This summer was supposed to be a reset for England but already it is shaping up as a reckoning. As New Zealand savoured a famous 253‑run win at the Oval, Matt Henry needing just 48 minutes to go through Joe Root and a crepe‑paper tail, the team they defeated and the setup behind it appeared in a state of disarray.
Like New Zealand as a whole, Henry was excellent in his execution. He snared all five wickets on the final morning to roll out England for 209 and to finish with 11 for 109 in the Test. As well as the best match figures against England by a New Zealander, Henry sent memories back to their victory at the same venue in 1999 – a result that left the home supporters chanting: “We’ve got the worst team in the world.”
This England team are not quite down there yet but a sixth defeat from their past eight Tests is an unwelcome trajectory. The series is level at 1-1 and Ben Stokes and Gus Atkinson will return for the decider at Trent Bridge that starts on Thursday. But what may have otherwise been a low‑key summer is now on a knife-edge.
Root tried to be chipper in what he hopes will prove his last press conference as a Test captain, saying he enjoyed the week and that the rookies at his disposal showed glimpses of their promise. Problem was, that lack of experience left England a distant second in every department and all momentum is now with the tourists.
The final target of 463 was always unlikely, albeit a Test match played on an excellent surface ultimately hinged on England’s poor second day. New Zealand wriggled free with the bat in the morning amid some ropey tactics from Root and a 100-run first-innings deficit was the upshot after Henry first got to work with the ball.
The final day was only ever a formality and from the moment Henry nipped one into Root’s pads on 77 in his second over of the day, Tom Blundell once again up to the stumps, a collapse seemed likely. Jordan Cox hit some crisp shots en route to 25, but was last man out, England having lost five for 27 in just 60 balls of play. Surrey had sold £20 tickets with no refund clause but still decided to give 50% back.
Will those higher up at the England and Wales Cricket Board also be considering a rethink? Keeping the leadership together after the horlicks they made of the Ashes tour last winter was a bold play and after the win at Lord’s they thought a new page had been turned. But that late night for Stokes and Atkinson in Chelsea reopened old wounds before a grisly defeat south of the river compounded them.
Expecting the return of Stokes to be frictionless is probably optimistic. For all that he and the head coach, Brendon McCullum, claimed to have moved on from their differences in Australia, things are likely to be awkward. Stokes has not always seen eye‑to-eye with the ECB either and trust here may be in even shorter supply.
McCullum and Rob Key, the team’s managing director, were angry at Stokes in particular for breaking the agreed curfew after Lord’s, and while Stokes held his hands up to the error at first he is then said to have pushed back, emotionally, when it turned out this would mean missing a game. Reports that he even mentioned retiring have not been denied.
As well as it being in his character, this also appears a response to the precedent set by Harry Brook’s late-night incident in Wellington in November – before a game, not after – and the fact he missed no cricket. There also seems to have been some ambiguity around the midnight curfew that was triggered in turn by the Brook error.
McCullum’s admission that the finer details of the “Cinderella rule” were not written down appears to have given all parties a slight get-out. The head coach insisted, however, that “everyone knew” what was expected of them. Being in a joint called the Rex Rooms at 1am, where their security guard was punched during a melee involving rugby players, was very much not in keeping with this.
While Stokes is not blameless – albeit the ECB concluded he was not present when Atkinson was the victim of two “unprovoked” attacks – player uncertainty over whether the end of a match was still bound by the midnight curfew speaks to the main question mark over this regime: a lack of attention to detail.
This led to the absence of any meaningful pre-Ashes preparation left the bowlers in particular undercooked and left the coaching staff failing to flag up the perils of driving on the up in Perth and Brisbane. It was a tour that was supposed to lead to lessons being learned yet even the imposition of a simple curfew is done half cock.
There is a legitimate question to be asked as to whether they are actively trying to fix the team’s problems when a wily seamer such as Henry operates with the wicketkeeper up to the stumps. It is not a new thing. Alex Carey did not invent it. England have struggled with this form of claustrophobia for three years now.
There are four days to find a solution before Trent Bridge, where Stokes will doubtless get a hero’s welcome when his name is called out. For all that he reopened the winter’s wounds with that needless late night, his stock is far higher in the eyes of England’s supporters than that of the management.
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