypted, which prevents coaching from becoming an unfair advantage. Traditionally, coaches relay advice during drinks breaks, use substitutes to pass messages, or stand on the boundary to cue the captain. McCullum’s approach is a step toward real-time involvement from the coaching box — a model common in many other sports, and one Buttler believes cricket is slowly adopting.
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“I think also for cricket in general, actually, coaches are getting more involved in real-time in cricket… I’ve played in the IPL, at Gujarat (Titans), Ashish Nehra is very active on the boundary rope. But it seems like cricket is a kind of sport where we are still a bit behind, maybe in that area where you look at other sports, the managers and coaches, and you think of rugby, running messages. So, maybe that will come more and more into cricket,” Jos Buttler added.
This isn’t McCullum’s first experiment with creative signals. During his Kolkata Knight Riders tenure, he famously used coded letters from the pavilion balcony to communicate with then-captain Eoin Morgan — a reminder that innovation in messaging isn’t new, only its tools are.
On the field, England have found ways to grind out results. They survived a nervy win over Nepal — a match deeper than they would have liked — but Buttler sees value in those tests.
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“In the T20 World Cups, (or) T20 cricket, generally the game is so close, one or two players can win games for their side on the day. Ultimately, we found a way to win, which is the most important thing,” he said. “Learning how to manage those emotions… If you can hold your nerve and manage to still execute skills, knowing the consequences are different, that’s probably good learning.”
Whether walkie-talkies become commonplace or remain a talking point, McCullum’s experiment underlines a broader shift: cricket coaching is evolving, and teams that manage in-game communication best may gain a decisive edge in tightly contested T20 cricket.
