England v Bangladesh: Postscript - Where do we go from here? Lessons from recent history

 

England v Bangladesh: Postscript

Where do we go from here? Lessons from recent history

November 6^th 2016

Back in 1980, as an England side in turmoil faced the West Indies, with no one giving a squad that included players of the class of Boycott, Gooch, Gower, Botham, Willis and Willey any chance of avoiding defeat, Geoff Boycott suggested that one way of beating the West Indies might be to make them overconfident. Indian fans share with their Australian counterparts a feeling that the natural order of the world makes their team superior to others, particularly to their former colonial masters. Even before defeat in Bangladesh, Indian fans were convinced that this series would end up in a 5-0 victory: if they were confident beforehand, one shudders to think what they feel now. Maybe England’s most effective tactic is to make the Indians overconfident so that the edge is off their game? There is some evidence that that is just what happened in England’s last tour in 2012.

There are a lot of parallels with England’s last tour of India in 2012/13. England had just come off a dire performance against South Africa. They lost the series 2-0, with both defeats heavy ones. Andrew Strauss resigned at the end of the series. And the whole side was questioned. So confident were India in England’s inability to play spin that they played three specialist spinners in a four-man attack. Add to that the fact that after India made 521-8d in the 1^st Test, England had replied by staggering to 30-3 (sounds familiar?), ended up with 191 and followed-on a mere 330 behind at Tea on Day 3. India’s spinners took 9 of the 10 wickets.

You get a picture of an utter shambles of a side, clueless against the opposition bowlers. Ojha’s 5-45 sliced through the brittle England batting and the one Indian seamer (Zaheer Khan) was treated with exaggerated respect. Nick Compton made 9 and 37 on his debut. On the same pitch on which India’s three spinners had combined for 9-139, England’s three managed 7-265. It was pretty brutally one-sided. Even if, thanks to a good start second time around and a huge innings from the captain, England entered the last day at 340-5, 11 ahead and looking at an unlikely draw, with a side that batted right down to #10, a collapse on the final morning ended things mercifully quickly. If India were confident before the series, half way through the 1^st Test they must have been utterly convinced that the series would be a gentle stroll.

Of course, history records that England made a strategic change in the balance of the side for the 2^nd Test. In came Monty Panesar. England played just two seamers, one of whom (Stuart Broad) had a nightmare and won the 2^nd and 3^rd Tests by big margins. The 2^nd Test scorecard must be the most unusual England bowling figures for decades: a token 4 overs from Jimmy Anderson with the new ball in the 2^nd innings and then Monty and Graeme Swann bowled unchanged. By the end of the series it was Team India in deep crisis.

What was the difference? One was that the England attack was better balanced: Graeme Swann was relatively ineffective in the 1^st Test but, in the 2^nd Test he was paired with Monty Panesar who could, at times, be relatively expensive but, together, they formed a dangerous pairing. Far more important though was the way that the batsmen started to play positively and make scores that gave Swann and Monty something to defend. The effort was led by Cook, who made a century in each of the first three Tests, but Pietersen, Bell and Trott all made big centuries too, while Root, Prior, Compton and Swann all contributed 50s. Eight batsmen averaged over 30 for the series. England do not have a spin pairing of the class of Swann and Monty – who remembers that Samit Patel played in 3 of the 4 Tests, but bowled just 41 overs, almost all of them in the 1^st Test and took just a solitary wicket? – but you can make the most effective possible pairing of what you do have. For England that may well be the off-spin of Moeen Ali (a much better spinner than the critics would have us believe and coming nicely into form) combined with the slow left arm of Zafar Ansari, backed up by some steady overs of Gareth Batty.

England opened with the dour debutant, Nick Compton partnering Alistair Cook, producing partnerships of 26, 123, 66, 58*, 165, 4, 3 & 48. The explosive Kevin Pietersen played at #4. Maybe we should pair Cook and Hameed and move Duckett down the order? England have the squad that they have. This is no moment for panic and emergency call-ups: you show faith in the players who have been selected and hope that they repay that faith. What you can do is maximise how effectively you use your resources. That may be something like:

Cook, Hameed, Root, Duckett, Bairstow, Stokes, Moeen, Woakes, Ansari, Batty & Broad