England Never Looked Like They Had A Plan

They came into the 2015 World Cup seeded the No. 1 team. Ironically they were the first Test team to be eliminated from the tournament. England’s cup of woe brimmeth over.

The change of guard ahead of the showpiece event was just the beginning of things to come. Losses to Australia, New Zealand and Sri Lanka notwithstanding, the Englishmen’s win over associate Scotland seemed like a consolation, before running into the roaring tigers from Bangladesh who are not new to toppling top teams at the World Cup.

Having never qualified for the knockout stage of the World Cup, skipper Mashrafe Mortaza described it as one of the biggest matches in Bangladesh's cricket history and he was wary of the opposition.

The must-win game at Adelaide was likely to go either way, and in conditions ideal for batting as the match progresses, England chose to bowl first. Once again the middle order changed the course of the match.

Two wickets before ten runs on the board, two more before hundred and Bangladesh was under pressure of capitulating soon. But the pair of Mahmudullah, who scored his country’s maiden WC hundred, and wicketkeeper Mushfiqur Rahim had different plans. I was quite pleased with the way they built the partnership with the former playing a composed innings while the latter kept the scoring rate high and eventually posting a very competitive score of 275.

The English bowlers, I felt, were too defensive and not trying to break the partnership. The seemed to be content with containing runs in the middle overs. James Anderson has been a pale shadow of his aggressive self and Broad seems to have lost his rhythm. Blaming it on the white Kookaburra for the lack of swing is one thing and relying solely on the ball to things without trying much is another. England still did well with the ball than the bat.

A CHASE UNPLANNED

Chasing a gettable target, England seemed to have come to the World cup totally unprepared. I think they did not have a plan in place. If they had one, it didn’t show. Regular fall of wickets after periods of consolidation is surely not a sign of a team in a positive frame of mind to win. Ian Bell, Alex Hales and Joe Root gave it away after promising much. Eoin Morgan, going through a most horrendous period in his career with a fourth duck in 8 innings, fell to the leg-side short delivery trap, caught at fine leg hooking. Jos Buttler and Chris Woakes played almost match-winning innings before Jos tamely edged one to the keeper.

Mortaza picked the right combination persisting with Rubel Hossain and Taskin Ahmed, instead of being tempted to go with Nasir. In hindsight, this seemed a calculated move.

If England planned hard to counter spin, they got that wrong. Veteran spin all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan was effective and economical, but the Bangla pacers were too handy in the end. Mortaza got his bowling changes working perfectly, bringing himself to break partnerships at the right time. While Taskin got the big wickets, Rubel bowled in the right areas with good pace. The wickets of Bell, Broad and finally Anderson were simply outstanding. In the end, it truly turned out to be Bangladesh’s biggest day in their cricket history.

England face Afghanistan in a dead rubber before heading home to reflect on what went wrong and induce large scale changes in team and approach.

(Jonty Rhodes served South Africa with distinction in 52 Tests and 245 ODIs, with four World Cup appearances. The first fielding superstar of international cricket, the acrobatic Springbok took many miracle catches, a lot of them at backward point. He'll be writing for Yahoo! Cricket as their World Cup Expert.)