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Victory in South Africa would be Strauss’s biggest coup

Posted on | November 2, 2009 | 1 Comment

This is a huge tour for England, and unless there are a few injuries in the South African ranks – or some hefty slices of luck going Andrew Strauss’s way – I can’t say I’m feeling too confident about their prospects.

South Africa are rightly installed as the No 1 Test team in the world, and their record at home is impressive. Yes, they may have lost to the Aussies there a year ago, but they were handicapped by the broken hand that Graeme Smith suffered at the start of the second Test. Smith is such a huge figure in their team: when he is around they truly believe that they can achieve anything.

England’s most obvious problem will be their lack of firepower. There will never be another Andrew Flintoff, and Steve Harmison also leaves a big hole in the attack. The rest of the bowlers are steady and can produce decent results in England when there is some movement in the air or spin in the pitch. But on flat South African decks, I don’t see them keeping anyone awake at night.

James Anderson now finds himself promoted to the status of senior bowler, which means he has to be more consistent. On his good days he is a world-beater, but the bad days come along too often for my liking. Stuart Broad, too, needs to step up. He produced a brilliant, Ashes-winning spell at the Oval, but at Edgbaston the ball was floating out of his hand like a powder puff. Broad has said he wants more responsibility now that Flintoff has retired from Test cricket.

This is his chance to grab it.

The other man I am concerned about is Ryan Sidebottom. I just don’t think England are using him in the right way. They are encouraging him to bowl as fast as he can, to push his speed up into the high 80s. But by striving for extra pace, Sidebottom has lost the control that made him such a success in his first full year with England. He has become too expensive and sends down a stack of four-balls.

Sidebottom’s strength is his swing, and that is only effective if you have pinpoint control of line and length. I saw Sachin Tendulkar interviewed the other day about the most challenging duels he has experienced in Test cricket, and he mentioned the spell that Sidebottom bowled to him at Trent Bridge two years ago. It didn’t actually get Tendulkar out – but that’s not the point, because it would have done for anybody else.

That sort of spell is what Sidebottom needs to get back to: proper swing bowling, when the ball almost seems to be under remote control.

He is never going to be a genuine nasty fastie, and searching for a few extra mph won’t give the likes of Jacques Kallis anything to worry about.

Another concern for England is the absence of Port Elizabeth from the Test schedule. That’s the only ground that you can count on to turn a bit; the rest are likely to reduce Graeme Swann to the role of a stock bowler, shutting down one end while Strauss rotates the seamers at the other. I am not sure Adil Rashid will get a game, because England’s strategy will probably revolve around containment, and he tends to be expensive.

Rashid’s weakness is that he has all the eye-catching tricks but he doesn’t have a stock ball he can rely on. When the young Shane Warne went to Richie Benaud for advice, Benaud told him to go away and perfect a stock ball he could bowl at will. Benaud thought it might take two years, but Warne’s talent was such that he did it in six months. It’s the same for professional golfers: when they are in trouble, or under pressure, they need to have a particular shot they can hit with their eyes closed. Until Rashid sorts that part of his game out, he will always be a risky selection at international level.

As for England’s batting, that has been shaky for a while. The best player in the side, Kevin Pietersen, is recovering from an Achilles injury, and no-one can be entirely confident about his form or fitness. Then there are the openers. There is no back-up in this position, so if either Strauss or Alastair Cook gets injured, the selectors will be struggling to find a replacement. I hear that Cook has done some rebuilding work on his technique, and I hope he has tried to stop playing around his front pad.

This whole tour is going to be a searching examination for England against a well-conditioned and well-balanced side. Strauss has already shown himself to be a strong leader, but if he comes back from South Africa as a winner, that will outstrip anything he has achieved as a captain to date.

Article courtesy of the Telegraph.co.uk

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Comments

One Response to “Victory in South Africa would be Strauss’s biggest coup”

  1. Kenny
    November 4th, 2009 @ 11:39 pm

    Where twenty wickets come from on good pitches is an obvious worry but the top order is a concern too.
    I’d always prefer three openers in my XI and yet England are going on tour with only two in the squad! I don’t like Bell at three so to rely on him as a back-up opener spells trouble to me. Pietersen may prefer to bat at four but I think the time has come for him to bat at three.
    Rashid’s bowling may be a gamble, his batting might be as well but if four quicks look unlikely to do a job then two spinners who can both bat might offer variation and a longer tail.
    My XI for the first test would be….
    Strauss
    Cook
    Pietersen
    Trott
    Bell
    Prior
    Rashid/Collingwood
    Broad
    Swann
    Sidebottom
    Anderson

    If Collingwood were prefered then I’d play him at five with Bell moving to six and Prior to seven, but I’d like to see Rashid given a chance to shine with bat as well as ball.
    The other alternative is to play Rashid and choose between Collingwood and Bell

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