Dealing with spin is key says Morgan

Eoin Morgan says improving England's performances against spin in one-day cricket is key to them finding consistency in the format.

England were undone by Sri Lanka's spinners in their 69-run loss at Headingley, with Suraj Randiv and Jeevan Mendis sharing five wickers in 15 overs between them. It was a familiar pattern for England who have been unable to counter slow bowling in ODI cricket for a number of years.

Morgan believes playing positive cricket is imperative to them overcoming the problem."Spin seems to tie us down, so that is something we have to improve - recognising we have to make that improvement as a unit rather than one or two guys going hell for leather," he told reporters. "It has always been a problem for England, particularly in major tournaments.

"The Indians are masters. They take the positive approach of whacking it out of the ground, between milking it around. We need to have a similar attitude, because we have shown when we have positive attitudes we normally win."

Last year, when England were compiling a run of ODI success by beating Bangladesh, Australia and Pakistan in successive series, they appeared to be making progress as a limited-overs outfit. That came to an abrupt halt after the last Ashes, when England lost the seven-match ODI series against Australia 6-1.

That crushing defeat preceded a poor display at the World Cup and Morgan is certain the difference came with how England played the Australian slow bowlers in June-July 2010.

"When we went through a spell of playing very good one-day cricket that is the area we capitalised on - particularly against Australia, when we played [Nathan] Hauritz particularly well and then took the same approach when [Steve] Smith came on," he said. "Our playing of spin dictates how we do - because when we went to Australia this year, we didn't play their spinners well."

Despite criticism from some quarters on another area - the lack of centuries England batsmen compile in ODI cricket - Morgan doesn't see it as an issue.

"It is not an inability to score hundreds [that is losing England games]," he said. "Over the past year or so, a few of the guys have got hundreds - but 80 off 75 balls will win you games. We have had people playing match-winning knocks, and it is not a major problem. It is not a massive thing in one-day cricket that you go out and score a hundred."