England beat Pakistan by 330 runs at Old Trafford earlier this week.
Apologies if you already knew the result but it’s actually the word ‘beat’ I’m interested in.
After deservedly coming second in the series opener at Lord’s a few days earlier, Alastair Cook’s side responded with a thoroughly efficient, high-class performance to level things up at one Test apiece.
The captain batted nicely, Joe Root played magnificently, Jimmy Anderson showed exactly what had been missing in North London and Chris Woakes continued his upward curve with another decent effort.
They were helped by a couple of limp Pakistan showings with the bat but I doubt anyone connected with England will really care. They won, they won well and that, really, is that.
However, as Pakistan’s first innings came to a close and Cook indicated he was going to have another innings and not enforce the follow-on, you could have been excused, given some of the opinion being offered, for thinking the very fabric of society was being vandalised.
With just less than half the game remaining, Cook decided to make the visitors bowl again after a relatively short time with their feet up, thus rubbing their collective noses in the dirt a bit and in the process put the hosts’ lead way into insurmountable territory.
Yet some of the reaction was absolutely ludicrous given, and this is the important part, there was more than two days of the game remaining.
In no particular order the gripes were along the lines of ‘they’ve only bowled 60-odd overs’, ‘what if it rains?’, ‘the Pakistanis wouldn’t want to bat again’, ‘they’re not thinking about the crowd’, ‘you can’t be number one in the world winning in this fashion’, ‘it’s insecure not ruthless’ and so on and so on.
All well and good if the cricketing world was run on hypothetical lines but as it isn’t, like all professional sport, all some distance wide of the mark.
The main factor to consider is the contest hadn’t been played out and a decision was being condemned by many with the ultimate outcome not yet known.
That, unless I’m missing something, doesn’t make any sense.
The aim of the game, as we are told so often when a manager/coach/captain gets the sack, is to win matches. It’s a results business and if results don’t stack up then whoever is in charge should be ready to feel the proverbial guillotine at the back of their neck.
If England had failed to bowl Pakistan out second time around then Cook, as I’m sure he would have been aware, would have squarely in the firing line and rightly so.
But, and in this instance it is a very big but, they did bowl Pakistan out and won the game with more than a day to spare.
In anyone’s eyes that is a comprehensive victory and now the dust has begun to settle and the scorecard can enter the history books, a 330-run triumph can be viewed in the correct manner.
You win by an innings, you win by 330 runs. Six of one and half a dozen of another. Is the latter of less worth than the former? No. Do England appear weaker for not enforcing the follow-on? No. Did they win in emphatic style? Yes.
The final point is what matters. England won the game and that is what they were there to do.
I can recall other sides acting in the same way and it being considered a hard-nosed way of operating. Don’t give the opposition a sniff and a demoralised team is one waiting to be thrashed.
What took place at Old Trafford was no different and hopefully, although my fingers will have to be crossed, the next time such a scenario pans out the reaction won’t be so immediately scornful.
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