England will be haunted by the latest horror show (26 July 1999)

26 July 1999

England will be haunted by the latest horror show

David Lloyd

Inquests, aftermath and a torrent of abuse will come tumbling down on England after this latest woeful performance.

We all watched in horror as the batsmen came and went in ugly fashion on Saturday after New Zealand acquired a healthy first-innings lead. England offered nothing. There was neither counter-attack in the way of a Botham or Milburn, nor epic stonewalling in the manner of Atherton or Bailey. The shots played by Mark Butcher, Alec Stewart and Mark Ramprakash will come back to haunt them. The public, the crowd, were incensed that such poor judgment should be contemplated at this level.

It is said, and probably rightly, that our top five are the best batsmen in the country but they do not get together as a unit. In the last 22 Test innings England have failed to reach 200 on 11 occasions. I mentioned last week that I always thought that there was something missing during my time as coach, and I felt that again during this game: nobody grabbed the game by the scruff of the neck. Chris Cairns did so for New Zealand. He is in prime form and he let everyone know it.

After the top five come two novices at six and seven. Martin Crowe, New Zealand's all-time leading run scorer, picked out a potential problem with Aftab Habib. As the bowler approaches, Habib makes three separate adjustments with his feet which bring them pointing to extra cover at the moment of delivery. Crowe says he has never seen anyone succeed at this level who did not have his back foot square to the popping crease. New Zealand, like every other team, do their homework and Habib has been bowled in identical fashion at Edgbaston and Lord's.

Chris Read at the moment is a No 9 at this level and England's eight, nine, 10 and 11 are all No 11s. Team meetings for New Zealand will be pretty simple: rip out the top five and the rest are yours.

Daniel Vettori is only 20 and it is well known in the game that he is not a world-beater, but we treat him as one, as we did Carl Hooper. Our batsmen are just not prepared to use nimble footwork to attack the spinner down the ground with a straight bat. The two swipes across the line by Stewart and Butcher were exactly the shots Vettori wanted them to play.

Little bits of rough will always be around as the Test match progresses, but with good footwork you can by-pass them. Sachin Tendulkar and Hansie Cronje have no thought whatsoever of staying routed to the crease against Shane Warne. They take the game to him and leave all the problems with the Australian - and he is a world-beater.

Nothing went right for England. The politics before the game left a lot to be desired and the information fed to the media regarding the fitness or otherwise of Alex Tudor was baffling. We were told that he was injured prior to the Edgbaston Test with a "niggle" in his knee, yet he played immediately afterwards in a county game while Surrey colleagues Stewart and Thorpe did not. It is worth noting that neither of them would be in need of a rest after having very quiet games.

Tudor had a scan prior to the Lord's Test - apparently unbeknown to England - and consequently turned up unfit. England would be hopping mad about yet another incident of not being informed by the county - and it is usually the same county.

Dean Headley came into the team and so Nasser Hussain got his wish after stating that he could not contemplate going into a Test without him. Again it is common knowledge that Headley has bowled poorly this season and yet he missed the Kent game against New Zealand.

If Tudor had have been fit, Headley would have sat out this Test and as Kent's game started on Wednesday last week he would have missed that too. Kent have no game next week and that is far too long to be inactive. Did England know all these things and who was calling the shots - they, Headley or Kent? The Tudor and Headley issues present another strong case for central contracts.

On electing to bat, Hussain would have been looking at the pitch and not the weather. A dry surface that looked good would have meant there may have been a little life early on, and to go to lunch on the first day at 80 for two was about right. After lunch England had no answer - in particular to Cairns, who bowled beautifully, and has developed a stunning slower delivery. Read's dismissal was an embarrassment and Hussain was left high and dry as the innings petered out.

New Zealand's response was nothing more than a gutsy effort as Matthew Horne dug in, Roger Twose saw off Tufnell and Vettori enjoyed himself.

New Zealand had the character and characters and we gave nothing. The tourists are supposed to be the meek and mild outfit but through Cairns and Dion Nash, they had plenty to say and I look on sustained verbal abuse as vile, cowardly and downright rude. An odd word, here and there, in the heat of battle is fine; it has been that way since the game was invented. But what is in the game now is totally unacceptable. Match referees pussyfoot about, fussing over bat logos and markings on pads and arm-guards. Get real, ICC. Sack the soft refs who are on a jolly and get someone in with a few teeth.

Where do we go from here? It grieves me to write that. The plot thickens because Duncan Fletcher's Glamorgan were not playing during this game. Why was he not at Lord's? The official line was that it was felt that it may intrude on David Graveney, Graham Gooch and Hussain. Nonsense. The captain's injury is a nuisance but if he is in control, with total responsibility, he can show us all his strength by first reflecting and then acting. We need to change. We should change, because we are in a mess. Do it, Nass.

Source :: Electronic Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk)