The cry goes up again: pick Monty!

Tomorrow England announce a squad for the one-day series. Monty Panesar is widely expected not to be in it. He hasn’t played a one-day international yet, and he would be a bit of a gamble as he has played hardly any one-day cricket for his county. But the same was true of Simon Jones when he became a first-choice one-day player for England in 2005. And Monty, like Jones, is something special.

He is a wicket-taker, and an inspiration. Matthew Hoggard, writing in today’s Times, says England need more of Monty’s attitude. A contributor to this blog, Ian, has described Monty as a talisman, which is spot-on. He has some of same the qualities – spark, enthusiasm, appetite and enjoyment – that Andrew Flintoff has, when not carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders.

England’s one-day team is in a mess. They have two big problems: getting bowled out, and not taking wickets. Jamie Dalrymple has come in this year and done well as a bits-and-pieces player, showing a strong temperament and getting some revs on the ball. But as yet he isn’t a strike bowler: in 14 games his best is two for five, and his strike rate, 52 balls for each wicket, is as modest as Ashley Giles’s. Michael Yardy, picked alongside him in the Champions Trophy, is another tidy bits-and-pieces player, a natural understudy to Dalrymple rather than a foil.

England treat one-day slow bowling cursorily, shipping players in and out as if the Nineties had never ended. Shaun Udal, last winter, and Alex Loudon, last summer, were each given a single match to show what they could do. Jeremy Snape, a wild-card selection in 2001-02 that turned out rather well, was forgotten by the following summer. He is, nonetheless, the third most prolific one-day slow bowler in Duncan Fletcher’s time, behind Giles and the equally tepid Ian Blackwell, with 13 wickets. The policy just isn’t working.

In the World Cup, the pitches may well demand two spinners, one of whom must be an attacking bowler. No England spinner has ever taken 100 one-day international wickets: the best, or most prolific, is John Emburey with 76. It’s time they picked a high-class spinner, backed him and gave him a run. Cometh the hour, cometh the patka.