It’s a tricky old time for cricket. The collapse of England’s World Cup white-ballers – and how they have managed to run up the white flag with quite such aplomb – is one of the great sporting mysteries of our time. One day they are the best in the world and hot favourites; the next they have soured overnight, like a pint of milk left out for too long.
Answers on a postcard please, as Ben Stokes admitted. English cricket has never travelled particularly well, which may have something to do with the conditions here being very different from those in nearly all the other top cricketing nations. England breeds lots of very good medium pacers who can swing and seam the ball in home conditions; overseas they find the ball stubbornly stays on a dead straight trajectory from the hand to the meat of the opponent’s bat and from there with a resounding thwack into the stands.
Maybe, as Moeen Ali said, ‘We’ve just been rubbish throughout’
And what works on a flat pitch on a sunny day at Lord’s often doesn’t on a Bunsen on a hazy day in Calcutta.
Comments
Join the debate for just $5 for 3 months
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for $5.
UNLOCK ACCESS Just $5 for 3 monthsAlready a subscriber? Log in