Directionless England set to suffer

One pattern established during the Duncan Fletcher years, namely the refusal to submit to defeat in a home Test series, has already been disrupted in his successor's first summer in charge; it is now the duty of Peter Moores and his team to break another trend. Just three matches against West Indies were necessary for the ugly truth about England's one-day team to make itself painfully apparent to the new coach and captain. Not quite the dismal outfit they are in Test cricket, this West Indies team are still an ordinary outfit, albeit fast improving, in ODIs. Yet despite taking the lead in the series, once away from the heavily overcast conditions which assisted their victory at Lord's and briefly clouded harsh reality, they never looked like getting close to, let alone overcoming, the only team who at that stage were below them in the ICC rankings.

Following that defeat, England take their rightful place at the bottom of the pile and are faced with the inglorious prospect of 7 matches against an Indian side which still packs a significant punch, World Cup debacle notwithstanding, without even the habitual succour of success in the Test series to galvanise them against the expected thrashing. Moores can take some comfort from the return of some key players, including influential all-rounders Andrew Flintoff and Ravi Bopara who were absent in the West Indies series. Nevertheless, he is more likely to reflect on what he is missing, with Marcus Trescothick having ruled himself out of the winter tours and consequently drawing a line under a distinguished international career, something which Steve Harmison, who would be unavailable anyway, has already done as regards one-day cricket.

One-day cricket is all about strategy; well-thought out plans efficiently executed have ever been the basis of successful teams in the shorter form of the game. And, unsurprisingly, a 50-over innings can be broken down into beginning, middle and end, different phases which require different approaches both with bat and ball. Although the prevalence of hulking openers with equally large weapons (bats) and the extension of the fielding restrictions has persuaded most teams that all-out attack is the best way to start off an innings, it is by no means the only way, although as England found out at the World Cup, a contrary strategy can be tricky. The problem for England at the top of the order is a lack of continuity and clear-thinking. Back in the Caribbean last spring, the idea was to preserve wickets and to score the majority of runs at the end, rather than beginning of the innings; all well and good, but the problem was that theory did not convert into reality. While they should have been aiming for about 70 runs for the loss of no more than one wicket in the first 20 overs, in preference to over 100 for the loss of three, the reality was more like 80-3, too few runs scored and too many wickets surrendered. The current partnership is a classic example of England hamstringing themselves as they veer between sticking and twisting - Alistair Cook is yet to prove he can bat throughout a one-day innings, and was guilty in the last series of getting himself out after promising starts, while Matt Prior deserves a chance, but would probably be better suited to leading the charge at the other end of the innings. The squad selected is for the first four games only, and that is probably the time which Cook and Prior have to convince the selectors they should not opt for a wild-card at the top of the order, with Luke Wright and Phil Mustard having pressed their claims in the high-profile games over the weekend.

The identity of the man coming in at first drop is also a conundrum yet to be satisfactorily resolved; England are not helped by the fact that their Test match No.3, Michael Vaughan, has proved himself immiscible in the one-day melting pot, and, although not yet officially retired, is not in the primary thoughts of the selectors. The necessity for adaptability has generally pushed the hierarchy in the direction of Ian Bell is , although his one-day career is, if anything, even more frustrating than his Test one and his fortunes fluctuate from one game to another. On a given day he looks the perfect man for the job, with a well paced knock which balances the innings; the next he may scratch around listlessly, causing those watching to wonder why anyone ever let him near a coloured kit. One option yet to be assessed is Ravi Bopara filling the same position for country as he does he county; his wristy, intelligent batting makes him a more dangerous prospect than Bell in one-dayers, and deploying him at the top of the order lessens the congestion for places in the lower order.

The middle-order is at least one area where England can feel comfortable; now that the idea of batting Pietersen at 3 has finally run its course, he is settled as heart of the batting at 4, followed by Owais Shah, who earned himself the right for continued selection by being the standout batsman against West Indies, pushing captain Collingwood down a place. Unless the selectors surprise everyone by pushing Flintoff into the top 3, something which would probably be ill-advised given past experience, he should follow his captain in; his batting increasingly deteriorated over the course of the last year, and he was becoming an untenable option at 6, and it remains to be seen whether a demotion will allow him more freedom to express himself with the bat; much as they need his bowling, England could also do with Flintoff discovering the one-day batting form of 2004 and being ringleader in the dash for late-order runs.

Just as with batting strategy, bowling plans can also be divided into the three basic stages. And in the previous series, it was more in conception than execution where England's tactics erred. While the lack of ability to take wickets with the new ball is a concern, the way they approached the middle overs was the most worrying aspect of the bowling; the slower bowlers, Mascarenhas, Panesar and Collingwood, were all utilised with the intention of rattling quickly through overs quickly in the period between the power plays and the slog overs at the end. And while they succeeded in keeping the scoring rate down, they were made to pay at the death, where West Indies twice milked over 100 of the last 10 overs having kept wickets in hand. And while Mascarenhas can boast an excellent economy rate (3.5 rpo) from his three matches, he failed to take a wicket, while Panesar managed just one and a tailender at that. Hopefully the harsh lesson dealt out by West Indies will convince the English strategists that they must use bowlers who are genuine wicket-taking threats in the middle overs. The return of Flintoff gives them an extra option in that area, as well as at the end of the innings, where he is England's only proven "death bowler", having the skills which the scorecards from the last two games suggest Anderson, Broad et al are not endowed with. With regards to that, they would do well to jettison Mascarenhas's all round talents in favour of an extra front-line seamer, giving Collingwood options to exert pressure throughout the innings; if that pressure brings about wickets, it would also go some way to alleviating England's problem with bowling at the death, where damage sustained is always in direct correlation with the number of wickets preserved by the batting side. It would also allow England to see how Broad copes with batting at 8, something which could also influence future Test selection. To start off with, Sidebottom should get the nod to take the new ball with Anderson, with Tremlett to come into consideration at some point in the series.

The role of Monty Panesar is also something which bears scrutiny. Despite being an excellent attacking bowler in Test matches, his 19 ODIs have failed to bring that many wickets, with an economy rate of 4.48 which is not quite frugal enough to justify the lack of success. One obvious explanation is that he is grossly inexperienced in this form of the game, having played more times for England than Northants., whom he has represented just 11 times in pajamas. What is his strength in Tests, namely nagging accuracy and a flat, buzzing trajectory, count against him in ODIs, where batsman prosper when they know what to expect. To succeed in the one-day game, he will have to alter his approach slightly and flight the ball more, enticing batsman and, to an extent, try to buy wickets - in the increasingly batsman friendly game, the Illingworthian exhortation of "I can get him for less than six" sadly no longer holds water.

Batting in the first twenty overs; taking wickets with the new ball; taking wickets with the old ball; restricting scoring in the death overs. That doesn't leave out much, which goes a fair way to explaining why England have been such a poor one-day side, and gives an impression of the problems faced by Moores and Collingwood in what is becoming akin to a Holy Grail quest. Converesly India, despite their World Cup travails, are a one-day team bursting with all the right stuff; the collective number of caps achieved by England's putative top 6 (228) is dwarfed by Tendulkar's total, which the 7 matches will bring within 5 of 400. Not to mention Dravid and Ganguly, who boast 615 between them or Yuvraj Singh, who at the age of 25 is in sight of his 200th. The batting, possessing two of the one-day game's greatest talents in Tendulkar and Ganguly, and supplemented by the calm and eloquent strokeplay of Dravid, as well as the aggression of Yuvraj and Gambhir and outright brutality of Uthappa (ODI strike rate of 102.1) will give England's green attack nightmares; while the bowling, much of it the left-arm variety so hard to get away in one-day cricket will be a significant examination of a batting order whose future is very much in flux. Unlike in the Test series, defeat is anticipated by English supporters, and the realisation of that fear over the course of 7 matches and 700 overs would make this at least the second worst summer of the decade and be a further bitter pill in what has been an undoubted annus horribilis for the team.