Moores must attempt confidence trick

A few weeks into his second spell as England coach, after a Test series loss to Sri Lanka and defeat in the Lord's Test to India, Peter Moores was asked if the team had hit rock bottom.

"Who knows what rock bottom is," he replied. "But I'm pretty sure it's not losing a cricket match."

It is that sense of perspective that England will need in the next few weeks. After the mother of all defeats in Wellington - never have England been beaten with more deliveries remaining in ODI cricket - there might be a temptation to wallow or punish or seek excuses. But none of that will do England any good. Not in the short-term, anyway.

As far-fetched as it seems right now, England have to believe they can still win this World Cup. They have to regroup and rebuild shattered confidence so they go into the match against Scotland on Monday in the best possible frame of mind to perform at their best.

So, over the next 24 hours, Moores and Paul Farbrace and co will have to lift the spirits of their crushed squad and ascertain who is up for the fight and who looks scarred by recent experiences. He will try to remind them of some of the good things they have achieved on this trip - beating the current world champions in successive games and scoring 300 against Australia - and learn from some of the mistakes.

"I don't think we're looking for excuses," he said as the squad arrived in Christchurch. "I don't think anybody is looking for comfort. A defeat like that is not an easy one to shake off and it shouldn't be. You would be disappointed if it was. Days like that should live with you for a while.

"We have to accept that Wellington and the MCG weren't good enough. You can spin it how you like, but that wasn't an acceptable batting performance.

"My overriding feeling was that it was a disappointment for the people who came to watch because it wasn't an acceptable performance. The players' preparation for the game was good but we didn't play in the style we wanted to play. We have got address that and come back with something.

"Our preparation in the tri-series was great. We beat India twice, we scored 300 against Australia. Now, as coaches, we have to work with them and to find a way of being able to produce a good enough performance to gain some momentum. We have to get some momentum into our team.

"Nobody is coming in on a big white charger to change it. The group is here - both coaches and players - and my role in that is to try and make sure that we galvanise everybody to play the best cricket we can."

Is Moores the man for that job? In his first spell as England coach, he gained a reputation for being intense. He was described, by his critics at least, as the man who, instead of alleviating pressure at times of hardship, added to it. Most memorably, he was described as "the woodpecker" in Kevin Pietersen's autobiography: always nagging, never relaxing.

There has been little sign of that character in the first few months of his second stint. He has seemed calm and consistent. Until the eve of the World Cup, anyway.

The changes that England made for the first game of this tournament - dropping Ravi Bopara, bringing in Gary Ballance for his first game in almost six months, moving James Taylor and taking the new ball from Chris Woakes - may yet be remembered as the moment the squad were destabilised. Much of the preparation and improvement made in Sri Lanka and in the tri-series was squandered. Many of the plans and formulas disturbed. The confidence in the dressing room compromised.

Take the example of Ballance. Few would dispute that he has the class to flourish in international cricket but, promoted to the side having not even made the tour of Sri Lanka a few months earlier, he looked short of game time and out of form. Now his long-term confidence could be diluted as England consider dropping him for the Scotland game. It is back to the days of Graeme Hick et al: pick, drop, pick, repeat.

Equally Bopara, who could now be recalled, will have lost some confidence. He will know that, if he does win a recall, he will be under immediate pressure to perform at risk of being dropped for, perhaps, a final time. It is not how the best teams manage their players.

There are also some mixed messages being passed to the team. If England really want to play the aggressive cricket they claim, why did they select Ballance and not Alex Hales?

Hales, impressive in the nets and the only England player to register a T20 international century, could well replace Ballance in the top three for the Scotland game, while Chris Jordan is bowling with good rhythm and could improve the fielding and batting by replacing Steven Finn, whose two overs cost 49 on Friday.

"We're looking for a style of play that we're starting to show at times," Moores said. "We have shown we can get 300.

"Everybody can sing in the shower but not everybody can sing on the stage. You have got to be able to get it out of yourself and that's one of the things a player has to get over to become a top-flight player.

"We have seen England players in the past who have managed to do that and we will see players in this team who will get over that line. They haven't quite done it as a collective for the last two games. Some individuals have done better than others.

"We have to accept that some of our players are emerging. The way we played, nobody in that dressing room - coach or player - would be happy with. We have got to be judged by what we come back with. We can talk all we like but we have got to start playing better cricket."

The vultures are gathering, though. Both Moores and Paul Downton, England's managing director, have endured underwhelming first years in position. While they might be able to withstand an early exit from the World Cup, history suggests that the Ashes series that follows could define their careers.