Unhappy New Year

This time last year England began the new year with the onerous task of trying to avert a situation where they had arrived in Australia as Ashes holders and would leave it only the second team in history to lose every Test of an Anglo-Australian series. They failed, setting the tone for a year in which the one-day side hit rock-bottom, failing to win a game of significance at the World Cup; and the Test side threatened to join it, winning matches only against West Indies and losing proud recent records with defeat to Inda and Sri Lanka. As the world wakes to 2008, the slightly less punishing exercise of selecting a team to tour New Zealand is at hand for the English management, although it is a duty they should not be taking lightly.

There are more problems with this England team than will be reflected in the selected 16, unlikely to be much changed from those who toured Sri Lanka. They have a 'keeper who misses too many important chances; a slip cordon of part-timers; an incumbent No.6 batsman with a Test average of 8; six batsmen who produced just one century in three recent Tests; a first-choice spinner who has lost confidence and for whom there is no viable alternative; and a pair of ill-starred opening bowlers, one in a rut of injuries, the other perpetually luckless. Expect Matt Prior to remain as wicket-keeper, his gutsy batting emphasised and the catching and stumping errors glossed over: unless he cuts the mistakes, Ryan Sidebottom might well be giving himself an economy version of that haircut he's been saving up for. Don't hold out much hope for a recall for James Foster, the most balanced alternative; his medical records have evidently not been updated since the broken arm which lost him his place back in 2002.

Ravi Bopara could retain his squad place, but it would take some serious front for him to be given another chance; Owais Shah might just retire in protest. That is the most likely change in the batting, although this would not be a bad time for David Graveney to go cap in hand to Mark Ramprakash's dancing studio. More likely is a recall for Andrew Strauss, which would be an illogical move. Unless you are of the opinion that Strauss will start scoring runs now he has had a break, nothing in his situation has changed since he was rightly axed at the end of the summer following a year without a century. England could do with his catching ability, although it would be well remembered that, at full strength, Strauss is a third slip. There is also no obvious place for him in the batting, with Cook and Vaughan looking like a happy combination at the top, which Strauss and Cook never were. Shah, by the way, is a slip fielder and will bat at either No.3 or 6, the two positions up for grabs. There is not much scope for change in the bowling ranks, with the pace trio of Hoggard, Sidebottom and Harmison all worthy of selection and Graeme Swann, despite having usurped Panesar in the one-day team, not Test match material as a lone spinner.

England are in an invidious position, and not just because of their No.5 ranking. Even if they win every Test of the six they play against New Zealand home and away in the next six months, it will not bring them much credit. Reality has dawned, finally, but expectation takes longer to recalibrate itself. New Zealand are a poor Test side too, with a paucity of high calibre players. But they will scrap hard and produce a good collective effort as they often do, especially against England. For England it must be an exercise in regaining the winning habit in time to give the South Africans a good challenge in the main event of the 2008 season. Another away win for the one-day side would be much more significant, as the Black Caps (the artists formerly known as the Kiwis) are a good one-day outfit, and will be another good barometer for England's improving side, which should be largely the same as that which surprised the Sri Lankans on their own patch back in October.

At such times it is easy and common to blame the "system", such as it is. And there are problems: in a nutshell there is too much cricket at both domestic and international level, and too many mediocre overseas players are pervading domestic cricket. But the much maligned county game has nevertheless, by one means or another, endowed England with 11 players of Test-class. There is a more than decent crop of young players too, the best of whom now get shipped around the globe to learn how to play in different conditions and develop rounded games. The ECB, blundering and money-driven as it is, does not drop the catches, make batting mistakes or bowl badly. Maybe fatigue is a factor in reduced performance. But while the other lot are holding on to the chances and outperforming them with bat and ball it's a poor excuse.