Perhaps it is best to put England’s achievement in winning five successive tests abroad in context by understanding that the last time they did so they actually won seven in a row between 1911 and 1914, Jack Hobbs was on the side, George V was on the throne. and Archduke Franz Ferdinand kept thinking that “this afternoon could be a beautiful opportunity for a walk.”
There have been long passages in England’s cricket history where winning anywhere, let alone Asia, was enough to spark national celebrations and MBE’s everywhere. Do it five times in a row? Make no mistake, this is a great achievement.
We have to acknowledge that England’s opponents, especially Sri Lanka, have not been at their best. And yes, we probably have to admit that preparing to take on a daunting team from India with games against this version of Sri Lanka is a bit like warming up for a fight against Tyson Fury over Thora Hird for tea.
But England has faced its own substantial challenges in recent months. Overcoming them and completing these victories reflects a certain amount of stamina and character. They have now won four successive test rounds with new coach Chris Silverwood and have established a roster based on substantial first-inning totals that has seen them win eight and lose one of their most recent 11 rounds.
Don’t forget: England (and, to be fair, Sri Lanka) came into this series without the usual prep time. They had to settle for just one day of cricket between squads on a green surface in Hambantota. They also ran out of at least three first-choice players in Ben Stokes, Jofra Archer and Rory Burns and a more likely pick in Moen Ali. They also lost the draw in both games, which in these conditions is a significant disadvantage.
And just because you don’t hear them complaining about the deprivations of life in the bubble, don’t think it’s not difficult. It’s lonely, boring, and frustrating. But everyone has accepted it knowing that English cricket, even world cricket, needs these tours to take place to avoid financial collapse. The game owes them a lot.
The last day of the series could hardly have been better for England if Silverwood had written it. His bowlers under pressure took windows; his hitters under pressure (well, most of them) scored runs. They even took Sri Lanka out fast enough, in 35.5 overs, to engineer an additional day at the beach on Tuesday. They couldn’t have reasonably expected better.
This was an especially important day for spinners in England. They had had trouble playing the required role in the early innings. It wasn’t just that they ended up wicketless, it was the first time since 2001 that the closers claimed all 10 wickets in a test inning in Sri Lanka, but only seven of their 64 overs were maidens. That inability to play a holding role meant that both Mark Wood and James Anderson were forced to throw more overs than Dom Bess.
In the second entry, they found more useful conditions. There was, by no means, a great turnaround. But there was enough to sow some seeds of doubt in the minds of hitters who didn’t know which balls would spin and which would go straight. As a result, the skills of Bess and Jack Leach, which, by the high standards of test cricket, could be described as relatively modest, were put into play.
That doesn’t mean it sounds harsh. Leach, for example, is an admirably consistent bowler. He rarely throws badly – yes, there have been a few loose balls on this tour, but he came in without much cricket in the last 14 months – and, under that exterior of everyone, he has shown he has more resilience than might immediately appear. . . Sickness, injury, remodeled action: it has returned from abundance.
But you don’t win a lot of turns. It doesn’t boast of having a tricky drift or a devastating drop. There were times in the early innings where he seemed a bit toothless.
However, in a position to provide assistance, you can really play a role. You don’t need a fancy twist on such surfaces; You don’t need to be Shane Warne or Murali. Instead, Leach’s ability to put enough balls in the correct area, vary his pace and flight a bit, and gain some natural variation is sufficient.
This is where fair bowling in Taunton has come in handy. Rather than chasing the game, as an inexperienced bowler might have done, both Leach and Bess were content to bide their time, build spells, and rely on their own abilities and the field to do the rest. And despite all her limitations, the fact remains that Bess claimed 12 wickets at 9:25 p.m. in these two games and produced a major inning on the third day of this game. Yes, that’s flattering. But for a developing gamer, he keeps finding a way to contribute.
There is a possibility that, in India, they could replicate such performances on the fourth and fifth day. However, in general, the launches in India are flat and full of races for the first three or four days. It would represent a significant tactical error if they presented England with the kind of spinning surface that could put England’s spinners into play.
We must also acknowledge that some of Sri Lanka’s hitting was of a modest level. The objective of the last day, without a doubt, was calculated aggression. Instead, they hacked and made their way into recklessness. His 126 here was not as poor as his 135 in the first test – there was hardly any assistance on the surface that time – but it was an unusually frantic smooth display. It’s hard to imagine India selling its windows at such a low price in the next series.
But this is, very often, the way of modern cricket. When conditions favor bowlers, batters invariably try to fight their way to safety. It is a scenario that reflects the dominance of limited overs cricket, certainly, but also the decline of defensive techniques. If the Sri Lankan hitters had relied on their defensive play, they would surely have reacted differently to this situation.
In addition, he wonders if the ECB would have penalized one side of the county that produced an acreage like this. A pitch where Sri Lanka’s left arm spinner Lasith Embuldeniya opened the bowling alley and claimed two wickets on his first 19 balls. One pitch where the spin claimed 23 of the last 24 wickets to fall in the game, and the other was due to an outing. Some of Somerset’s opponents have bleated like lambs after their experiences at Taunton. But in preparation for test cricket in Sri Lanka or Bangladesh in particular they do a decent job. If other counties did the same, England’s pool of spinners, and its pool of batsmen who could play spinning bowls, would increase rapidly.
This was also a great day for Dom Sibley. He came into this inning having scored six in three innings in the series so far. With Ben Stokes and more pertinently Rory Burns returning to the squad for the India series, his place on the squad is likely to be reduced. I really needed some racing. And England also needed him to score something.
Sibley’s technique appears to be in transition today. He hasn’t worked with Gary Palmer, the open-minded coach who reinvigorated his career a few years ago, for some time. So while it’s still open, he then puts his front foot on the field and ends up playing through it. This negates the purpose of the open stance and leaves you with an important leg before risk. Three times here he was the beneficiary of the referees’ decisions. It also has few launch shots. It rarely seemed comfortable; not for a moment did it look pretty.
But he looks hard at the ball, he has a strong mind and remarkable patience. By playing more often than before and relying on himself to adjust to the turn, he found a way to prosper. And seeing him on the line in the fourth inning, he did what many other famous players have failed.
And then there was Jos Buttler. Buttler has hit as good as this at times. He was excellent on the previous tour of Sri Lanka, for example, and very good on the recently completed series against Pakistan. Here he produced a couple of flowing innings to ease pressure from his teammates.
Perhaps most significantly, it has never been better maintained. Yeah, he’s been pretty good at defending closers for a while. But standing up to turn, it had sometimes seemed like an accident waiting for it to happen. Here he took the ball cleanly as often as any goalkeeper could hope for and looked like a much improved player.
With that in mind, there will be those who ask you to stay with the team in India for the entire test series. But it is true that Buttler returns home after the first test. He looked more tired than anyone after his World Cup win and is clearly better when he updates. Who can tell if the prospect of a break hasn’t helped you produce your best form here? After all, such freedom worked wonders for Sir Alastair Cook in his Final Test.
With Joe Root hitting as well as he has in years and Stuart Broad and Anderson showing no signs of decline despite their years, England are heading to India in the best frame of mind they could have hoped for. You suspect there will be some very difficult days in the coming weeks. No one is suggesting that England is anything but homeless.
But 107 years from now, it’s quite possible that a new generation of fans will look back on these results and think ‘five in a row; Imagine that. ‘ Whatever happens next, this has been an admirable achievement.
George Dobell is a senior correspondent for ESPNcricinfo
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