Sri Lanka v England
1st
Test Preview: Of Mice and Men
November 3rd 2018
Finished the silly season element of England’s first post-Alistair Cook
engagement, we move on to the serious stuff of the Tests, on which memories of
the tour will be based and a judgement on its success of failure, made. For Sri
Lanka too, this will be a series that marks the end of an age, as Rangana Herath
retires after the 1st Test.
Probably it is a more critical moment for England, as Cook has been
omnipresent for more than a decade: the only Test that his missed in his entire
career was the 3rd Test of his debut series, when a stomach upset
caused him to miss England’s extraordinary win at Mumbai. Herath, in contrast, who
tormented England last time they toured, has withdrawn progressively from the
Sri Lankan side, increasingly reluctant even to play a Three-Test series over
the last two years, meaning that his replacement has been integrated into the team
in that time. In contrast, England really are in uncharted territory. Keaton
Jennings, who, in the eyes of many fans is lucky even to be in the squad, goes
into the series as senior opener, but with his place seriously in doubt. To
accompany him, England have the options of the uncapped Rory Burns, the uncapped
Joe Denly and the uncapped, injury cover of Ben Foakes. Plan A is for a top
four of Jennings, Burns, Denly and Root. Unfortunately, there is not a clear
Plan B.
Of course, after a wet white-ball series, England are seriously short of
cricket. Of eleven planned days of cricket and the T20 since England arrived on
the island, just three and the T20 have not been rain-affected. It goes without
saying that, if you schedule a tour in monsoon season, however good the reasons
of fixture-congestion, you have to expect this: England agreed to this
schedule, put up with it! Although there are some players, such as Joe Root,
Jos Buttler, Moeen Ali and Adil Rashid, who play all three formats and have, at
least, had some middle time (Jonny Bairstow’s attempts to add football to his
three cricket formats has left his tour in doubt still, although he seems to be
on the road to recovery), the red-ball specialists are seriously short of
cricket. England’s warm-ups are becoming more unsatisfactory with every passing
tour and not just in the sense of quantity cricket: a 14-a-side format in which
people come and go as they wish, is not conducive to focussing minds and to intense
match-preparation. To see the bowling attack flogged around Colombo on the first
day of red-ball cricket was no way to instil confidence that England will be
competitive: those three lions roaring on the coloured shirts in the ODIs have
become nervous kittens when switched to a white shirt.
England have played six series in Sri Lanka since 1981/82, but have not
won one since the unexpected 2-1 win in 2000/01. On that occasion, England came
back from 1-0 down, staggering to a target of 74 to win the series on an
extraordinary minefield of a pitch at Colombo[1].
The last three series have produced two defeats and the shared series in
2011/12 [lest we forget, England went into that series ranked #1 in the ICC
Test rankings and proceeded to lose the first four Tests of the winter, before
runs for the top three and a monumental innings from Kevin Pietersen set up a
face-saving win].
England entered the white ball cricket very much favourites, against a
Sri Lanka side with a shocking recent record and duly won a series that ended
up being so rain-affected as to be little more than a string of T20s, but still
had one of their all-too-frequent brain-fades in the final, dead rubber,
leading to the usual suggestions that they were lucky to win the series. In
contrast, they enter the Tests very much as second-favourites. The white ball
men turn into red ball mice. Quite apart from a top-order as unstable as the
ODI side’s is solid, the make-up of the bowling attack is a real issue. While
the surfeit of all-rounders helps a lot to give options, experience shows that
a solid core of specialists is as necessary to win in Tests, as all-rounders
are necessary in ODIs.
England start with a few players who are certainties – Root, Buttler, Stokes,
Moeen Ali, Adil Rashid and Jimmy Anderson are all certain to start – but who
joins them is far less certain. The fact of the lack of practical alternatives
suggests that Jennings and Burns must open, but neither is exactly flush with
runs: Jennings has had innings of 13 & 45; Burns, 47 & 19. After them,
with Moeen seemingly – and thankfully – ruled-out as a #3, the field is
thinner. Joe Denly has had three innings – 20, 25 & 0 – Ben Foakes, only on
tour as cover for Jonny Bairstow, has 16* and 19* and Ollie Pope, who seems the
most likely to spend the Tests refining his net technique, 18* & 0.
While England started with the idea that Joe Denly could act as third
spinner and #3, encouraged by his 4-19 in the T20, those figures look a little
less spectacular on closer examination, particularly remembering that balls
slapped straight to fielders by batsmen desperate to gorge themselves on loose
deliveries, appear as a wicket in the scorecard alongside the jaffas. Figures
of 1-48 and 0-43 in the two warm-ups, with batsmen treating him with somewhat
greater disdain than do the Division 2 batsmen in the County Championship, do
not suggest that his bowling will be a major weapon in the Tests. While Denly
can get away with the occasional bad ball in County cricket, Sri Lankan batsmen
feast on such offerings. The conclusion is that if three spinners are needed,
England would do better with Moeen Ali, Adil Rashid and Jack Leach (OB/LBG/SLA),
rather than the two former and the assorted leggies of Denly. A good
performance by Leach in his only opportunity to bowl – good economy and a
wicket with a real jaffa – has advanced his case and, at the same time,
weakened the case for Denly. Leach is a specialist spinner and one who has taken
wickets all around England, taken them with the Lions in the Caribbean and
shown himself to be lethal in favourable conditions at Taunton.
However, if Leach plays, it will, most likely be at the expense of an
all-rounder, making a solid #3 even more important. At the same time, the seam
attack looks thinner than one would wish in these conditions. Stuart Broad’s
place has been questioned and there is an argument for giving the new ball to
Sam Curran, relying on him and Ben Stokes to support Jimmy Anderson. This would
make room for Jack Leach plus a specialist bat, but Curran’s bowling looks
frighteningly friendly when neither ball nor pitch offer help (a single, quite
expensive wicket so far in 20 overs) and Ben Stokes is not the man to offer
long spells of great economy to shut up an end. One line of argument is that
the third seamer is a toss-up between Broad and Curran, another is that Chris
Woakes, whose away record is uniformly poor, could sneak past both. While
Woakes has had plenty of bowling on the tour – “plenty” is a relative term
here, but only Adil Rashid and Moeen Ali have exceeded his 33 overs – he has
only had a single, brief innings at Dambulla to prepare him for the Tests. The
only agreement seems to be that the pace of Ollie Stone – who has bowled almost
as many overs as Chris Woakes – will be surplus to requirements.
The most likely decision is that Broad’s experience will triumph over
Sam Curran’s promise of late-order runs and that he will sneak the third seam
position, but it is by no means clear-cut and worries of the longish tail may
encourage England to start another transition by dropping the second of their
three icons of the last decade. England though know that to win a Test they
must take 20 wickets and that, all things being equally, a seam attack of
Anderson, Broad and Stokes is probably the one that offers the best options to
take wickets.
With Stokes, Moeen Ali, Adil Rashid, Leach, Broad and Anderson, the
attack covers most bases, even if the tail is a little longer than England
might wish, especially now that Adil Rashid’s days as a top-order bat who would
average 40 in a season look to be long over. It is not impossible that they
could yet go back on their stated plans and continue with the experiment of
Moeen Ali at #3, allowing an extra middle-order bat to play. Moeen says that it
is his regular position at Worcestershire, but his opportunities to play for
his county have been very limited since his England call-up and he has made a
great success of batting in the lower middle order, so the place at #3 is more
likely to go to a specialist without Moeen’s extra load as one of the main
bowlers.
The last couple of names are going to be on a wing and a prayer, but a
possible XI looks like:
Jennings
Burns
Foakes
Root
Stokes
Buttler
Moeen Ali
Adil Rashid
Jack Leach
Stuart Broad/Sam Curran
Jimmy Anderson
It would be an extremely inexperienced top three, however, with England
hoping that Jonny Bairstow will make the 2nd Test, this may be very
much a pragmatic one-off pick, with various changes, both positional and of
personnel, for the 2nd Test.
----------------------------------------
Ps (04/11/2018): Some small hints that thinking may be changing:
Selecting 3 spinners looks to be certain; Ben Foakes may take the
gloves; Moeen may bat at #3 after all to add some experience to the top order;
Sam Curran may replace Stuart Broad – which all makes sense of Jack Leach plays
instead of Joe Denly. England play their most potent spin attack, but at the
cost of lengthening the tail, hence Curran’s run-potential is required and if
the main weapon is to be spin, the best gloveman is required to stand up to the
spinners, meaning that to reduce his load, he will bat at #7 and Moeen will bat
at #3.
[1]Darren Gough had match figures of 5-56; Andy Caddick, 4-69; Ashley Giles, 6-70;
and Robert Croft, 5-74, which gives an idea of conditions.
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