Cricket 2014
The Pits
March 31st 2014
All logic said that England would end
their campaign with a comfortable win of The Netherlands and would return home
feeling a little better after an encouraging World T20 in which they could say,
quite genuinely, that they were unlucky to be eliminated. No one could have
imagined the full horror being on the wrong end of a hammering – their only
heavy defeat of the tournament – to a side that is no longer ranked high
enough to play official ODIs.
The team was awful. Catches dropped.
Misdirected bowling. It took a mean spell from Ravi Bopara and, after a rather
dodgy first over, from James Tredwell, to pull back the run rate. Then the
batting was abysmal. England lost, inexplicably, to a team who they should have
put to the sword, a team who were better on the day and, who should also have
beaten South Africa.
In the three games so far the batting,
condemned before the tournament as insipid and powder-puff, has been England’s
strength. It has not been just Alex Hales’s century. In 30 matches in the
tournament – 60 innings – just six times has 190 been reached, two of them by
England. In Hales, England have the fifth highest run-scorer of the tournament
and the second highest of the players not involved in the preliminary round.
Various other batsmen have had useful innings, although the top three of Hales,
Lumb and Moeen have not given England the solid starts that one would have
liked. Moeen Ali, in particular, has been disappointing with the bat. However,
a line-up criticised as unable to clear the boundary has hit 20 sixes and 58
fours in their four games (really in three because, today, the totals were 0
and 4 respectively).
When England have been weak has been
in the bowling. No one has more than 4 wickets. Apart from the strangely
underused Ravi Bopara, whose six overs over two games went for just 28, no one
comes close to Chris Jordan’s figures: 4 wickets at 19, with a strike rate of
15.5 and economy of 7.35. Dernbach’s economy has been 11, Bresnan’s 9.7 (just 1
wicket for 97 in 10 overs), Broad’s 8.5, although with the consolation of 4
wickets at 25.5.
One thing that is singularly odd is
that England’s three most economical bowlers bowled just 27.2 out of a possible
48 overs between them: in part that this because England used so many bowling
options – 6 or 7 bowlers in each match – but it is still poor use of your resources
to leave so many overs of your most reliable bowlers unused.
Bresnan and Dernbach have struggled.
It is hard to see Dernbach playing again. Tim Bresnan has also looked more the vulnerable
Bresnan of 2006 than the heroic figure of 2010/11. Can England continue to wait
on him to rediscover his best form? It is hard to know how badly Stuart Broad’s
knee problem has hampered him. After a poor start to the tournament with a
couple of Dernbach-like overs, he has finished more strongly, but has never
felt up to taking the new ball – not having him running in strongly with the
new ball has weakened the attack significantly.
Like the death bowling, the fielding
has been shambolic. Catch after catch has gone down. There have been misunderstandings
in the field with runouts missed and catches dropping between fielders with
neither making a serious effort to take responsibility. Unfortunately it has
not been limited to difficult chances and to outfielders: several sitters have
gone down and Jos Buttler has missed a couple of important chances too.
However, things are not as bad as
they feel. The core of a strong side is there. Probably eight or nine of today’s
starters will be in England’s best side in the summer, with the two or three
changes more likely to be in the attack and one of those is more due to the
nature of English pitches, which will not require two front-line spinners. Joe
Root may well usurp Moeen Ali, but there must be some concern about Eoin Morgan
who has only reached 20 twice in his last ten innings. The biggest need is to
find a reliable death bowler and someone to use the new ball effectively. With
Ravi Bopara, Moeen Ali and, presumably, Joe Root able to bowl overs, there will
be no shortage of support options.
I stick by what said yesterday... it is not all bad. The side just needs a little luck and to win a couple of games to get some momentum.
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