England will be without their regular one-day opening pair of batsmen, Alastair Cook and Ian Bell, and their regular opening pair of bowlers, James Anderson and Stuart Broad, and their first choice-spinner Graeme Swann, and their regular captain. Eoin Morgan has led England, in place of Cook, only against his native Ireland.
No Cook, no Bell, no Anderson, no Broad, no Swann, and if and when Kevin Pietersen plays it will be on only one sound knee. England’s second-choice pace attack looks particularly thin, as Steve Finn is not yet back to his best and the rest are raw recruits. Australia, with their heavyweight opening pair of David Warner and Aaron Finch, could inflict record-breaking damage, just as they did in the first T20 international.
So it will be a surprise if Australia do not win by a bigger margin than England’s 3-0 in the Tests. Six of Australia’s players, including Michael Clarke, will be extra-motivated by their memories of losing the Test series – not to mention their Champions Trophy match in June, the first in this series of interminable fixtures between the two countries.
All of England’s selections were voluntary in that the key players are being rested, and were not dictated by injury. The dialogue in the selection meeting between Andy Flower, who has overall charge as well as being the Test coach, and Ashley Giles, England’s coach for 50-over and T20 cricket, might therefore have been one of those occasions that Giles referred to back in April.
“There could well be a situation down the line where Andy says you can’t have him (ie, a certain player), and I say well, I want him,” Giles said then. “But ultimately Andy is in charge, he’s team director, and we’ll have those discussions if we have to have them behind closed doors and come out in agreement. Ultimately it’s the good of English cricket: it’s a cliché but that’s what we’re here for.”
This situation has subsequently become more delicate. Straight after the Ashes series, Flower said nothing to confirm or reject reports that he was going to stand down as England’s team director after the return series this winter. He has never stated in public that he wants the job long-term, and now he has not even said that he wants the job short-term, beyond January.
A daringly planned and executed one-day series in the next fortnight against Australia – a 3-2 victory against all the odds – would put Giles in better than pole position to succeed Flower as the coach in charge of all formats, if the job arises in January. Following this one-day series, England play no more limited-overs matches until after the Ashes.
A 5-0 defeat in the next fortnight, on the other hand, will look like a serious blot on Giles’s CV to the independent selection panel — which is not composed solely of former players who will understand the circumstances – that the England and Wales Cricket Board usually constitutes to make the appointment of team director.
Amid these politics, and confronted by Clarke’s highly motivated side, any England reserve who does put his hand up can expect to be drafted into World Cup considerations. The next instalment, in Australia and New Zealand, is less than a year and a half away, and given England’s unrelenting schedule it is inconceivable that all three of Anderson, Pietersen and Swann will still be going by then.
England’s first-choice one-day team were not good enough to beat India in the Champions Trophy final at Edgbaston, so several new faces will have to be introduced if they are going to challenge – without home advantage – India and the two host countries. And all the while these new faces have been growing up without ever playing 50-over county cricket, a brilliantly cunning plan to ensure that England never win their first global 50-over trophy.
An outbreak of common sense will occur next year when the ban on 50-over county cricket – in place since 2010 – is lifted. England’s cricketers will then be able to compete in this format without any hands tied behind their back.
Five England players hoping to make an impression ...
Michael Carberry: Brilliant strokeplayer underestimated by more than one county but not, at last, by England. Hit 146 off 132 balls for the Lions against Bangladesh A to gain promotion.
Chris Jordan: Now 24, has grown into his body and can sustain real pace. Can hit a long ball, too. Key challenge is to develop the variations and subtleties for limited-overs.
Jamie Overton: Tall, strong and quick for 19. Has a fine action, everything going in a straight line, with some outswing. Bowled well in Australia last winter for the Under-19s.
Boyd Rankin: The latest signing – or poaching – from Ireland has yet to play an ODI for England but at 6ft7in gets plenty of bounce to force the batsman back. Aged 29, he is, alas, no batsman.
Ben Stokes: Destined to be England’s No?6 in more than one format. Has speeded up as a bowler, gets more bounce than the injured Woakes, and has hit seven first-class centuries.
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