An apologetic Nathan Bracken says his comments about use of mints in English cricket to generate reverse swing were "tongue in cheek" and should not tarnish England's Ashes win.

The NSW pace bowler was accused of "sour grapes" by England's leading reverse swing exponent Simon Jones after stories written about Bracken's remarks in a radio interview.

But Bracken said they'd been taken "a bit out of context" and he had not been talking about England's Test bowlers. He also said he had never seen sweets used to enhance swing in first class cricket.

The left-armer's comments about English mints were made when discussing NSW bowlers having their sweets checked by the umpires before last week's ING Cup match against Queensland.

He told Sydney radio station 2KY on Wednesday that breath mints in England apparently made saliva sugary and that was the talk there.

"Every team has lollies and things like that, we (NSW) had all our lollies checked before the first game to make sure there was nothing illegal that we had," Bracken said.

"When I was playing at (English county) Gloucester a couple of years ago as soon as we needed the ball to go 'Irish' the captain would call and they would bring out some of these mints and it would work."

Media stories suggested Bracken's comments may have revealed a secret weapon - mint saliva - which could have helped England's bowlers bamboozle the Australians in the recent 2-1 Ashes series win.

When the story reached England, Jones bit.

"Are you telling me that they've not done it?" Jones said.

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