For a handful of years, a frantic scurry to overhaul the tame exit at the 2015 World Cup saw England go all-in, knowing the next chapter was at home.
Out went the classy, dependable types – always better suited to the longer form anyway – replaced by the fearless and bold. It was a necessary change that highlighted the shift from previous eras of the format.
Enormous scores and sheer pace became the obsession, and while the plan wasn’t flawless, they never wavered from it. The injection of new coach Trevor Bayliss had the home World Cup at front of mind, leading a unit that vowed to express themselves and chase down any score. The concept of total cricket was conceived. No amount of runs would be too great, no objective too ambitious.
Fast forward to that unimaginable day at Lord’s this year. Regardless of your age, you will probably never witness anything like it again. Despite the extraordinary circumstances, England were declared winners. A tick for the Bayliss appointment, a tick for the attractiveness of English cricket and a tick for grapsing the most elusive prize throughout their history.
The ECB sure won’t be losing sight of the white-ball stuff either, as the T20 World Cup approaches. Adding the much-discussed Hundred competition, retaining the domestic T20 Blast and allowing a swag of names to contribute in overseas leagues – particularly the upcoming BBL season – ensures ideal preparation for the next ICC tournament.
Expectations will be reduced from the World Cup just passed, but the cricket world still anticipates a strong English display, wielding such unprecedented batting power.
Among this devastating white-ball success – where most of the available resources have seemingly been allocated in recent times – remains a middling Test outfit continually trying to get its house in order. The air of fallibility occupies the minds of fans and press, with a case of here we go again, as consistency between days of cricket is a dream, let alone consistency across entire matches.
England are still reliable at home. Familiar conditions are beautifully exploited by renowned quicks, where visiting batsmen struggle. But the search for stability in the Test side continues. It is imperative this format is prioritised by new coach Chris Silverwood and captain Joe Root.
(Julian Finney/Getty Images)
The right initial steps have been taken, although the finished product is some distance away. With consistency lacking in the Test arena, plenty lies ahead for England if they intend to reach Lord’s come the final of the ICC World Test Championship. The quality of other contending teams could make that a bridge too far, though.
It can’t happen overnight – this side must improve its basics by batting long and containing the hefty totals frequently posted by opponents.
However, are high expectations for Test cricket unrealistic as the modern schedule feasts off a diet rich in white-ball cricket?
Squeezing in four domestic competitions will not be done with ease, and the County Championship appears well down the list of priorities.
The ingredients of this line-up are forming, though. Finally, a top three built for Test match batting appears set. Trying well over a dozen openers since Andrew Strauss’ retirement in 2012 is a poor look, even if a side like Australia has had similar problems. Through a revolving door of top order and wicketkeeping options, instability has cruelled this side.
Dom Sibley is a true opener and has got there through time at the crease and runs for an extended period. Rory Burns proved an astute selection by adapting to Test cricket in this year’s Ashes series. No matter how unfashionable, the duo have the mettle to display proper Test match batting.
Thirty-three-year-old Joe Denly brings a long, solid county career to a climax by looking equipped for the task. Just this week the trio consumed 663 deliveries in the fruitless first Test, with Denly in particular grinding superbly, while Sibley has built a game around this exact skill.
The realisation is already happening – the profitable gung-ho approach of slapping the ball around in shorter forms ultimately cannot withstand Test attacks and conditions. The middle order is a luxury of scoring power, and can benefit from top-order platforms, which England wasted at the Bay Oval.
Players finally seem content in their favoured positions, too. Denly has spent most of his domestic career at three, and Joe Root at four is his preference. This more conventional, balanced line-up could be the tonic.
The form of their captain has dipped ever since he assumed the role. This is well known. Whether he is the best fit remains to be seen, but the drums are already beating. There may be more appropriate options, but testing expeditions to India and Australia in the next 24 months will answer that, or change may happen even sooner.
The end of a dominant period came with the whitewash defeat in the 2013-14 Ashes series. Since then, England has a Test winning percentage of 43.
There is a long road ahead for this side, and featuring at Lord’s come June 2021 should be the number one goal.
But is it?
Stuart
Roar Rookie
And Jofra Archer, heralded as the next superstar fast bowler can’t buy a wicket in New Zealand.
IAP
Guest
Yep Stokes is their only quality test cricketer now. Root is now an ordinary player.
Zenn
Roar Rookie
Sibley, Frawley and Pope are exciting prospects for England.
Riccardo
Roar Rookie
:laughing:
Joshua Kerr
Roar Guru
Root's mindset is not one you would expect of an England test captain and I am annoyed at him for this. His test game will continue to flounder if he continues to play T20 internationals and in T20 leagues. The Hundred takes place during next year's Pakistan tour so how on earth that is going to work I have no idea but Root will definitely need to prioritise. Ben Foakes has disappeared after his good 2018-19 season and I think that's a shame - would be great to put him back in the team as the new replacement wicketkeeper for Bairstow.
Joshua Kerr
Roar Guru
I didn’t mean to! I just took the ball and ran with it! Past the tryline. Into the crowd. Out of the stadium. Across the road.
Joshua Kerr
Roar Guru
Roy was just plonked into the test side after the World Cup, having not played a first-class game at all in 2019. I think that was more of a spur of the moment thing. Root does not play the 'captain's innings' and I do think that the pressure of the captaincy is getting to him because he has to answer questions about a) the team's poor performance and b) his own poor performance and he knows that he can't just say to the media 'oh, I'm rubbish, drop me' (as if he would but you get what I mean). Root used to be on par with Smith, Kohli and Williamson but has now lagged behind. Disagree with you on Buttler - I think he is a good middle-order batsman who can get some good runs on the board in style and you do need at least one batsman like that. But of course you don't want a destructive white ball style in tests but something in between is quite useful.
DaveJ
Roar Rookie
Not sure giving priority to the World Cup is a reason/excuse for modest Test performances. Everyone involved in the Test team, from players to selectors, still has a strong incentive to perform. Players from other teams - Kohli, Smith, Williamson, Warner, du Plessis, manage to do well in both forms of the game. I wonder whether it wasn’t also the fact that Bayliss gave too much encouragement to cavalier batting in the Tests as well as in ODIs. Has the County Championship been devalued too much? In an era where the number of warmup games has been cut to the bone, do England in particular suffer on tour (especially the bowlers) for lack of practice with non-Duke balls? The lack of a good spinner post-Swann also hits them hard away from home. Maybe they are just going through a tough in producing top line batsmen, like Australia (our weakest period since the mid-80s).
Gurlivleen Grewal
Roar Pro
I think the problem with Root is his emphasis on white-ball cricket vs Red ball. He should be taking a break from T20s and use it to recharge himself. Instead, he vehemently opposes any suggestion of not being part of England T20 setup. He wants to play the hundred too ofc. Smith would gleefully give up T20s - he likes to bat which gets a plenty of in tests. Williamson has taken the criticism in stride and has the work ethic that if he doesn't fit in the team, he would sit out. Kohli knows he has the game so he sits out of T20s regularly. There is no dearth of T20 players in England who are much better than him in the format. This kind of starts a quid pro quo where he is backed for white-ball cricket and he backs his clique of friends in tests. All a happy bunch (don't seem to be faking it, have a good dressing room, have respect) they don't have the transferrable skills for different formats. Foakes should be an automatic pick given his performances and should be batting at 6. Instead they use Butler to thwack a 30-40 at 7. Root should be setting up the agenda by batting time as he talked before the game, but he played a typical guide to the third man shot, twice. As a captain of the side, better is expected of him.
It's going to be a long 5 tests in India end of next year if Root hasnt rediscovered his 2014/2015 form, he's been a passenger the last 12 months really, the only other players that look like genuine matchwinners are Stokes and possibly Ollie Pope, if he bats anywhere near his FC average.
Gee
Roar Rookie
I will miss "Total Cricket". It was always fun listening to English fans and commentators wonder why when the batted down to 11 they kept getting bowled out for 100 :)
Paul
Roar Guru
hi Ryan, I read a couple of pieces on the BBC homepage about the appointment of the new England coach, Chris Silverwood. Part of his brief is to change the nature of England Test cricket, away from the ultra aggressive style, favoured by Trevor Bayliss, back to the more traditional approach, ie bat long and the runs will come. The Ashes probably summed up Bayliss approach, with both selections and some of the innings. I think England started the new ear with their first innings being sedate, to the point of being almost a crawl, but they did bat for a lot of sessions. That they didn't get it right second time round shows there's lots of work to be done, especially with the mindset of guys ( that shot Ollie Pope played in the second dig was pretty bad!). I see quite a number of similarities between what Silverwood/Root are attempting and what Langer/Paine are doing. Both want their top 6 to bat for long periods, leave the high risk shots in the change room till well past 50 and generally graft a big score. The problem for both countries is a dearth of Test batting talent. The current England lineup has real potential, but who else is bashing the selection door down, if one of the current crop gets injured or drops off form.? Ditto for Australia. The plan that Silverwood & Root are working on appears to culminate with the next Ashes. This might imply they're not hugely concerned about the Test Championship. I agree with Joshua England needs to settle into a more traditional style of Test batsman asap, but if they're aiming for a series 2 years away, they may be prepared to suffer more short term losses with the aim of getting it right in 2021.
IAP
Guest
England built a team of filthy sloggers who got flogged every time they had to bat on a pitch that wasn't a road. Everyone knows they didn't actually win the world cup - they "won" by a stupid rule that will never be applied again, and still needed that after a shocking umpiring mistake allowed them a draw. They're reaping what they sowed now - they don't have quality batsmen; one-day sloggers aren't batsmen. They couldn't even win the ashes at home against a one-man band, and were saved from losing outright by one extraordinary innings (from Stokes). No, England aren't a good test team, and they have a long way to go before they are.
Chris Kettlewell
Roar Guru
Certainly with Finch (and to an extent with Roy), the biggest issue of all was that they decided to bat them in tests where they batted in ODI's, not where they batted in FC cricket. Both Finch and Roy are middle order batsmen in first class cricket. Finch was horrendous in FC cricket earlier in his career, even as he continued to do well in ODI's. But in more recent seasons, batting in the middle order, he has done a lot better. I think the idea of opening with him in the UAE was the thought that it was conditions where they were basically opening against spin, so opening with a middle-order batsman who was okay against spin sounded reasonable. The stupid call was to continue that back in Australia.
AREH
Roar Guru
Was going to mention Bailey, glad you did. There was little immediate FC form to support his selection. Opting for Finch last year was speculative too, based mostly on ODI credentials. While international runs carry weight, there is an odd belief sometimes which assumes the same can be achieved against the red ball, ignoring many factors like batting conditions, different bowlers etc etc.
Chris Kettlewell
Roar Guru
Interestingly, one of those exact mistakes is the guy just chosen as Australian national selector. George Bailey played 5 test matches and his selection was 100% based on his form in 50-over cricket, not in first class cricket at all.
AREH
Roar Guru
'The issue is then hoping for those white ball players to form the core of the test side.' Thanks Chris, and this is definitely something I neglected to touch on. Expecting some of their incredible white ball players to transition into test cricket is a punt to say the least. Roy was out of his depth and it wasn't his fault - the guy shouldn't have been selected. Australia have made these mistakes before, too. Some can translate the form, but a lot can't.
Riccardo
Roar Rookie
All true and a good read. Methinks however, and I'm sure the stats will bear this out, the Black Caps are becoming formidable, especially at home. The performance at Mount Maunganui to kick off the season proper, even if it was POINTLESS, was utterly dominant, despite being behind England at the end of the 1st day, after losing the toss. I'm picking England to be better in Hamilton though...
Chris Kettlewell
Roar Guru
Totally agree, reasonable for England to have that focus on white ball cricket. The issue is then hoping for those white ball players to form the core of the test side. Roy and Buttler should never have been allowed near the test side. They seem to have realised that with Roy, but keep persisting with Buttler, neither should have been picked for test cricket based on their first class record. Bairstow is a bit the same. He had one home season where he did really well in test cricket, but outside of that hasn't been that good. He shows "flashes of brilliance" as a white ball player playing test cricket will, but I'm not sure he's really a test cricketer either. Then there is the issue of Root. He's the "best batsman" but he's not been playing like it for the last couple of years. England need Root to be reliable. Have to agree with the first comment too, England have had major struggles even at home, but they've often had someone find just enough to get them out of jail. By all rights they should have lost to India last season, but India choked at a couple of vital times. Really, Australia should have won the Ashes 3-1, if they'd just had one better umpiring decision, used DRS slightly better, or not just got everything wrong on that one morning at Headlingley. England need Root to turn his form around. He'll never be in the same league as Smith or Kohli, or even on the next tier with Williamson, he's just not that good, but he can still be a good, solid test number 4 for England, and they need him desperately to do that. And I think Buttler needs to go, find someone who's actually a decent first class batsman to replace him. Stop hoping for him to bring his destructive white ball game into test cricket.
Riccardo
Roar Rookie
Think Josh just-out-articled you mate! :laughing: Still, a good read and thanks. Root hitting some form will give them a bit of balance and I think they under-estimated the Black Caps at Mount Maunganui. Hamilton may be more telling, especially with the absence of Boult. The fact the criteria see no points awarded here is frankly galling; Test Cricket needs more meaning, more attention and more attraction, not less. God bless the Barmy Army...