Tag: IndvEng

Pietersen to return

In the first of two bits of cricket news to come out today, it was revealed that Kevin Pietersen had completed his reintegration process and had been added to the squad to tour India. I said the other day that this was something the ECB needed to get sorted as soon as possible and fortunately they have done just that. Apparently all the reintegration that was needed was for him to talk to Flower, Cook and a few senior members of the side.

Despite my misgivings over Pietersen’s actions and his poor results in the subcontinent I do think this is a good thing. The matter can now be laid to rest and hopefully Pietersen will have learnt to think a bit before he speaks and acts. The ECB appear to have got all they wanted out of the situation with Pietersen dropping his demands to play in the full IPL and agreeing to play both forms of pyjama cricket and it cannot be argued that they did so in a way which hurt the team as Pietersen only missed one Test. They have clearly acted in the best interests of English cricket in the long term and should be applauded for their success.

Pietersen will presumably then be in the playing XI for the first Test, so I expect it will be back to him at four with Bell at five and I would hope Prior at six. With Bell likely to miss the second Test that would give an opportunity to one of the younger players in the squad as well.

One more month

As of today it is exactly one month until England play the first Test against India in Ahmedabad. Of course, really it is a bit less than one month because I’m writing this late in the day on the 15th and the time difference means that the match will be starting about 16 hours before this on the 15th of next month. (It will actually be the 14th for me.) But never mind that. I am, of course, greatly looking forward to it. Although England have not had a good year in Test cricket so far, India are far from their peak and England are very much in with a shout. But there are a few things to be settled over the next month.

The first is the Pietersen matter. He is now being reintegrated into the team and although it seems likely that he will be added to the touring squad (likely as a 17th member rather than displace one of the current 16) it is not guaranteed. I can see the logic behind this; Flower wants to have Pietersen back in the side, but will rightly not compromise the reintegration process if it is not completed in time for the Test series. But I think it would be better for the team if the matter could finally be put to rest. As I have stated before, Pietersen is of very limited utility in the subcontinent and England lose very little by not having him. I would therefore lean toward leaving him out. But if he is not to be left out then he should be added to the squad as soon as possible. The uncertainty about Pietersen is not yet a problem, but the longer it is left the more it damages the pre-tour plans.

A less important matter is that of Cook’s vice-captain. Stuart Broad seems to be the next in line, being the T20 captain, but he has yet to demonstrate any qualities that suit him even to that role, let alone the vice-captaincy in Tests. In fact, it is almost hard to think of a player less suited to the role than Broad. Much better candidates for the role would be Graeme Swann, Ian Bell and Matt Prior. Swann is possibly the first choice as he did a good job as T20 captain when Broad was injured, though I might just prefer Bell. In general I prefer to have a batsman captain as it rules out ego playing a role in bowling changes and fielding reviews. Matt Prior is another possibility, but his habit of considering every single appeal to be out is problematic. I would go with Bell in the end, but it is something at which Flower will probably have to look. Of course, England might go back to the practice of a few years ago and not have an official vice-captain at all. But a deputy would still have to be nominated if and when Cook goes off the field.

The other matters to be sorted are the more commonplace ones of team selection. Specifically Cook’s new opening partner is yet to be determined and neither is the final balance of the side. These are probably both matter which will be settled during the warmups however. Right now I’d have Root open and play three seamers and two proper spinners, but I might change my mind based on performances in the warmup matches.

Of course, all those matters take a slight backseat to trying to find a way to keep the batsmen from losing their heads whenever a spinner comes on.

A triumph for the ECB

I’ve been busy over ht past couple of days, but now that I have had time to see the full extent of the most recent news about Kevin Pietersen I note that it looks very good. Pietersen seems to have finally realised that his position was untenable and that if he wanted to play for England (and by extension command a high price at various T20 events) he was going to have to bend. Anyone who had noted that he was going up against an unhappy Andy Flower could have probably told him that a month ago, but never mind.

The deal agreed upon is a very good one for both parties. The ECB have very rightly not conceded any of the important ground and demanded (and received) a real apology from Pietersen, not something via his agent. I kept seeing over the last weeks complaints that the ECB were making him apologise more than once, but that isn’t true. He never issued a public apology; his agent did most recently, but that is not the same. Before that, in his YouTube video, Pietersen had never actually uttered any sort of apology. He avoided it as skilfully as a seasoned politician. The ECB were quite right to make Pietersen himself apologise and apologise properly. Mike Selvey described the whole affair brilliantly in the Guardian. Pietersen can now work on regaining the trust of his teammates and demonstrate that he really is fully committed to play for England, something which has been conspicuous by its absence in Pietersen’s actions over the past few months.

The ECB were actually quite lenient, which should go some way to placating those who have been unfairly criticising them over the past few weeks. They are allowing Pietersen to play in the Champions League during his reintegration process which is a surprising show of reconciliation. They are also allowing him to come back for the tour of India, at least on a trial basis, rather than making him wait for the series against New Zealand. (As I have set out before, he is of little use in the sub-continent. But this is a good show of leniency by the ECB and it is for the best not to drag the matter out longer than need be.) Pietersen can certainly have no cause for complaints with the deal, now he must hold up his end and work his way back into the England fold.

It is good for all concerned that this episode seems to be nearing a conclusion. Although there has been a lot of ire directed at the ECB and Flower, it is Pietersen’s fault and Pietersen’s fault alone that it has taken this long. He has finally seen some sense and finally realised that he must abandon his arrogance and ego which have been the source of all these problems. Hopefully now he can complete his penance and return to a stronger and more unified England team. Unfortunately, given Pietersen’s history I would not be surprised if he did or said something stupid to throw everything back into the air.

England still don’t need Pietersen

It was reported in the Telegraph that Kevin Pietersen had refused to sign a four-month contract with England before being left out of the touring squad to India. In other words, for all his talk about committing to England and wanting to play for England when given the chance to return he decided that he did not want to do what was required of him. His arrogance is staggering; he is labouring under the delusion the one calling the shots. He has to be forgiven by Flower and his (former) teammates to come back and whilst that ought indeed to happen, Pietersen does not seem to grasp that it is not down to him, the one seeking forgiveness, to set the terms. He must show humility and contrition for his behaviour over the whole summer to be allowed back and a large part of that is simply accepting the terms given by Flower and co and then actually working to get back into the side. It should not have to be stated that giving one’s public ‘apology’ via an agent and then haggling about one’s penitence is not the path to forgiveness.

In the meantime, we will be treated to more hysteria about England not having a chance in India without Pietersen. I’m not sure on what this is based; it’s not like England have been cruising to victory in Asia with him. Excluding the two match series in Bangladesh in 2010, Pietersen has played 16 Tests in Asia of which England have won only two and lost nine. England have not won any of those six series, the best result being a 1-1 draw in India in 2006 and of course Pietersen himself led the team to a 0-1 defeat in India in 2008.

The individual averages are even more damming. Pietersen in his career averages only 33.94 in Tests in Asia (excluding Bangladesh) in 31 innings. There are six batsmen with better averages in Asia in those same Tests (excluding Owais Shah who played only one) with the list topped by Marcus Trescothick and Paul Collingwood. And yet I have not heard anyone suggest that England cannot win in India without Collingwood or Trescothick. Amongst current players Pietersen is behind Cook, Prior and Trott (and Strauss, if one wishes to look at until-very-recently-current players as well). Despite all the suggestions that he can take the game away from oppositions and counter spin in a manner of which no one else is supposedly capable, the fact is that he either can’t or doesn’t. I’d much rather have Colly back than Pietersen.

But perhaps that is harsh. All it really shows is that Pietersen is not some talisman to lead us to victory in India. And whilst that is an important point it does not mean that he has not been vital in the wins we have had elsewhere. England’s most notable victories in recent times have come in the 2009 and 2010/11 Ashes and in the 4-0 win over India in 2011. Perhaps Pietersen was integral to those? Well, not quite. He’s been good, of course; he’s been useful. But he has not been the main factor. Pietersen actually only played two matches in the 2009 Ashes, during which he averaged only 38. To be fair, few of the batsmen had a good series, but that was still only a bit more than Graeme Swann who averaged 36 in all five Tests. Pietersen was also outscored in the series by Jonathan Trott who played in just one Test.

In 2010/11 Pietersen finished behind Cook, Trott and Bell in the series averages (and was not even close to the first two) despite scoring 227 in just one innings at Adelaide. That one innings was an outstanding display and utterly deserving of all the praise put on it. But the other four Tests got him just 133 runs. He helped England win that series, but he did not do so alone and was not even the biggest contributor. And of course, that only looks at the batting. He was not at all involved in England bowling Australia out for 98 in Melbourne.

The only one of those three great wins where Pietersen really was the main destroyer was in 2011 against India. He scored 533 runs at an average of over 100 with a pair of centuries (one of them an unbeaten double ton). Once again there were some brilliant innings and his contributions are deservedly praised. But once again he was not alone. He was the highest of seven England batsmen to average over fifty (and barely scored more than Ian Bell) in that series and once again the bowlers did just as much work. He was a huge help for England but he was not the reason they won.

The conclusion is obvious: Pietersen is a good player. He is an asset to England, but he is not the only asset. England can win matches when he is absent or not contributing and they can lose matches when he plays. He is one player not The Chosen One. The suggestions that England can not win without him are likely a product of a combination of hyperbole and poor memory; they certainly do not have a factual grounding.

An XI in India

After the England quad announcement was put back to tomorrow, there has been a lot of speculation about who might be included. I’ve already said my preferred squad, but there are a few things which have changed since then.

First off is that Eoin Morgan has a central contract and looks certain to be in the squad. I still think that is a bad idea and in fact his inclusion baffles me to an extent. He has a reputation of being a good player of spin and an asset on the subcontinent, but this seems to have come from nowhere. (I did see a suggestion that he played spin well because he played hurling in Ireland. Not sure if that is the actual rationale or not, but it is a ridiculous notion.) He has played one series in conditions that are similar to the subcontinent, in the UAE early this year, and he had an absolute shocker. He looked as shocking against spin as the rest of the squad and that is the only time we have seen him in conditions like India. There is simply no reason at all to include him without his proving his worth in the County Championship.

There’s also a suggestion that one (or very possibly both) of Ravi Bopara or Samit Patel will be in the squad. My thoughts on Bopara are well established. Patel is a more complicated matter, but I don’t think he should play. He is not Test quality with either bat or ball and I don’t like the notion of having such a ‘bits and pieces’ player in the side. It’s a philosophy that seems to be common for sides playing in the subcontinent that they need a special side or a special player for balance. Whilst I do think that there is merit to altering the balance a bit, I don’t see any logic in having players who are not good enough in the side just because they are not good enough at more than one thing. The conditions in India are different, but not so different that sides need to do something odd. Teams, or at least good teams, do not select unusual players for the different conditions in England, South Africa or Australia. So why for the subcontinent? Selectors need to keep faith in Test quality players to perform even in different conditions.

England squad in India

With the retirement of Andrew Strauss, there now another aspect to the question of how England will look when they play India on the 15th of November. England need a new opener in addition to deciding how they want the middle order to look and deciding on the balance of the bowling attack.

As far as an opening partner for Cook goes, there are three main possibilities: Trott could be moved up a spot with someone like Nick Compton coming in to the middle order, Joe Root of Yorkshire could come in or Michael Carberry could come in. Of the three, I think moving Trott up would be a very bad idea. He has batted at three for almost his entire career and despite being a bit short of form at the moment he has had great success at that spot. To move him would also necessitate moving Ian Bell up to three and them possibly leaving three batsmen at four, five and six with only six caps between them. I would rather break up the inexperience. Choosing between Root and Carberry is interesting because a couple of years ago there really would not have been a choice. Carberry was the heir apparent and was even given a Test against Bangladesh when Strauss was rested in 2010. But he suffered from a blood clot in the lung and although he has fought back from that his form has fallen off this year and Root has had a blinder. (Both have been in Division Two.) I’d be quite tempted to have them both on the plane to India and see who looks better in the warmups. I’d have Root as the favourite though and (with a couple of LV=CC matches still to come, of course) if I had to pick just one right now it would be him.

With the bowling attack, England still have the ‘problem’ of having more Test quality bowers than they can fit into a single match. There is also the added problem in India of whether to play two spinners and if so how many seamers to play alongside them. The received wisdom is to play two spinners in India and indeed anywhere on the subcontinent. It is important as it provides a threat when there is not a lot of help for the seamers as well as a way to keep the scoring tied down. But England’s strength is seam bowling. We have seen in New Zealand’s series in India that good seam bowlers can get help from the Indian pitches and can make life difficult for the batsmen, at least in August. I think England would be well advised to play three seam bowlers, but that does not rule out two spinners. England played three seamers and two spinners in the one match they won over the winter last year, so Flower is clearly not impossibly set against the idea and it has been successful. I favour five bowlers anyway, but especially in conditions such as in India that can be quite draining on the bowlers. To play three seamers and two spinners would give England ample options for both attack and defence and I think they will need that.

The most obvious second spinner would be Monty Panesar, though Samit Patel does offer more with the bat and acquitted himself decently in Sri Lanka. He did not, however, look Test quality and England may need a bit more in a four Test series. There is also the matter of Swann’s elbow to be considered. He is being rested from the ODIs against South Africa, but it is not at all clear how fit he will be in India. England could not afford to have just Patel and a half-fit Swann, I think, which would mean an almost certain recall for Monty Panesar. He didn’t look great in the one match he played in Sri Lanka, but he was very good in the UAE before that and his nearest competition, James Tredwell and Simon Kerrigan, are a bit short of international quality and still too inexperienced respectively. At least one of them (and with an eye to the future I would have it be Kerrigan) should be in the squad as backup, but I would not expect them to play unless Swann is so injured he has to miss a Test.

This just leaves the middle order. Right now it is Trott, Bell, Taylor and Bairstow, but if England do play five bowlers than one of them would have to miss out and it’s a fair assumption that it will be one of the lower two. (Though if Trott is moved up to open then that would no longer be the case.) Bairstow is probably the favourite to stay in the side after his heroics at Lord’s, but Taylor looked very talented as well and should at least be on the plane. He can push for a spot in the playing XI during the warmups. There will also be no doubt suggestions of recalls for Eoin Morgan and/or Kevin Pietersen. Neither should be seriously considered, however. Morgan did well by announcing that he wanted to focus on his Test career, but he still has to back that up by actually refining his technique and improving at the first class level. He may get back in the test side at some point, but he is behind both Bairstow and Taylor now and will need to prove himself over most or all of a season with Middlesex. Pietersen should simply never be considered for England again. Most of his actions this summer have been unconscionable and although he was not the main reason for Strauss’s departure there can be little doubt that he does carry some of the blame. As Rob Smyth put very well in the Guardian: ‘if he cannot see “Straussy’s” blood on his hands, he has an even bigger lack of self-awareness than we feared’. Pietersen threw England into disarray at the end of 2008 and he is having a go at doing so again. Regardless of how talented he may be, it is time England got shot of him for good.

With all of the above in mind, my touring squad to India would be: Cook*, Anderson, Bairstow, Bell, Bresnan, Broad, Carberry, Davies†, Finn, Kerrigan, Panesar, Prior†, Root, Swann, Taylor, Trott

The playing XI would depend heavily on the results of warmup matches, but I would lean toward: Cook*, Root, Trott, Bell, Bairstow, Prior†, Broad, Swann, Anderson, Finn, Panesar

Samit Patel and the IPL

I’m very glad that Samit Patel declined to play in the IPL this year. He says that he needs to focus on Championship cricket to improve his chances of selection to the Test side. It would be easy for him to try to get some of the money on offer in the IPL with the knowledge that he is very unlikely to get a Test place anyway, but I am glad that he has chosen to fight for that slim chance all the same.

Right now his best chance of getting into the Test squad is probably as a second spinner for subcontinental tours. He’s probably still behind Monty Panesar for that spot and may soon be behind Simon Kerrigan, but he can bat better than either of them. It’s probably too late for him to get into this winter’s tours, but a full season next summer could boost his chances for selection against India, where he performed well in the recent ODIs. I’m not sure how much going to the IPL may have jeapordised those chances (it didn’t really hurt Eoin Morgan), but it would have caused him to miss almost half of the Championship. It probably can’t hurt for him to make his priorities clear to the England management though and a good season will ensure that his name is at least mentioned.

Three from three!

It’s not often that I can get a hat trick sporting victories in a day. (To be fair, it’s not often that three of my sides play in the same day.)

England’s men started the morning with a T20 against India. Despite my earlier prediction, they finally found a bit of form and restricted the hosts to 120-9 off their twenty overs, though once again the death overs were expensive. Steven Finn was once again the pick of the bowlers with 3-22. Showing that they had taken the lessons from the ODIs to heart, India opened the attack with spin from both ends. This did tie down England to an extent, but KP was intent on breaking the shackles and did so to awesome effect. He hit 53 off 39 (5×4 3×6) deliveries before being adjudged LBW to a ball that pitched outside leg. By this time the match was all but won, and England got home with six wickets and eight deliveries to spare. Unfortunately England’s women were denied by rain after being well on top in their T20 match in South Africa. They were 15-0 chasing 111 to win and it’s probably the only way South Africa were going to avoid defeat.

Whilst that match was going on, Bath Rugby played London Irish in the Premiership. Bath won 12-13 thanks to a late penalty and some very good stoppage time defending. Bath were probably the deserved winners; ten of their points came from tries. They could have had the match well in hand, but Sam Vesty missed both conversions and a first half penalty. He was still responsible for eight of the points, however, scoring one of the tries as well as the match winning penalty in the 77th minute. The first try was the only scoring of the first half coming after Delon Armitage was sent to the sin bin for a high tackle on Tom Biggs. It was a very see-saw encounter with Bath coming from behind twice in the second half. The win takes them to fourth in the table.

To cap off the day, Liverpool beat West Brom 2-0 at the Hawthorns. The Reds did not play brilliantly, and showed why they dropped points to Man United and Norwich in the preceding weeks, but West Brom were awful. Their defence was nowhere for much of the first half and their offence only put pressure on the Reds a couple of times. Liverpool took the lead early through a penalty after Suarez was brought down. It’s worth pointing out that although Suarez gets a lot of criticism for diving and going to ground easily he stayed on his feet in the Carling Cup tie against Stoke when he could have had a penalty and made an effort to do so today. The West Brom fans were not happy with him or the referee, but their ire should be directed at their own defence. Despite efforts to put him off, Adam converted from the spot to give Liverpool the lead. Suarez continued to play well; though he still could not get the finishes that have eluded him in the league this year, he set up Liverpool’s second goal just before halftime. Carroll was the scorer, his third for the Reds this year, after Lucas stole the ball in midfield and Suarez put him through on goal. Liverpool’s defence held firm in the second half for just their third clean sheet this season. The only real disappointment for the Reds was Stewart Downing, who came close to scoring his first Liverpool goal, but hit the woodwork.

Let’s get this over with

Now that the World Series is over I can turn my attention back to England’s disaster of a tour to India. The final match is tomorrow, a one-off T20 in Calcutta. England are the reigning T20 World Champions as well as the number one ranked T20 side according to the ICC’s recently unveiled rankings. Despite this, I can’t see England winning. Admittedly, T20s are rather more of a lottery than any other format (as we saw against the West Indies) but England have played so abjectly against India that it will take a huge slice of luck to win. Graeme Swann will lead the side again and once again it will be a very young side.

After the match England will be able to fly home for a much needed rest until the series against Pakistan in the UAE in the new year. Whilst there will be a lot of questions asked about the performance in India, England have never been all that good at ODIs in India and the focus should certainly be on the upcoming series. Pakistan are playing rather well against Sri Lanka right now, and it is looking like it will be a good contest in January. Pakistan have shown that they have the firepower to bowl England out twice in that series (though they’ll need to improve their fielding). I think this will be the more interesting of the two series. Sri Lanka appear to pose the opposite problem; England found it difficult to bowl them out twice in England this summer and it won’t be any easier in Sri Lanka. England have not actually won a Test match in Sri Lanka since the last match of the 2001 series, but Sri Lanka are a worse side than they have been for some time and England are a much better side. I think England will manage to beat Sri Lanka 1-0, but I’m not sure about Pakistan. It’s going to be a tricky winter and the best thing England can do is get the T20 over with and put the series behind them.