England finally reach the Bell End

It took a lot of hinting, cajoling and physical coercing, but the England selections finally gave in to our desires, to show that they know what to do with heads, and satisfying released exactly what we all want to see: a white paper of real substance.

Although, in its usual desperate search for branding with which it could use to “sell” to the “media”, England’s line-up has already been branded as the “new face”, the “future” on our happy march towards the “next era”.

A completely novel era where the bits and pieces player that doesn’t really excel at anything have been given central importance. Let’s look at England new vanguard:

Ravi Bopara – bats a bit, apparently bowls, but the ECB FORBIDS him from doing so.
Paul Collingwood – see above.
Tim Bresnan – although his medium pacers aren’t good enough for international level, he bats a bit, so that’s ok.
Stuart Broad – see above.
Graeme Swann – see above (ish).
Matt Prior – his keeping is rubbish, but…

In fact, the only players that actually appear to be good at anything are Andrew Strauss (whose seems to be alright at batting at the moment) and KP (whose brilliant mind games have surely won England at least eight matches in the past).

It’s as though the Englanders looked at New Zealand and collective thought “oh yeah, that’s where we’ve been going wrong – let’s pick the crap players.”

Ah well. Spare a thought for Michael Vaughan though – his chances were smote by the Yorkshire weather. Not for the first time has a promising career been suppressed by Northern precipitation.

Welcome to the defensive era, where we succumb the Ashes before it begins and seem to be meekly comply with the Australians demands for whatever debauched designs they have for us. It’ll be all over our faces before long. And I’m telling you, knowing Australians, it won’t be very long at all.

Guest Blog: Baby-Faced Broad is the perfect role model

Stuart Broad, not content with sending mothers everywhere into raptures, is to turn his attention to their cricket-playing sons. This ‘nice-looking young man’, as my gooey-eyed mater insists on calling him, is the ECB’s top choice to front a campaign against abuse in recreational and youth cricket.

Broad is ‘just the sort of role model we need’, according to an ECB official, echoing my mother’s view that Broad is indeed ‘a man you’d be happy for your daughter to bring home’.

While Broad clearly holds some sort of hypnotic power over womankind, whether he can exert his influence over the present generation of unruly young cricketers remains to be seen. Abuse is now widespread in the modern game, both at professional, amateur and youth level. While instances of abuse or dissent amongst international cricketers are justifiably clamped down upon, in village or youth cricket umpires have little power to punish offenders.

For example, last season my local side was forced to lodge an official complaint against another village team, after the sledging in a rather high-spirited game began to feel more like racial abuse. After a lengthy, bureaucratic and time-consuming process the offenders were eventually punished, but during the game itself the umpires had been powerless to halt the abuse. Admittedly this is anecdotal evidence, but the word on the street is that this sort of thing, despite ‘not really being cricket’, is becoming increasingly common, particularly among younger teams. Clearly umpires need more power to stop such behaviour in its tracks.

The ECB’s solution, The Guardian reports, is that ‘this summer a system of yellow cards is being secretly trialled at three private schools’. (Quite how this trial can be said to be secret, now that its existence has been publicised in a national newspaper, is a question that the article does not get round to addressing.)

Personally, I find the whole yellow card idea quite ridiculous. Just imagine the scenes that could be taking place on a public school playing field near you this summer:

‘Oh I say, how’s that, umpire?’
‘Not out.’
‘But I jolly well heard a nick.’
‘You may well have done, young Faux-Bowyer. But what matters in this case is that I did not. The decision remains not out, and nothing you can do or say shall induce me to raise my finger.’
‘You absolute rotter!’
‘That, young man, is dissent. You have just earned yourself a yellow card, not to mention a week of detentions.’

All this seems a far cry from the cosy fictional world of everyone’s favourite public schoolboy cricketer, J C T Jennings. (If you’ve never heard of him, then I apologise. You must have suffered a terribly deprived childhood.) I seem to recall Jennings and Darbishire receiving nothing more than a mild ticking off after cutting Latin in order to watch a local game. These days their actions would no doubt earn them both a red card and a three-match suspension.

Now, I know the Jennings stories weren’t actually real, but nevertheless I still believe that there was indeed a time, probably nestled somewhere between the two world wars, when boys knew how to behave, and such things as yellow cards were considered unseemly. Whatever happened to The Spirit of Cricket? I just pray that Stuart Broad can resuscitate it before it is too late.

If standards of behaviour have indeed so degenerated that a system of yellow cards is deemed necessary, then cricket will truly have sunk to a new low. Why, we’ll be little better than footballers! I’m pinning my hopes on baby-faced Broad. That nice young man may well turn out to be a Jennings for our time.

Anderson or Broad?

After the weekend’s embarrassing antics, I felt that some worthy and boring pieces about selection policy should redress the balance. So bear with me whilst I indulgence my ego.

Mercifully, the England management broke into Steve Harmison’s room at night, and attacked his spine with hammers. This injury should keep him well clear from temptation and ensure that we should have proper bowlers in the set-up. For a while, at least.

The remaining places should go to Matthew Hoggard (who’s great), Ryan Hairybottom (who has Done Enough) and Monty Panesar (who is like whelks to the gulls). There is one more spot, but two bowlers: James Anderson and Stuart Broad.

Who should take it?

This is an awkward one, because, unlike the Shah/Bopara debate it’s not a simple matter of old vs. young. They are both young players, and we should hope that they’ll both be in the side when the two old swing bowlers retire to the big swingers’ party in the sky.

So, as bowlers, what do they offer? So far this season, Anderson has taken 14 wickets in three matches (averaging just under five wickets a match), although in 2006/07 he was less impressive: averaging nearly ninety runs per wicket. Plus, he’s yet to take a wicket during this tour.

Broad, on the other hand, extracted wickets and some bounce from the slow Lankan pitches. Although, the difference isn’t great; both offer a similar package. At test level, it seems sensible to assume that Anderson is the incumbent and, as he has not performed terribly, should retain his place in the interests of stability and fair-treatment.

The issue may be decided, however, not by bowling, but by this “three dimensional cricketer” nonsense. As you can see from the picture, but Anderson is not a natural batsman.

If Anderson was picked, Hairybottom would have to come in at eight – leaving a very long and vulnerable tail. If you are picking Owais Shah at six, as a specialist batsman, and Matt Prior as batsman-wicket keeper at seven, you might consider this ample protection for a weak tail.

I’m not convinced by this line.

This may be negative, but in Sri Lanka you must look to extract the maximum from your squad. Furthermore, given that neither bowler offers an obvious edge over the other, then it is reasonable to bring in this additional factor, and consequently, we must side with Broad.

Pick Broad I say.

Runs lower down the order

This blog was founded on bile. The very first post vented its spleen against Duncan Fletcher and his ridiculous policy of dropping Monty Panesar because he wanted runs at number eight. That post began the ill-informed, typo-ridden, poorly constructed rants that characterise Ayalac to this day.

However, not wanting to go back on my word too much, England have a problem. Namely: runs at number eight.

As Graham Gooch pointed out on TMS, England are stuck with four number ten batsmen – each operating inter-changeably at eight, in the same ineffectual manner. The TMS boys had a very good way of putting this problem: although England have to pick their four best bowlers now, this is not a sustainable weakness in the long term.

Moreover, when Andrew Flintoff eventually returns at six, the batting line-up will look increasingly vulnerable.

Under Fletcher, England played an understandable, if limited, strategy of effectively picking three all-rounders: Flintoff, Geraint Jones and Ashley Giles. This lower middle order all contributed with the bat, and help underpin England’s innings.

Matthew Prior, although a prat, seems more a more dependable batsman than Jones. But who fills Giles’ role? The stats feature thing in cricinfo points out that the average for each of England’s last five wickets has fallen from 20 in 2005 to 15 since. Only Bangladesh and the West Indies have a comparably low average. It is questionable whether the pressure on the upper order that this entails can be continued in test cricket.

One would hope that Stuart Broad and a Liam Plunkett renaissance might reassure Fletcherians of the future. But the potential return of Steve Harmison and Matthew Hoggard will not sure up the tail-end.

If England are genuinely to think long-term, they wish to pick players because of a future potential. This will entail hard decisions. How far can we expect Ryan Sidebottom to go? Should he be dropped in favour of Broad on the basis of age as well as runs? Should we pick Plunkett instead of James Andersen, irrespective of bowling performance?

Flecther’s bottom four may look something like this:

8. Broad
9. Plunkett
10. Panesar
11. Hoggard

This won’t terrify many batsmen. Perhaps we need to re-jiggle the order. Select Flinoff as a specialist bowler, and forgo the all-rounder. How about:

7. Flintoff
8. Prior
9. Broad/Anderson
10.Monty
11. Hoggard

Arguably, the second line-up offers the same total runs as the first list, but a bit more penetration in the bowling line-up. Obviously, you would lose a bowler. But four should be enough.

Re-jiggling: the way forward.

Five year-old wins ODI

It was a familiar story to those following the England vs. West Indies series. Fidel Edwards bowls well to keep the English under pressure, but his colleagues failed to exert similar control.

The Windian upper order mixed flimsy shots with bad judgement, seeing their innings reduced to 13-4. From there, on this Lords wicket, there is no coming back.

And they didn't.

It is as if the West Indies haven’t even tried to adapt their technique for English conditions. There is no discernable sign of improvement, or intent to improve. Just useless wofting.

It’s not just through accident that Ian Bell was the highest scorer in the England innings – it gives you a strong hint at the sort of game you need to play on a sparky pitch.

Once again, it was left to Shivnarine Chanderpaul and Dwayne Bravo to pick up the pieces, and their partnership of 61 looked threatening at one point. However, along comes some kid from the flat country, and polishes the Windies’ tail off without fuss.

My brother has a three year-old kid. Stuart Broad looks a bit older than him, so I reckon Broad must be about five.

Anyway, he bowled well. Better than Steve Harmison. I imagine that the England fast bowling line-up may become quite competitive during the Indian tour. You know, when we have to bowl proper, like, and not spray it around hoping that the bloke at the other end is going to sky it to mid-wicket. Like. Those Indians are alright at batting.

For being better than Harmy, young Broady, you get one Ayalac thumbs-up.