England’s limited-overs captain Eoin Morgan, bucking a trend set by his Test equivalent, Alastair Cook, this summer, opted against naming his side 24 hours before Tuesday’s first one-day international with Sri Lanka, with a genuine selection dilemma his reason for dodging the question, as opposed to deliberate obfuscation.
Morgan’s white-ball cricketers have made significant strides over the past 12 months, emerging from the wreckage of the 2015 World Cup to play a forward-thinking style of play that has beaten New Zealand and Pakistan, run Australia and South Africa close in 3-2 defeats – as if to remind us that their transformation remains incomplete – and reached the final of the World Twenty20 in India.
A significant ingredient in this upturn in fortunes, however, has been the presence of Ben Stokes, an all-rounder who, if his numbers are yet to stack up consistently in one-day cricket, offers balance that becomes immediately apparent when he is not available. For this five-match series with Sri Lanka, a team who are themselves rebuilding, this is now the case.
Stokes continues his recovery from knee surgery before the Test series with Pakistan next month and Morgan and the head coach, Trevor Bayliss, are pondering their options. With goals of winning the Champions Trophy next year and the 2019 World Cup and Stokes’s all‑action approach making further injuries likely, it is not a totally unwelcome puzzle to solve if this series is to inform plans for those two tournaments on home soil.
Rain on Trentside forced both teams to train inside on Monday denying them an extended look at a pitch on which Nottinghamshire have posted two 400-plus scores in 50-overs cricket this season, with Morgan and Bayliss to decide on the make-up of their side on the day of the match, the forecast for which is better.
Their predicament is simple: play the extra batsman and risk being short of bowling or draft in the extra seamer for Stokes and miss out on the chance to cash in on Jonny Bairstow’s stunning form.
Given Bairstow’s golden summer – he averages 94 across all formats – one option could be to leave out one of Moeen Ali and Adil Rashid, the two spinners in the team, in a move that, while still reducing six bowlers to five, would at least allow a fourth seamer, Chris Woakes, to be picked. Joe Root’s off-breaks, which burgled two wickets in the World Twenty20 final defeat by West Indies, may need come to the fore again as a result.
Morgan said: “Jonny has been in an incredible run of form for a very long time. The runs he has scored in Test and county cricket have been so many, it is actually a joke. The Stokes conundrum does present a couple of problems but either way, we have to be comfortable with what we go with. Ben leaves a huge hole and having him is a luxury.”
Were Stokes fit, then the captain himself would perhaps be under the greatest threat from Bairstow’s current glow. Morgan, whose leadership over the past 12 months has not been insignificant, it must be said, has gone 18 international innings without a half-century, since scoring 76 against Pakistan last November and admits runs are needed on a personal level. He said: “I feel reasonably good, I feel a lot better than I did in the winter, so hopefully on home soil I can get a score under my belt. When you want to get a score and it’s not actually happening, it’s nice to recognise the achievement of where you are, as opposed to just putting yourself under pressure to score runs all the time.”
Trent Bridge offers some comfort to Morgan in this regard too, as both the venue for the most recent of his eight ODI centuries – a blistering 113 against New Zealand last summer when 350 was chased down with six overs remaining – and a maiden Test ton, against a highly skilled Pakistan attack in 2010.
This opening fixture in front of an expected sell-out crowd in Nottingham gives England the chance to go 12-2 up in the ‘Super Series’ – a dormie position in the multi-format points system. Morgan admits the scoring method devised by Andrew Strauss, the director of cricket who wisely opted to retain him as captain last year, is not at the forefront of his mind; instead he wants to “reconnect” with the cricket that wowed audiences in 2015.
Morgan said: “It’s a key summer in that we’re 12 months down the road and we have built a lot of confidence. There’s a bit more expectation on us as a side and it’s important to relish that expectation. The Champions Trophy is this time next year and the World Cup is two years later so as the home side both times we’re looking to put in performances, particularly at home, that people don’t see us as outsiders.”
Sri Lanka, who sit fifth in the ODI rankings and would need to avoid defeat to prevent sixth-placed England jumping above them, come into the series on the back of a convincing 2-0 win over Ireland last week but have lost Shaminda Eranga, the right-arm seamer, to an illegal bowling action and, more seriously, a possible heart condition.
Eranga remains in hospital in Dublin as he awaits test results, after reporting a racing pulse during the warm-up for the 136-run win at Malahide on Sunday. He would, however, have been unavailable to play in th ODI series after being reported during the Tests for a suspect action that was proved to be illegal during official analysis in Loughborough.
Sri Lanka emerged 3-2 winners in the corresponding series two years ago, the decider of which ended in acrimony when spinner Sachithra Senanayake ran out Jos Buttler, who was backing up at the non-striker’s end, in an incident that saw Alastair Cook, then England captain, accuse them of “crossing the line” and prompt a debate about the spirit of cricket.
Mathews upheld his team’s appeal for the so-called “Mankading” at the time – the controversial but legal mode of dismissal named after the Indian who first effected it against Australia in 1947 – and, ahead of this year’s encounter, claims he would have no issue doing the same again should the situation arise.
He said: “We are not looking forward to doing the Mankading. We will play our cricket within the rules. If someone is trying to take advantage of the rules then we will probably warn him. But the recent Test series was played in very good spirit, so hopefully we’ll play the ODI series in very good spirit, too.
“I still stand by it, because we warned him twice. That’s all we could possibly do at that time.”
England (possible): Alex Hales, Jason Roy, Joe Root, Eoin Morgan (c), Jonny Bairstow, Jos Buttler (wk), Moeen Ali, Chris Woakes, David Willey, Chris Jordan, Steven Finn
Sri Lanka (possible): Kusal Perera, Danushka Gunathilaka, Kusal Mendis, Upul Tharanga, Dinesh Chandimal (wk), Angelo Mathews (capt), Dasun Shanaka, Farveez Maharoof, Seekkuge Prasanna, Nuwan Pradeep, Suranga Lakmal
