While it has taken the rare and controversial dismissal of Ben Stokes at Lord’s to spark the one-day series to life it has been the clinical performances of the Australians that, in theory, make Tuesday’s day-nighter at Old Trafford a must-win affair for England.
Two-nil down with three to play, Eoin Morgan’s side are certainly finding life against the world champions much tougher than against the early-summer tourists, New Zealand. But their head coach, Trevor Bayliss, appears less concerned by immediate results than performances.
Set the task of competing for the 2017 Champions Trophy and the 2019 World Cup, the Australian has an eye on the future and getting experience under the belts of a rebooted side. In order to get his team tournament-ready, this may involve sucking up defeats to learn more about individuals.
“We want to win every series we play in. That’s not possible,” he said. “We’ve also got a four-year plan. To do well and hopefully win the next World Cup we’ve got to have a depth of players and reserves ready to go. If we never give some of those guys on the fringes a go, we won’t know if they’ve got the goods.
“We’d have more people on our back if we got to the next World Cup and we had the wrong team and we didn’t play well. We want to take our time, make sure we get the best team we can put on the park, playing the best cricket at the time. If that doesn’t happen to be good enough, we’ve given it a shot.”
Accordingly Bayliss appears in no mind to make a knee-jerk reaction to the two batting collapses that scuppered their run chases in Southampton and London. Having resisted the urge to put Moeen Ali at No3 in the absence of the rested Joe Root – how they have missed their talisman – England should give James Taylor another chance to show he can push on from two stop-start scores in the 40s.
One change is guaranteed, with the wicketkeeper Jos Buttler rested amid a personal slump in form with the bat and replaced by Jonny Bairstow, who may have a point to make after winning his previous one-day international against New Zealand at Chester-le-Street almost single-handedly with 83 from 60 balls.
While England’s batting, so crippled and outdated in last winter’s World Cup, has shown green shoots of recovery this summer – it fired against New Zealand but is yet to do so against Steve Smith’s side – the bowling continues to lack bite.
In this era of fielding restrictions and Twenty20 hitters, wicket-taking capability has been prescribed by some as the best tool to keep totals down. But only once in the seven one-dayers this summer, with 408 on the board against New Zealand at Edgbaston, has the attack taken more than two wickets in the first 25 overs, while in their 19 matches this calendar year England have bowled the opposition out only four times, compared with Australia’s 12 times in 16.
Asked for an appraisal of the attack so far, Bayliss replied: “We have probably over-pitched too much in the first couple of games and let the Australians hit easy fours. We have to make it as difficult as possible for opposition batters to score runs and through that you will take wickets, especially on the one-day wickets. We have to bowl to our field better than we have done.”
Bayliss admitted he expects both of his left-arm options, Reece Topley and David Willey, to play during this series. Whom they replace remains the question, with Chris Woakes the sole seamer on either side at Lord’s to go at under five runs an over and Liam Plunkett having only just come back into the team. Both, however, went wicketless.
A crumb of hope comes in knowing Australia have been forced into at least three changes themselves, with David Warner’s broken thumb and soft-tissue injuries to the ever-fragile all-rounder Shane Watson and seamer Nathan Coulter-Nile ending their involvement in the series early.
The World Cup winner Aaron Finch, who has hit four centuries against England in one-day and Twenty20 cricket, steps up to open after proving his fitness for Yorkshire’s second XI following a broken foot, while the fast bowler James Pattinson – action remodelled to prevent further back issues – should play.
The third vacancy appears a call between the spin-bowling all-rounder Ashton Agar – last seen for his country in the 2013 Ashes, where he made a world record 98 from No11 – and the seamer all-rounder Marcus Stoinis, whose contribution as a sub fielder on Saturday was a dropped catch at third man off Taylor.
England (possible): Hales, Roy, Taylor, Morgan (c), Stokes, Bairstow (wk), Ali, Rashid, Plunkett, Woakes, Finn.
Australia (possible): Finch, Burns, Smith (c), Bailey, Maxwell, Wade (wk), Marsh, Agar, Starc, Cummins, Pattinson.
