Sweet and salty desert initiation for England’s cricketers

By Jack Sheldon

The most eagerly anticipated prize handed out at the post-match presentation after each match during England’s series against Pakistan in the United Arab Emirates was the inventive ‘Sweet and Salty Performance Cash Award’. The tour was England’s first full visit to Pakistan’s adopted home in the Arabian Desert and, when looking back on the events which unfolded over the past six weeks, they will feel that their performance fitted the criteria for this bitter-sweet prize – a pick ‘n’ mix of the good, the bad and the ugly.

The England team and their supporters rightly place Test cricket on a pedestal above the younger forms of the game, and so the 3-0 whitewash inflicted on them during that leg of the tour will hurt badly. Ahead of the series expectations were that this would be a tough challenge – perhaps more demanding than the defeats of Australia and India in more familiar surroundings over the previous twelve months. However, the scale of the task England faced was severely under-estimated. Most observers, myself included, felt that a one of two-nil series victory for the number one ranked side in the Test Match game was likely. The eventual score line was completely unconsidered.

The way in which the batsmen adapted, or failed to adapt to be more precise, to conditions during the Test series will be a particular disappointment. Some commentators, endorsed by England’s Team Director Andy Flower, have pointed the finger of blame at the schedule which gave England only two warm-up matches before the 1st Test. But any more than two practice games is now highly unusual on any tour, and one of the disadvantages of playing in the UAE is that opposition is not readily available as it would be in Pakistan, so in some respects England were lucky to have even those matches that they did. Perhaps preparations were not focused strongly enough on the task of facing Saeed Ajmal, and starting an innings against spin. But, in Flower and Graham Gooch, England had two brilliant players of the turning ball amongst the backroom team and so, given the generally meticulous nature of the pair’s regime, it would be a major surprise if this was where England fell short. Therefore, the players can only really blame themselves for a series of abject batting displays, the ugliest of the lot being shot out for 72 in pursuit of double that in the 2nd Test at Abu Dhabi. Eoin Morgan, who has since lost his Test place for the upcoming tour of Sri Lanka, was all-at-sea from the moment he got off the plane for his first overseas appearances in the longer format. Despite featuring in all of the matches, including the one-dayers and Twenty20s, he never managed more than 31. Meanwhile, Ian Bell and Kevin Pietersen – evidently the two most naturally talented batsmen in the England team – also battled fruitlessly against Ajmal and Rehman during the three Tests. Whilst Pietersen certainly suffered from technical difficulties at this stage of the tour, I would argue that confidence was just as important a factor in the struggles endured by both players. Ajmal removed the pair for a combined total of two runs on the first morning of the series and the off-spinner was dominating the contest from that moment forth.

It would be easy to view the Test series as a complete mess for England. However, in reality they often found themselves in good positions and surpassed themselves in the bowling department. Fears that Stuart Broad would, presented with less-helpful pitches, regress to the ‘Enforcer’ he tried and failed to be in previous parts of his Test career were proved completely unfounded as he regularly found something in the surfaces which the Pakistan seamers failed to. He also mucked in well with the bat, and, were England not such an admirably tight-knit unit, would be well within his rights to be annoyed that the woeful batting displays meant that he was never on the winning side. James Anderson was as good as ever, if a little unlucky at times, whilst England surprised everybody, perhaps themselves included, by appearing comfortable playing two seamers and two spinners. That this was possible was in no small part down to Monty Panesar’s strong return – the result of hard work with Sussex, and the treatment he received from the England management during his time out of the team which ensured that, whilst knowing he had to improve, he never felt alienated from the squad.

If the Test series was the salty part of England’s trip then the one-day and Twenty20 series were emphatically the sweet segment. Off the back of the 5-0 drubbing inflicted in the One-day International series played in India before Christmas, nothing much was expected in the 50-over game. But, as in the Test series, expectations were confounded and England reversed that embarrassment to win 4-0. A critical aspect in this was that the openers produced four hundreds in four matches. One-day International hundreds are a rarity, particularly for English players, and so this was a huge achievement which, against a less talented batting line-up than India’s, went a long way to securing the wins. Gooch’s Test emphasis on the batsmen going on to score so-called ‘daddy-hundreds’ when they make a start would appear to be bearing fruit in the one-day format as well. A great deal of personal pride can be taken from their achievements by Pietersen and Alastair Cook. At the start of the series neither were a unanimous selection amongst pundits – by the end they were, along with Broad and Steven Finn, amongst the first names on everybody’s team sheet. Pietersen’s revival in form can be seen as, in part, the result of more defensive field settings from Pakistan opening up his scoring options, but batting at the top of the order is important too. He is very comfortable against the hard ball and he was often already on 25 by the time Ajmal and Shahid Afridi came into the attack.

The English bowlers rarely disappoint these days and, as in the Test series, they carried out their plans beautifully in the 50-over game. Steven Finn showed signs of improvement in India but, for me, this was the series which served notice that not only does he swing the ball at speeds often above 90 mph but he also means business about becoming one of the leading pace bowlers in the world in all forms of the game within the next couple of years. Pakistan didn’t take a liking to his bowling in any way and found themselves knicking off and being trapped lbw with regularity. The rest all bowled solidly enough for this Pakistani batting line-up and ensured that the margins of victory for England were always sizable.

Twenty20 International cricket started as a hit and a giggle but with the defence of the World Twenty20 crown in Sri Lanka this autumn fast approaching the matches in the United Arab Emirates were played with high intensity by Stuart Broad’s men. The gremlins from the Test series re-emerged in the first match but some big positives emerged from the later games as England won the series 2-1. Jonny Bairstow looked every bit the international cricketer as he played a crucial aggressive hand in the second match whilst Jade Dernbach demonstrated that he had come close to mastering his death-bowling talent in third match. Bairstow’s name perhaps comes after those of Ben Stokes, Jos Buttler, Alex Hales and James Taylor when listing the young batting talent in county cricket but, thus far, he is the only one of the five to play a match-winning innings for England – and has now done it twice. The others will surely produce in the very near future but Bairstow could well have pushed his name to the front of the pack in the selectors minds. Dernbach’s internationals up to this tour had been schizophrenic – occasional flashes of brilliance mixed in with being hit round the park at more than six an over on a regular occurrence. But his spell at the death on Monday displayed wonderful control of variation and foxed all of the Pakistan batsman he bowled at. England will hope that they have found their own answer to Lasith Malinga and Umar Gul in him. The sustained success enjoyed in this format means that England should, along with the sub-continent teams, start as favourites to win back-to-back World Twenty20s in six months time.

Before that trip to Sri Lanka, England will head over there shortly for a two-match Test series. Although the hosts have struggled of late, following the retirement of Murali and political upheaval, the visitors are sure to be tested against the slower bowlers once again. It is perhaps no coincidence that the venues to be used during the series – Galle and Colombo’s P Sara Oval – both have a reputation for favouring the spinners. Although Sri Lanka no longer have a master like Murali in their ranks the pitches will turn more than they did in the UAE and England will thus have to ensure that a return to whites does not mean a return to batting collapses against a bowling line-up which posed them only a very minimal threat at home last season.

The overriding memory of England’s visit to the Gulf in years to come will not be a sweet one. Test series tend to live longer on the mind than one-day competitions, and this was England’s worst Test series defeat since the 2006/07 Ashes. But despite these salty headlines, there were numerous occasions where England bossed the opposition in alien conditions. Results should pick up on upcoming trips to the sub-continent and, if that is the case, England might look back on this tour in a more positive light and see it as one which set in motion the conquering of the final frontier.

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