Why England won’t win the Cricket World Cup
By Matt Rumble
England may have just set what looks on paper a dominant 327-8 score against cricket minnows Ireland, but there are clear flaws in the teams batting line up.
Kevin Pietersen looked in good touch, but again got in and got out, failing to turn a good score into a great one and getting himself out with a poorly executed, boredom induced reverse sweep for 58.
England’s lower order then again failed to capitalise on the strong foundations set by Jonathan Trott’s 92 and Ian Bell who again reached the 80s.
However, the rest of the side once again showed an inability to finish an innings with any distinction. And it is England’s middle-order which is holding back the side.
We saw against India that a failure to finish an innings cost the side an impressive victory over tournament favourites India, and today against Ireland, Paul Collingwood, Matt Prior and Michael Yardy failed to impress against a distinctly average Irish bowling attack.
Without the spark of Eoin Morgan, who is missing the tournament with a thumb injury, England appear have no-one capable of either guiding the team to victory when chasing, or scoring the quick runs required in the last ten overs to turn a good score into a great one when setting a total.
Collingwood again proved himself to be out of touch with the bat, and is lucky that his fielding and bowling are valuable assets to the side. That being said, his position batting at number five must be under severe threat.
Ravi Bopara was drafted in to replace Morgan, but was unconvincing against Netherlands and he has not since been given the chance to play and show if he has the ability to score quick runs in a fashion which would fill the void left by Morgan’s injury.
If England are going to progress deep into the knockout stages, they need to find a solution to this problem or they will inevitably fall to a side like South Africa or Australia who have batsmen capable of scoring big scores in no time with a class that is lacking from England’s middle order.
