West Indies v England, 3rd Test, Day 1: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

 

West Indies v England, 3^rd Test, Day 1: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

September 8^th 2017

The script was for a 3-0 series win against the West Indies and an argument about which of the new players in the side who had filled their boots against a sub-standard team might be good enough to go to Australia.

The reality is that the match is a decider in the series, that the West Indies have won two of the last three Tests between the sides and that England’s record in the Final Test of series since 2013 is so diabolically bad that the unthinkable – a series defeat – is a real possibility.

And, just to make things more interesting, the Test is at Lord’s, where England do not have a good recent record. And lost the Toss, which has, in the last few years, almost invariably been a prelude to defeat.

There is also the small matter of the Test future of Stoneman, Westley and Malan being very definitely still in the air. All have scored a fifty. All have shown flashes of ability. All have shown real vulnerability. And none of them have been able to turn a fifty into a big score. With just two rounds of County Championship matches to go for any alternatives to show their hand, the Test becomes a last opportunity to avoid yet another selection crisis. Reality though is that there are not a whole lot of other options without dipping into Division 2 cricket and there the lesson of Ben Duckett was clear: it is one thing flogging Glamorgan or Derbyshire in front of a couple of hundred die-hard fans, it is a whole different problem to do the same in a Test against India, or Australia, … or Bangladesh. Save the occasional, rare exception, the selectors have to draw from the reducing pool of English-qualified Division 1 players and there are not many of them left who are credible candidates and who have not been tried.

Quite apart from the real issues, there is a further sub-plot: Jimmy Anderson’s 500^th Test wicket.

When Jimmy Anderson took two early wickets in helpful conditions to move to 499, one assumed that the 500^th must come any minute. West Indies 22-2 and scoring at just 1.5 runs per over. Rout seemed imminent and, with it, that warm sensation that Headingley never really happened and that all is well after all. It is the sort of warm feeling that Australia have awoken to having, not without some alarms along the way, put the world – or at least, Bangladesh – to rights. From there though, things seemed to go horribly wrong. Shai Hope and Powell took the West Indies to Lunch at 35-2 after 20 overs and built from there. All the failings of Headingley were present: Broad was not getting his lines right, his heel injury flared-up badly again, Stokes did not look like taking a wicket and, after a good start, Anderson looked human and Cook was dropping catches.

The one difference with Headingley is that when Plan A did not work, Joe Root could at least throw the ball to Tobias Skelton Roland-Jones. Unlike Chris Woakes, who never quite got his length and line right, Toblerone knows what is needed, even if he did not make his accustomed immediate impact. Finally he got a ball in the right place and was fortunate enough to see Alistair Cook hang on. 78-2 with the two batsmen beginning to play their shots and nothing much happening, looked ominous; 78-3 looked so much better, but still well short of what it should be.

Then suddenly there followed one of these odd sessions of play where all logic seems to have gone out to lunch. Ben Stokes has rarely looked threatening with the ball all summer and today was no exception… until Kieran Powell, who was batting very well and looked set, belying his Test average of 26, to add to England’s woes, drilled the ball straight back at him. Good catch. Soft wicket. Thanks very much! Then Toberlone bowled a straight ball – admittedly a surprise weapon from England this summer – Jermaine Blackwood aimed a massive cross-batted slog and the stumps were scattered. Toberlone continues to keep his Test bowling average under 20 in his fourth Test, which is not one of the predictions that many pundits would have made about how this Test summer would pan out. The comfort (if you were a West Indian), or discomfort (if you were English) of 78-2 had become 87-5 and West Indies were sinking fast.

Moeen Ali came on to exploit the breakthrough and, first ball, could have picked up a wicket. Toss it up, bit of width, loose shot from Chase, edge – just wide of slip. How often when he gets a quick wicket does Moeen Ali start to shine. If the first couple of overs go wrong, his biorhythms go wonky. The pitch map would later report that Moeen had all the control of a paint spray; where was the bowler who had laid waste in the first five Tests of the summer? As in Bangladesh and India, a series that has started so well, seems to be ending in a series of full tosses, long hops and occasional leg side filth.

Fortunately, there was Stokes. You would have got long odds against Stokes being the main threat with the ball today. After a loose first over, his next nine produced 36 dots, a No Ball, four singles and three wickets. Suddenly Stokes looked like the devastating bowler that we know that he can be.

There is much debate among the fans about Woakes v Stokes. The argument is plain daft. Stokes is the nearest thing that England have produced to Ian Botham since 1981. Stokes is an impact player who can turn a match around in a session with a quick century, or a burst of 5-10 but, on other days, will manage a duck and 0-60 from 8 overs. He is not as reliable a bowler as the Botham of 1977-85, who could take the new ball and run through a side, but he is as near as we have seen. Chris Woakes though is a steady, reliable pro. He will not make stunning Test centuries, nor is he likely to take a spell of 5-1, but if you want someone to come in and score 40* nursing the tail, or to take 3-40 in 15 mean overs, he is the man. You want both in your side: it would be like having both Botham and Flintoff in your team… a genuine luxury.

Yesterday though, was Stokes’s day, even if another catch went down in the last over before Tea when Root dropped Holder off Stokes and then Holder creamed the next ball for four. Stokes was not impressed and followed up with three snorting deliveries.

119-7 at Tea and England beginning to rise to the occasion. Anderson with the ball after Tea and the tail in his sights. What no one had warned him was that he needed to be quick. Stokes allowed him just two overs to get the 500^th. When Jimmy A did not strike, Stokes did. His post-Tea bowling was 1.3-1-0-3:

…W…WW

Stokes is on a hat-trick in the second innings and finished with 14.3-6-22-6. Who needs Anderson or Broad?

That was the limit of the good news.

Now the bad news: England had to bat under lights.

Within 13 overs things had got downright ugly.

After 13 overs England were 19-3 and both Stoneman and Westley had gone for single-figure scores.

Even if he were to score runs in the second innings it is unlikely that Westley would be on the plane to Australia. Straight ball. Plays down the wrong line. LBW.

25, 59, 29, 9, 8, 3, 8, 8. Sadly, Westley has been completely found out at this level.

Stoneman’s case is more difficult: 8, 19, 52, 1. It is only his third match. It would be harsh to drop him, but he most certainly has not made a good case to go to Australia.

And, while Stoneman and Westley failed, it did not go unnoticed that Haseeb Hameed gritted his way to his highest score of the season in the gloom at Old Trafford. Make no mistake, Hameed is still in desperate form. No way is he ready to play a Test, but one of the signs of a player who has what it takes, is his ability to make ugly runs when in desperate form.

Even at 19-3 there was time for things to get worse. Joe Root’s wicket made it 24-4 and the West Indies are looking at an unlikely first innings lead. England start the second day with Malan (another who needs a score to seal the trip to Australia) and Stokes at the wicket and, at least battling. No one knows how much play, if any, there will be on the second day with rain and bad light threatening the day but, it may just be that rain is the only thing that will take the match deep into even a third day.

At 46-4 and still 77 behind, England can ill-afford to lose a quick wicket and much less two early in the day. Australia have their problems, but if they are quaking in their boots right now it is more likely to be with stifled laughter. 

England v India: 4th Test Haseeb Hameed’s Misfortune Could be Keaton Jenning’s Lucky Break

 

England v India: 4^th Test

Haseeb Hameed’s Misfortune Could be Keaton Jenning’s Lucky Break

November 30^th 2016

It is at least arguable that had England played Haseeb Hameed in Bangladesh they would have won the series. As it is, they have unearthed a gem. Scores of 21, 82, 13, 25, 9 & 59* in the first three Tests fail to measure his impact.

A score of 25 in the second innings at Visakhapatnam looks like a modest contribution, but it took up 50 overs of self-denial, inducing pure frustration in India as England tried to conjure a draw from the wreckage of a wretched performance. Hameed’s dismissal started the slide to defeat when India were beginning to look increasingly ragged and frustrated. Greater still though was his second innings effort at Mohali. Batting with a broken hand. Unable to grip the bat properly, he marshalled a recovery from 107-6 to 236ao. Ultimately both efforts were in vain, but both deserved so much better.

Hameed is on the iron bird to England to get a titanium plate put in his hand and, by all accounts, almost had to be ordered home, as he wanted to play the last two Tests. Unable to field, it would have been impractical, but it showed spirit.

No one doubts that Hameed will return to take his place as an opener for England next summer. He looks to have made the opening slot his own when he is fit again.

For now though, a replacement is needed. Already there had been hysterical calls to send out Sam Billings as the best available player of spin, but England’s problems go much deeper. India are not just providing a trial by spin: India’s pace attack is providing hostile and dangerous and is getting at least as much out of the pitches as England’s. England have tried Duckett, Root and Hameed as Cook’s partner at different times this winter. Root has done the job and was a good stand-in at Mohali, but right now he is a more natural #4 and it is where he is going to score the most runs. You can talk about using Root, Moeen, Duckett, or even Billings to stand-in as opener for the last two Tests, but they need a specialist.

With the Lions squad in the UAE one would think that the matter is simple. Unfortunately, unlike previous winters when they have had a heavy schedule of matches, the Lions tour this winter is more of a camp. The match programme only starts on December 1^st with four 50-over matches against the UAE and Afghanistan: hardly the most challenging opposition. With the 4^th Test starting on December 8^th, any replacement may get to play the first two games in the UAE, but no more, as preparation for two Tests against a rampant India.

While there were calls for Nick Gubbins of Middlesex to be called-up, over the summer Keaton Jennings just did that little bit better and showed a happy knack of making good scores into big ones: 7 centuries, including two doubles, testify to that, as do his First Class scores at the end of the season: 14, 0, 27, 45, 21, 0, 33, 171*, 40, 8, 201*, 11, 1, 25. When Jennings gets in, he scores big, but it can be feast or famine. Gubbins, in contrast, has been more consistent over 2016 and has more fifties, but fewer hundreds.

All-in-all though, Jennings was the right choice, if only to reward him for prolific form in Division 1 in a club in turmoil and for setting out his stall with Durham and England. With Jennings likely to play most of his cricket in Division 2 in 2017, if he were passed-over here, it is likely that his chance would be gone, at least until Durham return to Division 1. Of course, Jennings’s selection comes at a price: he is the latest in a long line of players born in South Africa to throw in their stall with England. It has left England open to the criticism, launched many times over the last few decades, that it is a team of mercenaries. There is something insidious about this in its purest manifestation of seeing how the picking of a multicultural team to represent a multicultural society causes so much offense to so many people.

England’s second and less expected replacement, is Liam Dawson. Dawson is very much seen as a player for the future and is being developed as part of a long-term plan. It turns out that Zafar Ansari’s injury problems are far worse than was revealed and he will, unexpectedly to most, leave India too before the 4^th Test.

England have got in a bit of a bind here. The top two spinners in the country are Jack Leach and Ollie Rayner. Jack Leach is young and Chris Rogers, his county captain, mindful of what his compatriots did to Simon Kerrigan, does not think that he is ready for Tests. He would though be the like-for-like pick, as a Slow Left-Armer. Ollie Rayner, in contrast, is more experienced, more mature now and ready, but would be a third off-spinner when Moeen Ali is already being criminally underbowled at times. There is a very highly rated Slow Left-Armer at Middlesex in Ravi Patel, but he has hardly played for two seasons and, although still on the radar, is unlikely to advance his career future at Lord’s in the near future.

It may be that Liam Dawson is the best of a poor set of choices but, with Alistair Cook’s well-known lack of confidence in spinners, putting an inexperienced spinner who is not even first choice for his county (the even younger leg-spinner, Mason Crane, has usurped his role as first-choice spinner for Hampshire), into the Test team, may not be a rip-roaring success.

England v India: 2nd & 3rd Tests: Paying the Price for Timidity

 

England v India: 2^nd & 3^rd Tests

Paying the Price for Timidity

November 29^th 2016

The 1^st Test ended on a high. England dominated. They looked the stronger side. India were poor. But for a timid declaration, England would surely have won.

It looked too good it be true. And it was…

India were able to take the positives of having held out for a draw in a match that they could well have lost and have never since surrendered the initiative. I had the great fortune to miss most of the 2^nd Test on a trip. It was a good, old-fashioned, made-in-England, massive foul-up. The pitch was nothing like as difficult as predicted, as Cook and Hameed showed in the second innings, but England paid for a couple of disastrously sloppy sessions.

In both innings, India were wobbling – 22-2 and 17-2 – and allowed to recover. At 248-2 soon after Tea on the first day you knew already that only an Indian collapse of epic proportions could save the match for England. The collapse duly happened, but from a platform of 317-4 after the first day: it meant that the match, realistically, was gone. Even after making a slightly sub-standard score in reply – 300 would have been about par for England – there was still just a chance if India could be rolled-over cheaply second time around. Broad and Anderson gave England a fighting chance with their new ball burst, but could not follow through. This being England, it is the hope that kills: even after the stand of 77 between Rahane and Kohli should have made the match safe, Broad and Adil Rashid so nearly dragged England back into contention by inducing another Indian collapse that stopped just short of a full-up panic.

Many fans would not have played Stuart Broad this winter thinking that he would be totally ineffective, but he has bowled his heart out and 8-211 in the three Tests that he has played over the winter has been scant reward, particularly as he bowled through a serious injury that may yet end his tour and suffered considerable pain in this Test. Similarly, after the Bangladesh Tests many people thought that Adil Rashid’s Test career might be over but, suddenly, he has flourished. In his first four Tests he took 11 wickets at 60.8; in his last four he has 22 wickets at 27.8. A decidedly depressing 117-3 became 162-9 and hope was threatening to re-kindle. The et tu Brute moment though was the last wicket partnership that did serious damage to Adil Rashid’s bowling figures and killed-off any lingering chance of a phoenix-like recovery.

India have refused to be killed off throughout the series. Simple as that.

The nominal England chase just demonstrated it. 75-0 after 50 overs. Hameed and Cook coping superbly and the Indian attack wilting visibly. The Close was in sight. Going into the last day with all wickets intact, England would have had real hopes of escaping with the draw. Suddenly it was 87-2 with both openers out and you knew that the match had gone. 75-0 became 115-6. Batsmen played like lemmings fooling around with hand-grenades in a minefield.

3^rd Test? More of the same. Win what was expected to be a critical Toss. Bat. And have a sub-standard first session. Even then, England should have crossed the psychological barrier of 300. It would have given them a real chance. No matter. Stokes and Adil Rashid (him again), engineered a magnificent fight-back with the ball. At 204-6, England hoped for a lead of 40-50. At 301-7, they hoped to limit the damage. India’s last 4 wickets though more than doubled the score. It was horrific. Catches went down. Chances were missed. England surrendered. And, through this, Moeen Ali, England’s most threatening-looking bowler for much of the winter, as in the 2^nd Test, watch most of the action from the outfield, as he had in the second innings of the previous Test. Why? Who knows? Was he injured and unable to bowl? Apparently not!

After a promising start to the series, England’s cup of woe has started to overflow.

·         Hameed has gone home injured. Needs an operation.

·         Stuart Broad has left into to rehabilitate in the hope that he may be able to return for the 4^th Test. If he does not, it looks like the iron bird home.

·         Chris Woakes is under assessment and in danger of possibly having to leave the tour (cracked thumb).

·         Gary Ballance is in desperate form and almost un-selectable.

·         Ditto Ben Duckett.

·         Zafar Ansari’s promising start has been shown to be a mirage. He is looking increasingly out of his depth.

·         Gareth Batty’s selection has been shown to be well-intentioned, but misguided.

And, despite having six players either too out of form or too injured to be considered, England have two players (Finn and Ball) who Air India apparently lost in transit. Jake Ball’s family must be thinking of reporting him to police as a missing person. Right now, his best chance of playing a Test must be as a specialist bat, so stretched are resources in that department.

When you are 134 behind, to slip to 107-6 is the last thing you need. England bat deep, but it is India’s tail that is wagging in this series. First Root and Hameed and then Hameed and Woakes initiated partnerships that threatened to turn things around, but it was not quite happening. Even Hameed and Anderson started to build a partnership. Hameed's courage deserved so much better support. If any one of his partners had batted on for just half an hour longer, India might have started to fray, but each time a wicket fell just before England could start to think seriously about getting back into the game.

A chase of 180 might just have been interesting, 103 was not.

Chris Woakes showed what was possible, cracked bone and muscular issues notwithstanding, by removing Vijay with his fifth ball, but when you have so few runs to play with, even if the opposition were to slip to 17-4, realistically, they are always going to scrape over the line and India are so much better than that.

India are now 2-0 up. England are struggling both against the Indian pace attack and their spinners and Ravi Ashwin’s travails against England in the past are becoming a distant memory.

Add in an injury crisis  and issues of form and confidence and England are in a mess.

England v India: 1st Test, Day 4 - India’s Collapse Sets Up Last Day

 

England v India: 1^st Test, Day 4

India’s Collapse Sets Up Last Day

November 12^th 2016

At 318-2, moments before the Close on Day 3, the talk was of India pushing on to a huge score and putting England under real pressure on the last day. Two wickets in four balls before the Close gave England a window of opportunity, although one of them was the nightwatchman. Realistically, England needed two wickets in the first hour and they got them. What is more, they were the prize wickets of Rahane and Kohli: the former to Ansari, the latter to Adil Rashid, neither of whom will have given the Indian batsmen many sleepless nights before the series.

After a superb summer in ODIs and an excellent ODI series in Bangladesh, in which he was the main wicket-taking threat, the Bangladesh Tests were not kind to Adil Rashid, who was in danger of making the transition from being a figure of fun to a figure of ridicule. Four wickets in the second innings of the defeat in Bangladesh though seem to have worked wonders for his self-belief; it matters nought that a couple of those wickets were to rank bad balls – the important thing is that wickets give confidence. Almost without anyone noticing, Adil Rashid now has 19 wickets in five and a half Tests: a pretty decent strike rate and a wicket every 70 balls. Similarly, Zafar Ansari had a really rough introduction to Test cricket, but then came back with a couple of good wickets and those have seemed to work wonders for his confidence too.

At the same time, it seems that Alistair Cook is beginning to handle his spinners with more sympathy and empathy. Even when one of the bowlers was hit for a six – and India hit seven of them to England’s five – Cook did not panic and kept faith: having runs in the bank undoubtedly helped.

The result is that India’s three spinners have generated little threat and have so far taken 6-435 in the match. England’s three have combined for 8-276 against arguably a stronger batting line-up.

318-2 became 361-6, with India just past the follow-on: just the sort of mini-collapse that suggests that the last day might get really interesting. India were indebted to the 7^th and 10^th wicket partnerships to get close because 425-6 then became 459-9 in another mini-collapse.

A lead of 49 was at least 50 less than England had hoped. The feeling was that at that stage only India could win. There were plenty of people – and not just Indians – who expected an England collapse and a modest chase on the last day. What has happened is just the opposite: 114-0 at the Close, with Hameed 62* and looking set for a debut century. He is only the third England batsman to score a Test 50 before turning 20 – the last was Denis Compton in 1937 – and one really does wonder why he did not play at least the 2^nd Test in Bangladesh.

England are 163 ahead and looking at a declaration around Lunch. If anyone wonders how the pitch is playing, the last ball of the day pitched in the rough outside leg and flew past the outside edge of Hameed’s bat. Balls from the spinners are pitching on a good length and taking off to chest height. There is plenty of evidence that a bowler could run through a side if he gets the breaks and a bit of luck.

England have made such a solid start that they can afford to take some risks in the morning session. There is also plenty of forcing batting to come. A chase of 280 in around 65 overs would be very interesting with the pitch only likely to get more difficult. Certainly, if England entertain thoughts of winning, they really must have taken an Indian wicket by Lunch, which means giving the bowlers 4 or 5 overs at the Indian openers.

England v Bangladesh: The Fall and Rise and Fall of Alex Hales

 

England v Bangladesh

The Fall and Rise and Fall of Alex Hales

September 13^th  2016

If there is one player who has epitomised the violent swings of fortune of the England team over the last year, it is Alex Hales.

An up and down year for England took another couple of unexpected tangents. First, after going 4-0 in the ODI series and setting a world-record score to boot, the series came to a shambolic end with a heavy defeat in the final ODI, followed by being utterly trounced in the only T20 as they staggered, drunkenly from 56-0 after 39 balls and threatening to cross 200, to 135-7. Pakistan won with more than five overs to spare and, as in the Test series, finished on a high and with the momentum. Those last two games of the international summer showed how England who, two games earlier, had looked sublimely untroubled in scoring 444-3 in 50 overs, can swing from brilliant to mediocre. There was some justification in the ODI, with a raft of changes introduced to rest some players and give a chance to others. Less good news was that with Adil Rashid and Moeen Ali being rested, Liam Dawson registered the worst-ever figures for an England debutant in an ODI. 8-0-72-2 was fairly eye-watering, although it is as well to record that just below Liam Dawson in the “worst-ever debut” list come Andrew Flintoff and Steve Finn, who both turned out okay.

While many regard Liam Dawson as the best young spinner in the country, it is interesting that, despite the lamentations to the contrary, the selectors have almost an embarrassment of choice of spinners for the two winter tours. Moeen Ali and Adil Rashid are assumed to be givens. Behind them, Ollie Rayner at Middlesex and Jack Leach at Somerset are causing mayhem from unexpected directions and both demand a call-up on the back of form, heavy wicket-taking and consistency. Ollie Rayner’s last three County Championship matches have produced 23 wickets (combined figures of 23-322). Middlesex fans have been frustrated for years knowing that he can attack and be lethal, but has all too often been used in a holding role to speed up the overrate and got overly defensive. If the selectors want to go for a form spinner, Ollie Rayner is currently the most destructive in the country.

If Ollie Rayner’s 23-322 since the summer break in the CC have put down a marker, what of Jack Leach’s 27 wickets in Somerset’s four matches since the break, including 2x6-for and 1x5-for? His wickets have been more expensive (27-529), but he has had to bowl long spells and put in hard grind in a much weaker attack than Ollie Rayner. With 56 First Class wickets, he is joint fifth in the wicket-taking list for 2016, somewhat ahead of Ollie Rayner, who is eleventh. Jack Leach was taking wickets in quantity even early in the season and has been consistent and threatening all summer.

Apart from Rayner and Leach, many fans have pointed to the golden summer that Gareth Batty is having with 41 wickets @ 32.3 and suggesting that he is the one outstanding candidate to head the attack in India. It is twelve years since he acted as unwilling stooge to Brian Lara’s 400* in Antigua: although picked twice more as cover for an injured Ashley Giles and briefly re-commissioned in ODIs in 2009, the 52-4-185-2 in that Antigua Test really finished him as an international bowler. However, fans will recall how Shaun Udal was plucked from pre-retirement obscurity in 2006 and won a Test in India and how both Pat Pockock and Peter Such were re-commissioned some years earlier with surprising success.

Many pundits will say that Liam Dawson (15 wickets @ 46.8) is the best young spinner in the country, while Simon Kerrigan has been disappointing this year (25 wickets @ 45.4), he has been a consistent performer over many years, while Zafar Ansari, who was picked as a spinner for last winter’s tours, is finally coming back to the sort of form that saw him selected, after injury saw him miss the start of the season (22 wickets @ 30.7, with 7-164 in his last two matches). Several other names are mentioned as promising spinners.

What though has really exercised the minds of pundits and fans is the latest extraordinary turn in the Alex Hales story. After a rather unhappy Test series in South Africa (to be fair, he was far from the only one to struggle with the bat), followed by a record-equalling ODI series against the same opponents, with his five consecutive 50s, crowned with a glorious century, he took a calculated risk and, when many fans thought that only heavy run-scoring in early season would save his place, decided to take off the first few games of the season. Obdurate performances to try to save games in a Nottinghamshire side that was unravelling fast, saved his Test place and a big fifty in each Test v Sri Lanka seemed to mark his breakthrough. The one thing that he failed to achieve was to get those last few runs to obtain a maiden Test century, but 5 half centuries is one more than Nick Compton (who reached 50 only 4 times in his 16 Tests), three more than Sam Robson (who reached 50 only twice in 7 Tests) and four more than Adam Lyth (who reached 50 just once in his 7 Tests): failure is relative here.

However, a poor series with the bat against Pakistan in the Tests led to many writing his obituary again, particularly after two failures in the first two ODIs, only to come back with the highest score by an Englishman in ODIs (and, unlike Robin Smith, whose record he broke, he is as English as you can get, born in Hillingdon in Middlesex). 743 runs @ 61.9 in 2016, with 4x50 and 3x100 is astonishing by any standards, more so even from a player who, only a few months before, was being written-off as a failure in ODIs.

However, with many questioning whether or not he had done enough to hang on to his Test place and the pundits saying, reluctantly, that he had probably done just enough, mainly due to the lack of obvious alternatives, Alex Hales has come up with a new surprise by withdrawing from the Bangladesh series on security grounds. It is only two Tests and, with the selectors having the habit of experimenting when England visit Bangladesh, it is quite possible that he would have been “rested” anyway. However, things have changed radically since the Pakistan Tests finished. Suddenly, it looks as if Alex Hales has ended his Test career.

There are several top-three batsmen who have made big runs this season. Tom Westley, with 1427 runs @ 62.0; Ben Duckett, with 1268 runs @ 57.6; Nick Browne, with 1196 runs @ 52.0; Nick Gubbins, with 1191 runs @ 59.6 and Chris Dent, with 1133 runs @ 45.3 have all shown some prolific form, not to mention a young sprog called Marcus Trescothick (1252 runs @ 52.2). While Westley is a #3 who could open, if necessary, the others are all genuine openers.

All but two of the above though have the not-inconsiderable issue of having made their runs against the much weaker, Division 2 attacks. Marcus Trescothick would no longer tour even if the selectors were to ask a 40-year-old to come back after ten years out of Tests. And Nick Gubbins, although he has his fans, has not been as eye-catching as some others, but will still be hoping that perhaps he gets the nod or, at very least, to be parked off-shore ready for a call-up on a Lions tour.

Two players have though really caught the eye.

A sequence of scores of 89, 57*, 114, 100*, 26, 17 & 56 by 19 year old Haseeb Hameed has led to a massive band-waggon calling for him to be picked for the Bangladesh tour. Having made his First Class debut at the end of the 2015 season, he has played just 18 matches, but his last eight have produced 4x100 and 5x50, boosting his average to 51.3. Bangladesh would be a great place to blood him before a far more politically charged tour to India where the pressures, on and off the field, will be far greater.

Another suitor for Alex Hale’s position is Keaton Jennings, another young player – this time 24 years old – whose record prior to this season was more likely to lead to calls for him to return to South Africa. However, he has committed his future to Durham, is now qualified for England and, despite Chester-le-Street’s  famously green pitches, is the run-away leading run-scorer in the country with 1565 runs @ 71.1 (almost 450 more than Haseeb Hameed, in three more innings) and has an impressive seven First Class centuries.

Quite possibly Alex Hales had not bet on a First Division opener who was already having a good season, scoring 201* on a famously tricky pitch, less than 48 hours after he had surrendered his opening position.

What will be interesting is to see if the selectors take both Keaton Jennings and Haseeb Hameed to accompany Alistair Cook in Bangladesh, with one of them, or maybe even both if the other is given a chance with the tricky #3 slot, having the chance to seal his place in the starting XI in India. The selectors have said that there will be no reprisals for either Hales or Eoin Morgan for missing the tour but, were Hales’s replacement to make a century in one of the two Tests, it would inconceivable that we would see Hales re-gaining his place in India.

While it is certain that Alex Hales will return to the ODI set-up in India, the chances great are that he will not even be in the Test party unless whoever replaces him has a dire tour. With England needing a stable opening partner for Alistair Cook and Nick Compton who might just have been pushed up the order instead, out of the picture, yet another player will have a chance to make a claim to be Andrew Strauss’s definitive replacement.

Rumour has it that a decision had already been made to go with Haseem Hameed this winter instead of Alex Hales. Maybe Hales just felt that he knew which way the wind was blowing and decided to bow-out gracefully, rather than be dropped. Whatever way it blows, the announcement of the touring parties is going to be met with great interest.