The whitewashers get whitewashed

	Beaten 0-3 after beating India 4-0 © AFP Enlarge

There have been few crashes in cricket harder than the one England just suffered. From the heights of their 4-0 whitewash of India at home, during which they wrested the No. 1 Test ranking, England hit terra firma in the UAE, where they were whitewashed 3-0 by Pakistan. The longevity of their No. 1 status is now tied to South Africa's fortunes in New Zealand. Very few teams have won all the Tests in one series, and then lost all the Tests in the next.

England's reversal in results is best illustrated by the difference between their batting averages in the Pataudi Trophy and the Mobilink Jazz Cup. Against India, England's batsmen averaged 59 in four Tests. Against Pakistan, they managed 19.06 in three, a fraction more than the number of awards handed out at the end of the series. England's 4-0, 0-3 turnaround was the ninth time a team lost all Tests in a series after winning all Tests in the previous one.

All of the previous eight instances, however, involved a two-Test series, and six out of the eight involved either Zimbabwe or Bangladesh. So a relatively stronger Test team would clean sweep Zimbabwe or Bangladesh and then be whitewashed by a more formidable opponent. The two exceptions are New Zealand's 2-0 victory against West Indies at home in the summer of 1999-00 followed by a 0-3 defeat to Australia, and Bangladesh's 2-0 sweep of a weakened West Indies in the Carribean followed by their 0-2 loss at home to India in 2009-10.

While the first time a team whitewashed another and then got whitewashed themselves was as late as 1996, the reverse took place as early as 1931-32. South Africa were beaten 0-5 on their tour of Australia: three were innings defeats, the others by 169 runs and ten wickets. Bradman scored a hundred in each of the first four matches, including the only unbeaten 299 in Test cricket. South then went to New Zealand, where they won both of the Tests.

The most recent of the ten entries in the table below is Bangladesh's 2-0 win in the Caribbean, which was preceded by a 0-2 defeat at home to Sri Lanka.

In 2008, England had a similar experience in one-day internationals, achieving a comprehensive victory at home and then losing badly in Asia. They beat South Africa 4-0 in the ODI series during the summer; the fifth match was abandoned with the visitors 6 for 1. England then travelled to India, where they lost the first five out of seven one-day games before the tour was interrupted by the terror attacks in Mumbai and the last two fixtures were cancelled.

England now have the chance to do the reverse. In their previous ODI series, in October 2011, shortly after they routed India at home, they were beaten 0-5 in India. Given their recent performance against spin, though, only the bravest (or perhaps most foolish) man would back them to sweep Pakistan in four ODIs in the UAE.

Perhaps the most remarkable turnaround in ODI form was Australia's performance in the 2006-07 season. After whitewashing England 5-0 in the Ashes, Australia lost the triangular series finals to Andrew Flintoff's team and sent a slightly weakened squad to New Zealand, where they were beaten 0-3 in the Chappell-Hadlee series. It was then that Australia, who had several players on the wrong side of 30, were given the 'Dad's Army' label, and they went to the 2007 World Cup in the Caribbean on a five-match losing streak. They did not drop any of their 11 games in the West Indies, steamrolling all opponents on their way to a third consecutive world title.