England thread

[Rob22888]

I think Bairstow's white ball position could be under threat, if he doesn't put in some good performances in the T20 format next year. His position certainly shouldn't be safe given England's depth of batting talent.

I remember in 2019, after them 3 defeats England looked a totally different side when Roy came back in and came off being ultra aggressive opening the batting. That successful Roy & Bairstow partnership was so critical, and I think England have really missed that in this tournament with Bairstow failing and Malan being a bit more traditional. That imitation of the opposition at the start of our innings has been lacking.

I know it was Ireland, but the way Salt & Jacks came out in that game at Bristol and whacked 100 in the first 8 overs is the sort of approach we need to get back to.

 

[ma1978]

Yeah, that baffles me about English cricket; they have the resources to be powerful in all formats but have had the mindset for decades they need to excessively focus on one.

They did that for much of the 2000s in the Vaughan/Fletcher era especially with regards to seeing ODIs as an irritating sideshow.

The reason is embodied both in the excessive love for Zak Crawley and the hatred for Kevin Pietersen which represents a broader issue In British culture where social cohesion and “soundness” is excessively valued and the mediocre are protected, and socially disruptive genius is ostracised.

English culture chews up talented outsiders in favor of mediocre conformity. There is also excessive tolerance for losing as long as social cohesion is maintained (good sportsmanship etc).

No way this would be tolerated in the provinces

 

[kevinw]

The reason is embodied both in the excessive love for Zak Crawley and the hatred for Kevin Pietersen which represents a broader issue In British culture where social cohesion and “soundness” is excessively valued and the mediocre are protected, and socially disruptive genius is ostracised.

English culture chews up talented outsiders in favor of mediocre conformity. There is also excessive tolerance for losing as long as social cohesion is maintained (good sportsmanship etc).

No way this would be tolerated in the provinces

Pietersen could've just not acted like a complete weapon most of the time.

 

[ma1978]

Pietersen could've just not acted like a complete weapon most of the time.

How is this relevant? You’re looking at him to bat middle order, not join your Pall Malls member club or attend the village garden party

 

[SteveNZ]

The reason is embodied both in the excessive love for Zak Crawley and the hatred for Kevin Pietersen which represents a broader issue In British culture where social cohesion and “soundness” is excessively valued and the mediocre are protected, and socially disruptive genius is ostracised.

English culture chews up talented outsiders in favor of mediocre conformity. There is also excessive tolerance for losing as long as social cohesion is maintained (good sportsmanship etc).

No way this would be tolerated in the provinces

Not sure this is quite true.

KP threw his captain and country under a bus in the most unfathomable way. I'm sure he'd bring up tall poppy syndrome, but that is often a convenient excuse for piss poor behaviour. OK, he had his detractors before that, but when you get a team dumping your gear bag over a balcony early at Notts, and otherwise genial senior players like Strauss and co don't want a bar of you, maybe it's worth looking in the mirror as to what you're doing that is affecting the environment. Runs aren't a panacea for that.

And excessive love for Crawley? The guy has been pilloried, justifiably for his lack of run scoring but unjustifiably for his upbringing. Valued in the England environment, but not in society as you are suggesting. Not at all.

How is this relevant? You’re looking at him to bat middle order, not join your Pall Malls member club or attend the village garden party

You're looking for him to score runs, but he also has to perform a duty as a team mate. When you're in changing rooms, on fields, in hotel rooms, in that team environment for so long, it's massively relevant. You can't be a c. Plenty of examples in plenty of sports as to why you can't. As I said above, a weight of runs doesn't particularly justify it.

 

[GIMH]

I think it was @vic_orthdox who said at the time of KP’s first axing, that you can’t bat with someone you don’t trust. It’s quite simple when you put it in that context.

 

[Owzat]

I'd get rid, we have younger options in T20 especially. Buttler opens in T20, he can do so with Jacks.

I'd ditch all from the World Cup 29+ and maybe only retain Rashid for a bit until someone who can bowl spin well enough in ODIs is found

bit hard to do that in English conditions as not really a spinners' paradise but can mix it up, play T20is and ODIs, Rashid some, other options some, not as if the skillsets are different just one much shorter


BUT I think the reason England end up with the same old faces is because of a lad's club and indeed pressure to put out "best XI" for bilateral series, even though there is plenty of talent about that could do a job even if the "best XI" in theory is the supposed optimum chance.

Does beggar belief that in preparation for this World Cup, and we'll write off 2020 (if only that could be said of it's phonetic version/format!) but since 2021 England have played in just India 30 months ago, and more recently Bangladesh. Surely a series against South Africa, Australia or New Zealand, even a Triangular, could have been arranged in UAE or even perhaps India with a bit of negotiation. FWIW in India

Livingstone 3-0-20-1 - terrific, the spin option they take along back then and now bowled a whopping three overs, terrific thinking
Wood 5/109 - did well then, bit expensive mind
Stokes 4/121 - was not going to bowl much if at all this time, but did ok
Topley 3/116 - did better this time around, but then wasn't just playing India
Curran (S) 2/138 - was it India, was it playing in India, or was it Curran.............?
Rashid 2/73 - has the track record to not read a lot into that, bowling to the masters of spin in spin central..
Curran (T) 2/146 - never seen the fascination with him TBH
Ali 1/114 - seasoned pro, should have stayed off the scene, now volunteering himself to make way for youth, they should all be!

grand preparation, one tour 2.5 years ago with much to be said for it, England could easily have said that Stokes, Ali, Root, probably Bairstow and anyone else playing much Test cricket could have stayed out of ODIs and put an ODI side together preparing for this World Cup when England were playing Tests - hence no involvement of Test players, well maybe Bairstow, maybe not

I would guess revenue would be the watch word for ECB, but it shouldn't be hard to schedule such that the ODIs home or away were played when England Test team weren't, but ultimately you can't prepare properly for a World Cup tournament if you're going to play lots in England and other dissimilar countries to the one it is being held in....


Root has been almost selfish in playing so many formats, averaging 27.52 in ODIs 2020-2023, he doesn't add a lot to the side that someone else couldn't, a Roy or Hain or anyone else

Same for Ali, 2020-2023 averaging 50.91 with ball in ODIs, 5.49 ER some may bleat but wickets undoubtedly give sides control in all formats, ERs for doh, wickets for dough. averaging 22.19 with bat not bad, not great hand in hand with a poor bowling average and SR only Root would be proud of

He should probably skulk off before someone (else) sees what he isn't adding, if someone thinks not taking wickets win games then clearly hasn't been paying much attention to how it worked out for England!

 

[ma1978]

Not sure this is quite true.

KP threw his captain and country under a bus in the most unfathomable way. I'm sure he'd bring up tall poppy syndrome, but that is often a convenient excuse for piss poor behaviour. OK, he had his detractors before that, but when you get a team dumping your gear bag over a balcony early at Notts, and otherwise genial senior players like Strauss and co don't want a bar of you, maybe it's worth looking in the mirror as to what you're doing that is affecting the environment. Runs aren't a panacea for that.

And excessive love for Crawley? The guy has been pilloried, justifiably for his lack of run scoring but unjustifiably for his upbringing. Valued in the England environment, but not in society as you are suggesting. Not at all.



You're looking for him to score runs, but he also has to perform a duty as a team mate. When you're in changing rooms, on fields, in hotel rooms, in that team environment for so long, it's massively relevant. You can't be a c. Plenty of examples in plenty of sports as to why you can't. As I said above, a weight of runs doesn't particularly justify it.

and this is why English sport underperforms, a team environment adapts to its stars, stars don’t adapt to the team environment

English team environments are entirely too adaptable to genial mediocrity and not adaptable enough to mercurial stardom

 

[ma1978]

I think it was @vic_orthdox who said at the time of KP’s first axing, that you can’t bat with someone you don’t trust. It’s quite simple when you put it in that context.

it’s easier to bag with someone you don’t trust but is good than someone who isn’t good but is a nice bloke

this is a uniquely English tolerance for mediocrity

 

[Blenkinsop]

Nah. Pietersen was a bellend and poisoned the well.

 

[ma1978]

Nah. Pietersen was a bellend and poisoned the well.

these are the justifications the English use to tolerate mediocrity. It’s poor management. You have to find a way to make your pillocks work, he wouldn’t have been jettisoned in SA or Australia. Warne and Waugh hated each other but they made it work

 

[SteveNZ]

these are the justifications the English use to tolerate mediocrity. It’s poor management. You have to find a way to make your pillocks work, he wouldn’t have been jettisoned in SA or Australia. Warne and Waugh hated each other but they made it work

OK...name one international side that has properly managed pariahs? Because the most obvious one to me is Jesse Ryder, who eventually NZ got sick of. His team mates got sick of him not preparing properly. Different to KP, I know in that sense, but he is an obvious one that I also hear 'was mismanaged' but anyone in that environment will tell you he was lucky to last as long as he did. I'd be genuinely interested to hear if there are other examples.

I think you'd have a point if you said you had to be part of the 'in crowd' to be part of the England set-up through the late 00s and 10s. It was very hard to forge a career if you weren't mates with Prior, Broad, Anderson, Swann etc, or if they didn't rate you. But that's not much to do with English cricket as much as those egos.

 

[Red_Ink_Squid]

Root has been almost selfish in playing so many formats

He plays two. And only irregularly played the one he's struggled in during that timeframe.

If anything I think he's underperformed in this WC because he hasn't played enough of them. And if he is inexplicably washed in the format he hadn't played enough for anyone to actually know that. We knew his record during this WC cycle had been poor, but seriously, who wouldn't have picked Joe Root?

 

[Ashes81]

these are the justifications the English use to tolerate mediocrity. It’s poor management. You have to find a way to make your pillocks work, he wouldn’t have been jettisoned in SA or Australia. Warne and Waugh hated each other but they made it work

With all due respect mate you're talking out of your backside.

The major reason that England underperform in most sports, cricket included, is not because maverick talents like Pietersen are mismanaged.

The major cause is a lack of investment in sport, and that many sports like cricket are played by a relatively small % of the population.

Sport in state schools, football apart, is barely played. The overwhelming majority of state schools play little, if any cricket.

There is little or no access to qualified coaches and there is little or no desire to change that.

In my opinion that probably has more of an impact than the likes of Pietersen being mismanaged, if indeed he was.

 

[ma1978]

I think you'd have a point if you said you had to be part of the 'in crowd' to be part of the England set-up through the late 00s and 10s. It was very hard to forge a career if you weren't mates with Prior, Broad, Anderson, Swann etc, or if they didn't rate you. But that's not much to do with English cricket as much as those egos.

this was in fact my point (maybe not well articulated). And yes I blame English cricket for that. That’s poor management; you need to have a setup that says I don’t care who is mates with whom, we care about performance and winning. Pietersen’s performance was never in question.

And that focus of mateness / social cohesion over performance is a broader problem in English society beyond the cricket. Look at the City of London as another example.

 

[Pup Clarke]

Pietersen was the architect of his own downfall. Has an extroadinary ego and doesn't even attempt to hide it

 

[ma1978]

Pietersen was the architect of his own downfall. Has an extroadinary ego and doesn't even attempt to hide it

who got hurt from it? English cricket

 

[Pup Clarke]

Not really when you've got a bloke called Joe Root churning out runs for fun circa 2015 onwards

 

[ma1978]

Not really when you've got a bloke called Joe Root churning out runs for fun circa 2015 onwards

How is this related?

 

[Pup Clarke]

What I'm saying is that Pietersen hasn't been badly missed or anything because a world class player like Root took over where he left off. So English cricket wasn't really 'hurt' by his retirement