It was only a few weeks ago that English cricket was reckoned to be in crisis; the team was losing to Pakistan in Test cricket and to Scotland in a 50-over game while the sages in the offices of the England and Wales Cricket Board were concocting a camel of a competition, obviously designed by a committee, which attracted ridicule from just about everyone in the game not employed by it.
Now, in the week when our football team have won a World Cup match, cricket has stolen the headlines after England smashed 481 for six in 50 overs against Australia at Trent Bridge. On Wednesday on the Today programme at 8.25am it was Trevor Bayliss rather than Gareth Southgate trying to explain a recent triumph.
For the moment the crisis on the field seems to have abated; the calls for the England coach to be sacked are not quite so deafening. Eoin Morgan is rightly heralded for his part in a remarkable metamorphosis. Thanks to the players the mood has changed – though the disruptive plans for the 2020 domestic season, which are likely to diminish the 50-over game that has attracted so many of these headlines, remain.
Morgan deserves to be praised as a brilliant captain, though not an infallible one. Bowling first in Edinburgh gave Scotland a chance of winning just as Tim Paine’s decision to insert England on a fine pitch at Trent Bridge contributed to his side’s humiliation.
Morgan makes many excellent decisions on the pitch but his greatest achievement in his three years in the job is a more wide-ranging, indefinable one; since 2016 he has managed to nurture an environment that allows his team to play with absolute freedom; in fact he insists upon it. Now he trusts his players to go for it and they trust him to back them. That represents some transformation.
It does not always work like this. During the last World Cup in Australasia, when Morgan had been catapulted into the captaincy at the last minute, the coach, Peter Moores, declared, rather like Morgan does now, that he wanted his side to play fearlessly. But then he picked Gary Ballance to bat at No 3 and no one really believed. England’s performances were shockingly poor.
Morgan, by his own example, by his crystal-clear belief about how England should play and by his influence in selection, has become far more credible. He clearly means what he says. With this relentlessly positive attitude Jonny Bairstow, Jason Roy, Alex Hales and Jos Buttler alongside himself and the only batsman offering ballast, Joe Root, are going to score a lot of runs very quickly more often than not. As things stand, Ben Stokes needs to be properly fit and bowling well to return.
Part of the deal is that they will occasionally implode playing like that but that does not matter much in five-match series such as this one against Australia. Firing four out of five times is fine. It is more challenging in a World Cup, which is what England are building towards. We remember World Cup winners rather than occupiers of the No 1 slot in the International Cricket Council’s ODI table. So the obstacle that remains for Morgan and his happy side is to deliver in the knockout stage of an ICC tournament, possibly on a surface that does not encourage the carefree strokeplay of Trent Bridge. There is so much more spice and tension in those games but as the team gain in experience, expectations can continue to rise.
There was a time when England were at their best in ODI cricket on bowler-friendly pitches upon which cagey batsmen could scramble just enough runs while their seam bowlers set to work. Now England are lethal on belting batting surfaces. No one else can keep up with them.
It is not just the batsmen to whom Morgan – and Bayliss – has the capacity to give confidence. Currently the captain’s greatest assets in the field are his spin bowlers – how often have we said that about England teams? In this series Moeen Ali and Adil Rashid have taken most wickets and been the most economical. It is clear to onlookers, but more importantly to the bowlers themselves, that Morgan trusts them as well.
This does not mean that this pair could suddenly transform into magical Test bowlers. It was instructive to listen to Kumar Sangakkara on Sky explaining how Rashid, in particular, is so much better with a white ball than a red one, not just because he has more confidence; he has more protection as well with a minimum of four fielders on the boundary for the odd stray delivery.
Morgan even seems to trust his pacemen despite the fact that their assets in terms of pace/swing can seem so modest. What he does know is important: that even if the ball sails into the stands, which happens so regularly now, their heads will not drop and they will bound in once more.
So there is plenty to celebrate. But the blunt, not to say curmudgeonly, truth is that we will only really remember this side when they win a trophy rather than break a batting record. Perhaps they can do that in 12 months’ time.
