Three months out from the World Cup, and I find myself wondering “how soon is it too soon to accept that England haven’t a chance of winning the thing?” There is, I suspect, a correlation with age here. I reckon the older hands, those whose memories, say, stretch back to the antediluvian opening combination of Geoff Boycott and Mike Brearley (average ODI strike rate, 49.53 between them) England fielded in 1979, have long since resigned themselves to the inevitability of the team’s exit in the quarter-finals this time around. Younger sorts will wait, I’d guess, at least until England have been shellacked by Australia at the MCG in their first match.
The youngest of all will make the mistake of hanging on even after England’s scrappy three-wicket win against Bangladesh in the fifth game of the group stages, in the futile hope it is a herald of better things ahead in the knockout stages. Thinking about it, that “s” was redundant. The line should have read “… the futile hope it is a herald of betting things ahead in the group stage [singular]”. Will it be India or South Africa who knock out England in the quarter-finals? That will depend on whether England can beat New Zealand, in a day-night match at the Westpac in Wellington, or Sri Lanka, at the same venue. England have played twice record at that ground, by the way, and been thrashed on both occasions.
There is an old, and well-worn quote, from the John Cleese movie Clockwise, which has been so often used to sum up the experience of being an England fan that it’s become something of a cliche around these pages. “It’s not the despair, Laura, I can take the despair. It’s the hope I can’t stand.” When it comes to England in the World Cup, it’s not the despair, and it’s not the hope either. There isn’t any hope. There hasn’t been since Wasim Akram clean-bowled Allan Lamb and Chris Lewis in successive balls back in ’92. Our aspirations for England’s World Cup campaigns are much more modest.
A hundred would be good. We’ve had only four of those in the last five tournaments (take a bow Andrew Strauss, Kevin Pietersen, twice, and Graeme Hick). All the better if it actually leads to England winning the game, which has happened only twice in that time (step down, Strauss). Better still if that hundred is in a game England won that also happened to count for something, which has only happened once (step down, KP). Best of all if that hundred counts for something and isn’t in a match against the Netherlands, which hasn’t happened at all. A couple of close matches along the way would be pleasing too. We got that much, at least, in 2011.
Right now, England are at the butt-end of what has been their single worst year of one-day cricket since 2006. Back then, they lost 14 matches out of the 20 games they played. This time around, they’ve lost 11 out of 18. The games slip out of mind so quickly, even the more ardent followers can be forgiven for having forgotten a few of the lowlights of the last 12 months. A quick recap then; in January, a 4-1 defeat to Australia, in May and June, a 3-2 defeat to Sri Lanka, and in August and September, a 3-1 defeat to India. In 2014, they’ve the worst record of any of the major teams, with the solitary exception of Pakistan. And, of course, when it comes to Pakistan statistical indicators of form are worth as much as a fistful of marks were in Weimar Germany.
England find themselves, then, with the span of the winter to try to solve a puzzle they’ve been working on not just for the four years since their 10-wicket trouncing by Sri Lanka in the quarter-finals of the last competition but the 40 years since the ICC first decided to stage the World Cup. It seems to have become one of the great riddles of the ages. Why is a raven like a writing desk? What was the meaning of the five orange pips in the envelope? What must England do to win the World Cup? England fans have seen a succession of coaches, captains, players and administrators grapple with this issue over the years. It’s been a bit like watching a grizzly bear try to make sense of a teapot. One-day cricket isn’t rocket science but England seem to think it is. That’s the only way to explain their obsession with idea of “building a platform” to “accelerate off”.
This time around, their strategy – eureka! – has been to agree with Cricket Australia to shuffle the Ashes series around to ensure England would, for once, have a clear run-in to the World Cup, instead of heading into it off the back of an arduous Test series. And so, they will play a seven-match series against Sri Lanka during the rainy season, and then, after a Christmas at home, a short triangular tournament in Australia. The value of which, in terms of how well it will allow them to acclimatise to conditions, is only slightly undermined by the fact three of their first four group games are in New Zealand.
Besides which, you just know, even now, that they’ll still be trying to figure out what their starting XI is. The bowling attack, we can assume, will be built around Stuart Broad and James Anderson. The odd thing about this is that the two of them haven’t played an ODI together since the Champions Trophy final, back in June 2013. In their absence, England have been using a rotating cast of eight different men, the most successful of whom, statistically at least, is one of the few they’ve actually ruled out – Boyd Rankin. He took 10 wickets at an average of 24 and an economy of 4.5 in seven games.
Then there is the Rubik’s cube of the batting lineup. As soon as Peter Moores has settled one of the six spots, he flips the thing around and finds that another of the five is in a mess again. No one has had the luxury of batting in the same position in each of the 18 games England have played this year, or even in the 10 that Moores has been in charge of. Ian Bell was opening with Cook, but he was pushed down to No3 so that Alex Hales could come in. That knocked Gary Ballance out of the side. Hales has just been dropped so that Moeen Ali can go up to open, back where he was in March. Although in England’s last match-but-one he was down at No7. That now seems to be Ben Stokes’s spot, though he has also been in at No3, No8, and No5. Jos Buttler is at No6 unless Ravi Bopara is playing, then he’s at No7, or the overs have been reduced, then he’s at No4.
The infuriating thing about all this is that England seem to have as much good young batting talent in the squad as they at any point in recent memory. They have a bunch of batsmen, from Hales, through Ian Bell and Joe Root, Ali, Morgan, Buttler, Ballance, Stokes, even Bopara, all capable of playing match-winning innings, a cracking crop of all-rounders, and some canny old quick bowlers. Even some handy part-time spinners. So if they could just get their house in order in the next 12 games then, well … Ah, there she is. That old devil hope. You’d think I’d know better by now.
GET WELL, PHIL
On Tuesday morning, as The Spin was about to be sent out, word came through from Australia that Phil Hughes is in a critical condition in hospital. He was hit on the head while playing for South Australia against New South Wales. There is little to say at this point, other than to add another wish to the many already made by cricket-lovers around the world that he makes a full and quick recovery. Hughes is the second batsman to be seriously injured in recent days. Ahmed Shehzad was hit while playing for Pakistan against New Zealand. His skull was fractured.
Without wishing to indulge in speculation, I will make one prediction. In the coming days we will, most likely, be told by some pundits that risk of serious injury, even death, is unavoidable in both professional and recreational sport. Which is true, but that doesn’t mean the authorities shouldn’t be doing everything they can to minimise that risk. I know from first-hand experience of covering the issue that rugby union, for instance, has spent far too long debating the practicality of improving health and safety measures, and worrying about whether such changes would be detrimental to the spirit of the game.
Cricket would do well to save itself the time and settle this question right now. If more can be done to protect players, then more should be done. That may mean introducing substitutes who can bat and bowl in the event of concussion injuries. It certainly means reviewing existing medical procedures to ensure they are in line with best practice, and also, most pertinently, investing time, effort, and money in trying to improve helmet design to ensure players are afforded the maximum possible protection.
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