ENGLAND’S seven-day hiatus between fixtures ends tomorrow with a must-win game against Bangladesh here, a genteel city that has witnessed seminal moments in English cricket history. The Bodyline row erupted at the Adelaide Oval and Andrew Flintoff’s side suffered a last-day Ashes meltdown there against Shane Warne in 2006.
Australian observers are not the only ones predicting an upset that would dump the Poms out of the tournament. Bangladesh, after all, have won two of the past three meetings. Even after a week of honing golf swings and some practice amid the Victorian splendour of St Peter’s College, the England camp remains tense.
Their fate is now out of their hands — a Bangladesh win over New Zealand would make anything England do irrelevant — and there is a growing acceptance that even if they qualify their best may not be good enough to take them beyond a probable quarter-final with India. But on the magnitude of the impending failure may rest the futures of those in management roles, from captain upwards.
Peter Moores, the head coach, is under heaviest fire. His justification of decisions through statistics arouses cynicism but this is not a week to stop listening to team analyst Nathan Leamon, who will tell Eoin Morgan to bat first if he wins the toss tomorrow or against Afghanistan in Sydney on Friday (another must-win).
England are happiest chasing, but there is good evidence for batting first in floodlit games. Those sides that have done so win about three times in four, usually by scoring huge totals. Of the 15 centuries scored in day-night matches, all have been scored for sides batting first. Before Brendan Taylor of Zimbabwe yesterday, the best individual effort batting second under lights was James Taylor’s 98 not out for England against Australia on the first day of competition. As Shane Warne has said: “The wickets really zip on at night.”
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In the only World Cup match at Adelaide to date, Pakistan folded to India’s seamers in the chase.
Apart from anything else, England’s experience of batting at night, and dealing with the ball “zipping on”, is limited to that encounter with Australia in Melbourne when Taylor alone settled. In their only other scheduled day-nighter, they batted first against New Zealand (and so badly that the game was concluded before anyone could flick the switch). When Bangladesh batted under lights they struggled against Sri Lanka. Afghanistan’s batsmen, too, have done best in day games. After scoring 303 for eight and 309 for six, and with runs there for the taking against a Bangladesh attack that conceded 318 to Scotland, England’s priority is reinvigorating their bowling. To this end, if they are to drop the out-of-form Gary Ballance, there is a case for bringing in James Tredwell as an extra bowler rather than Alex Hales — although on the evidence of yesterday’s long net session, Hales is under consideration. If Hales plays, doubts over his character must be set aside.
The attraction of Tredwell playing for Ballance is that it would allow Taylor to fill Ballance’s place at No 3 and give more exposure at six to Jos Buttler, who did not get to the wicket until the 45th over against Scotland and the 46th against Sri Lanka. The tail would be longer but it should hardly be required: in Sri Lanka’s 50 overs against Bangladesh, they lost one wicket. Bangladesh’s fielders are not the best.
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Toothless though England’s fast bowlers have been, there will be a temptation to retain the pace and bounce of Stuart Broad and Steven Finn on the basis that it is what Bangladesh would be least comfortable with. With an extra bowler on hand, Morgan could pull Finn from the firing line should he have an off-day. If Finn is not risked, Chris Jordan is ready to step in.
Fielding two spinners would bring problems of its own, not least who works with the short leg-side boundary, the pitch for tomorrow’s game being slightly off the centre of the square. The boundary is hardly as short as some in use at this tournament though.
Much is expected of Broad and Jimmy Anderson, who have just four wickets between them. Broad’s came in two balls against Australia, Anderson’s two against Scotland. If England go out, Anderson’s one-day career will not be the only one that ends.