From Bad To Worse For England

 

 

Cricket 2014

 

And the problems just get worse

 

November 29^th 2014

 

A week ago, I wrote:

“The 7-match series against Sri Lanka will be a good litmus test as Sri Lanka were absolutely awful as stand-in stuntmen for the West Indies in India. If England lose badly, it will be no good blaming the schedule, the lack of practice, team absences or the fact that Sri Lanka’s chefs cannot find the right ingredients for the England diet guide’s recipes.”

Two matches. Two defeats. No one has any illusions that it will not finish 7-0. Thanks to heroics from Moeen Ali and Ravi Bopara, the first game was close. The second has been simply embarrassing. The mantra is to take the positives and there have been none, apart from another nice innings from Ravi Bopara as the batting fell apart. This time Moeen Ali could not cover for the deficiencies of others with a quick-fire innings at the top of the order.

The batting was poor, the captaincy was worse. With bowlers having most success by taking pace off the ball, the decision to give Ravi Bopara just four overs in the first ODI and none in the second was hard to fathom. The fact that Bopara was by far the most economical bowler in the 1^st ODI makes it even harder to understand.

There is a strong suggestion that team selection is mainly made now on the grounds of the captain wishing to repel boarders. It is just about the only tenable conclusion when a player as talented and as successful in limited overs cricket last season as James Taylor cannot get a game. Alistair Cook knows that James Taylor would be a plausible alternative as ODI captain if he establishes a place in the side; he has most to lose if James Taylor plays and makes a success of it.

Similarly, with Moeen Ali making a success of opening, Alex Hales would, logically, only get a game at the expense of the captain.

Ah! The captain! Sixteen ODIs in 2014, but just one 50, falling in the 40s no less than four times. Only three times has he failed to reach double figures in an ODI in 2014, but the weight of runs is just not there and, all too often, when he gets past 20 and needs to move up a gear, he is getting out. His form is not dreadful, but if he is to have a place in the side he must either anchor the innings consistently at a decent pace for 30 overs and make some big scores, or learn to work the ball around to keep the score ticking through the powerplay overs so that the side gets fast starts. Watching him play out a maiden as Moeen Ali treated the bowling on its merits at the other end was a little painful to watch.

Eoin Morgan started the year with 282 runs in the 5 ODIs in Australia. Since then he has had 12 innings and reached 20 just four times, amassing 206 runs. Morgan’s place must be coming under severe threat, if only as a wake-up call to him. Scores of 1, 31, 3, 40, 12, 17, 28, 10, 32, 14, 1 & 17 are just not good enough. Nine times he has reached double figures, just four has he reached 20: he is getting starts and getting out.

Less culpable is Ian Bell. He has 4x50 in ODIs in 2014, although none since May. Since then, he has gone slightly, but distinctly off the boil. However, today was his 150^th ODI. He is just short of 5000 ODI runs and his 2014 numbers are very close to his career figures, which should save him from most criticism.

With talent of the class of Hales, Lumb, Taylor and Ballance unable to get a game and England losing and the World Cup getting closer, Alistair Cook cannot afford more defeats, or personal failures. A batting order starting Lumb, Hales, Moeen Ali, Bopara, Taylor, Root & Buttler might not win the World Cup, but would at least give England a chance of shocking a few sides. With Broad and Anderson to return, Finn on his comeback and Woakes showing signs that he is making good his talent, England would start to have the basis of a decent side that would bat very deep.

One wonders if Alistair Cook will survive as captain if England lose 7-0, or even 6-1, even if he starts to score some runs: how much patience do the selectors have with him? Possibly not much more.

Finishing In The Pits

 

 

Cricket 2014

 

The Pits

 

March 31^st 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.

Two Crazy Games

 

 

Cricket 2014

 

An Extraordinary Day

 

March 27^th 2014

 

 

After a few too many mundane matches, today has brought two corkers. A Dutch colleague who knows next to nothing about cricket was crouched alongside me in the dining room at lunchtime watching, stunned, as The Netherlands closed on an unblievable win against South Africa. Sadly, it was not to be and South Africa brought off another amazing narrow escape. Having won by 2 runs against New Zealand, they beat The Netherlands by 5 in a game that the Dutch should have won. The contrast with the Sri Lanka game was remarkable: the Dutch bowled with discipline and chased as if it were Ireland in front. So fast was their scoring that it seemed that unless they panicked, victory would come with several overs to spare. The Dutch though, can hold their heads high… they left the South Africans close to panic.

The game that came afterwards was, if anything, even more extraordinary. Few pundits gave England much chance of winning and fewer still thought that, having dropped catch after catch in the outfield, England would be able to chase 190 to win, especially as it would be the seventh highest successful chase ever in a T20. In fact, only seven times before today had a team chased 180 successfully in a T20 international.

When the opposition starts the chase with a double-wicket maiden you normally think that it’s curtains. However, Hales and Morgan batted sensibly and stayed either ahead of Sri Lanka at an equivalent stage or, at least, very close. The biggest difference in the scores was 6 after 8 overs (Sri Lanka 58-1, England 52-2) but, from the end of the 10^th over England were never behind save, momentarily and marginally after 18 overs. If you were watching the scores you could see that unless England did something stupid they would be very close at the end. As the ball got harder to grip, the scoring rate mounted and Sri Lanka’s chances of pulling the match back got slimmer. Two wickets in an over helped but then, as Sri Lanka played their trump card, hoping that Malinga would kill England’s challenge; what it did though was kill Sri Lanka’s as Ravi Bopara hit his first two balls for four and calmed any nerves.

The headlines will be for Alex Hales’s century and a magnificent innings it was, but England had other heroes too. Eoin Morgan, whose recent form has been awful, played a wonderful innings. Ravi Bopara supported calmly at the end when, so often in the past, batsmen have lost their heads. And, with a chase of 200 a real possibility, Chris Jordan’s last over, the penultimate of the innings, went for just 4 runs and included the wicket of Sangakkara – 4-0-28-2 was the most economical spell of the day by any bowler. Even Jade Dernbach had one of his better games of the recent past.

One win does not make England a great side, but neither are they such a bad side as many have claimed. They now face South Africa in a winner-takes all game on Saturday: the winner will almost certainly make it through to the semi-Finals, the loser is out. South Africa have squeaked past New Zealand and The Netherlands and blew a winning position against Sri Lanka – you would worry a lot more if England were facing India.

There are still many permutations in the group. Any of the four Full Members could still qualify. Sri Lanka must beat New Zealand to qualify. South Africa have to beat England. England have to beat South Africa and New Zealand have to beat Sri Lanka. Unless the Dutch play party-poopers, the two winners will go through and the two losers will go out. There is even a freak combination of results that would allow the Dutch to go through (England beat South Africa, New Zealand beat Sri Lanka, the Dutch beat both England and New Zealand, leaving all five sides on four points).

The Crash-Dive Continues, But England Start To See Some Light

 

 

Cricket 2014

 

The England Crash-Dive Continues

 

March 16^th 2014

 

 

Having shown some signs of better things to come in the Caribbean ODIs, England’s T20 series was an unmitigated disaster. Having no Joe Root can be spun as a blessing – he will get his first decent break from cricket in a year and a half as his thumb heals, but the loss of Stuart Broad to the sort of injury that generally can only be cured with months of rest and then Ben Stokes to a self-inflicted blow, hardly reduces the feeling of crisis in English cricket. It is all so different from the situation just seven months ago.

Stokes’s ill-judged decision to take out his frustration on a door will, hopefully, reduce some of the hype about him. Since his 70 in the 3^rd ODI v Australia, his scores have been 0, 5, 5, 4, 0, 4, 0. He has added 3-43, 0-36, DNB, 0-13, 0-21, 0-30 & DNB to his scores, with batsmen finding easy pickings as the first flush of success against Australia faded away. It all adds to the feeling that, although he has talent, he has a huge amount of work to do to become a top-rate all-rounder. And, first of all, he needs to find some discipline.

Had Broad and Stokes been available, Chris Jordan would surely not have got a game. As it was, he has added to his burgeoning reputation. T20 is a format where you can bat for six balls and bowl six balls and be hailed as a hero. It definitely rewards style over substance and quantity over quality. However, Jordan’s brief and violent innings turned a total that was too small to challenge the West Indies power into one that was just big enough and his ability to knock over batsmen was demonstrated again, quite apart from taking a brilliant catch. Just why he was not in the Test squad, particularly when England were struggling to find bowlers is a question even the selectors are probably asking themselves. Quite possibly his selection would have not made a blind bit of difference, but you do wonder if his athleticism and ability to bowl at over 90mph might have been improvement over Chris Tremlett’s gentle medium pace and Boyd Rankin’s lameness. Surely the selectors have to give him a chance against Sri Lanka if he shows any kind of early-season county form.

Although Hales, Bopara, Bresnan, Lumb and Buttler all had one significant score, no England batsman managed to sum more than 85 runs in the series. No one had the sort of run of form that allowed the side to build big totals around him. And a measure of the bowling is the fact that Ravi Bopara took as many wickets as the next two highest wicket-takers combined. Time and again it was Ravi Bopara, jointly with James Tredwell, who had to bring the situation back under control after a fast West Indian start. After the economy rate of 5.1 for Bopara and Tredwell, the next best was 8.2 for the debutant, Steve Parry and 9.5 for Jade Dernbach, who was nothing like as bad as he had been in Australia. In contrast, Wright, Stokes, Bresnan and Broad came out with the eye-watering combined figures of 13.5-0-163-3. Ravi Bopara comes in for some fairly vicious criticism from England fans, much of it unjustified. In this series he has justified, once again, his place in the side as one of the most reliable members.

One player who England are unlikely to use in Bangladesh is Luke Wright. Whatever his success in the Big Bash, a sequence of scores of 9, 0, 8, 1, 0, 0 and 7* cannot be ignored, especially when combined with minimally used bowling. However, with one or two ifs and buts, England’s T20 squad seems to be sorting itself out. Moeen Ali did not have a great tour of the Caribbean but his potential and ability to bowl useful spells of spin cannot be ignored. Probably ten of the places in the side are pretty well decided: Hales, Lumb, Morgan, Bopara, Buttler, Ali, Broad (if fit), Jordan, Parry and Tredwell are givens, with Jade Dernbach likely to be the tenth. The final place is probably between Bresnan, Bell and Woakes, with Bresnan likely to start favourite. It is not a great side, but it is not as bad a team as many will try to make out and, if the breaks fall the right way, could spring a surprise or two.

Australian Lazarus, Some English Consolation

 

 

Cricket 2014

 

Australian Lazarus, English consolation

 

March 6^th 2014

 

Yesterday Australia duly finished-off South Africa to win the 3^rd Test and the series. It has been a series of three incredibly one-sided matches, the smallest margin of victory was the 231 runs of South Africa’s win in the 2^nd Test.

Following on from the pattern last summer, the side that won the toss dominated all three Tests, scoring 397, 423 and 494-7d in the process, while dismissing the opposition for under 300 in every innings of the three Tests. It is a curious statistic, but South Africa’s 287 in the first innings and 265 in the second innings of the deciding Test were by some distance the best efforts in either innings by a side not batting first. In contrast, the side that had batted first declared in the second innings in all three Tests, losing a maximum of 5 wickets in the process.

In the 13 Tests that Australia has played since the start of the English summer the side batting first has taken a first innings lead in all but two games – the 1^st and 4^th Tests in England, both of them still won by the side batting first. In fact. The only time in the 13 Tests that a side batting first lost the match was England in Melbourne, where even a 51 run first innings lead was not enough to conjure a win.

Given this sequence of “bat first and dominate (usually win) the match”, one wonders what would have happened had England won the toss and batted in the first three Tests in Australia, or South Africa had batted first more than just the once in the recently concluded series. Would England have gone 3-down and had the fight knocked out of them? Would South Africa have capitulated so tamely? We will never know… What is clear is that, in all three series, the toss has had a disproportionate influence on the course of the matches.

The South Africa series also confirmed another trend in the 13 matches: despite the heroics of David Warner and Chris Rogers, their starts have frequently been diabolically bad, with the side being rescued time and again by the middle order and the tail.

At Trent Bridge, 117-9

At Lords, 128ao

At Old Trafford, 129-3

At Chester-le-Street, 76-4

At The Oval, 144-3

At Brisbane, 132-6

At Perth, 143-5

At Adelaide, 174-4

At Melbourne, 122-6

At Sydney, 97-5

At Centurion, 98-4

At Port Elizabeth, 128-6

The best start, by far, was in the Cape Town Test, when the third wicket fell at 217 in their first innings. Seven times at least half the side was out for under 150 and nine times the middle order and tail had to orquestrate a recovery from a distinctly unpromising position such as the 132-6 at Brisbane, or the 97-5 at Sydney. That Australia have won seven of eight matches this summer despite a stuttering top order that has only twice delivered a good start (counting the 174-4 at Adelaide as “good”), is a tribute to how well the lower order and the bowlers have rescued situations, leading to frequent jokes that they have followed Bradman’s example of reversing the batting order to confuse the opposition.

The revival of Australian fortunes has been astonishing, having been saved by bad light from losing 4-0 in England after a disastrously misjudged declaration at The Oval, they have roared back in a way that few people anticipated. Many fans were expecting a closer fight in Australia, as the Darren Lehmann regime started to take effect. However, there was an understandable feeling that Plan A was for Mitch Johnson to have one or, just possibly, two good matches and for Michael Clarke to have a couple of big innings and, between them, to win a Test or two. There was though no obvious Plan B. What has happened is that the new ball pairing of Ryan Harris and Mitch Johnson has proved (almost) irresistible. The one occasion that they had an off day – at Port Elizabeth, on what was expected to be a sporty pitch – the side was overwhelmed.

However, the fundamental problems have not been cured. The top order is still very fragile, but being bailed-out constantly by players such as Clarke and Haddin who are close to the end of their careers. One suspects that much of Mitch Johnson’s revival and effectiveness has been very much due to his new ball partner who is now going under the knife and whose career has been extended nervously Test by Test. Will Mitch be as effective without another bowler to support him who can bowl at high pace and with great stamina? Siddle is a good third seamer. Pattinson has promise, but seems not yet to be ready. Others are highly rated in Australia, but are yet to show themselves to be matchwinners. The other side of the coin though is that Brad Haddin has found a formidable lieutenant at marshalling recoveries in Steve Smith who is scoring big runs and starting to develop as a spinner. It will be interesting to see how Australia fare if they have to go into a Test without both Harris and Haddin.

While South Africa and Australia were playing out an extraordinary finish in Cape Town, England and the West Indies were struggling to look the part in the Caribbean. Although England have won the series, mainly thanks to adapting better to the conditions, the level of cricket was often dire. The batting was hit or miss and the death bowling from both sides appalling, to be charitable and describe it with no worse a term than that. South African and Australian fans were united in being dismissive and have every right to be. However, there are some encouraging signs for England: having thrown away the first game, they could have fallen apart as they did in Australia, instead they came back and won two tight finishes with a very young team, despite wobbles that showed just how low their confidence has fallen.

Ravi Bopara held together a chase to reach a target in a match that appeared to have slipped away in yet another miserable collapse. Joe Root has scored 167 runs in three innings and has centuries in the warm-up and the 3^rd ODI and taken wickets. Moeen Ali has had two useful innings and bowled well. Tredwell has been very economical and Steve Parry a revelation. Michael Lumb also has a century and Jos Buttler should have had one.

On the flip side, Ben Stokes showed that he is far from the finished article with a few, expensive overs and a grand total of 9 runs in three innings. And Luke Wright’s contribution from two matches was one run and not a single delivery.

It is hardly a recovery, but maybe just the beginning of better times to come.

A Win At Last

 

 

Ashes 2013

 

Yes, a win!

 

January 14^th 2014

 

 

The game against the Prime Minister’s XI was a major landmark in England’s tour: a first win for two months – in fact, the first time that England have avoided defeat in five games. The fact that it was against a side that some would say would not have challenged some of the English county 2^nd XIs, puts the match into perspective, as does the fact that Cook and Root managed just two runs – but, to look on the bright side, no ducks – between them, puts a bit of a dampener on things. The calls for Alistair Cook to drop himself from the side are getting louder.

In fact, five of the Prime Minister’s XI side have had international experience (two of them though are long retired) and all but a couple of players have played the First Class game. The new ball attack and first change was reasonably challenging and compounded England’s top order crisis. When you are 12-2 after 5 overs there is no way that you can spin that as anything other than a bad start. When the two wickets are the Captain and (the former) Boy Wonder, two of the key elements of your international side, it looks plain awful. It is getting hard to see how Root can be selected for the 2^nd ODI, unless as a bowler and Cook’s position is getting weaker by the game. Stuart Broad’s return for the 3^rd ODI could well see Alistair Cook being “rested”.

In contrast, Michael Carberry had another Michael Carberry innings: 47 in quick time and no hanging around bothering the scorers with logging a fifty. It should be enough to earn him a place, probably at the expense of Joe Root.

England’s recovery had a lot to do with the middle order “B” formation of Ballance, Bopara, Buttler and Bresnan, rudely interrupted by Eoin Morgan, who should bat at four in the next match to allow four B’s in a row to take their rightful place. Runs from Ballance, Buttler and Bresnan complemented a brief but violent Bopara innings. It was Bopara’s day, as he then finished the Prime Minister’s XI innings with four wickets and a runout in 27 balls. Ravi Bopara comes in for a lot of ridicule from fans, but has shown in the last year what a vital and valuable player he for England is in the limited overs game, with power hitting and useful wickets.

Chris Jordan added to his growing reputation with another mature performance, with an early wicket and final figures of 5-0-13-1. Tredwell and Bresnan gave solid support and, if Boyd Rankin was a little expensive, 2-39 from 8 overs was not the disaster that he might have feared. Chris Jordan knows that a couple of good performances in the remaining matches and some solid early season form should see him walking out against Sri Lanka in May, possibly even to take the new ball. It is not impossible that Jos Buttler could join him in the side, with Matt Prior given a chance to recover his form and enthusiasm with Sussex before the India series.