Muddled Australia try to learn from England

While Australia talk about rejuvenating their cricket team to be realistic World Cup contenders next year, England are emboldened and benefiting fromhaving a specialist one-day captain.

Eoin Morgan is in total control of his side and England’s decision to split their captaincy jobs is working superbly as far as whiteball cricket is concerned.

This series against Australia is the best performance by the team under Morgan’s command and it is hard to see them not going 4-0 up on Friday at the Adelaide Oval. Meanwhile, Australia are in a mess. They have lost 10 of their past 11 ODIS and are casting envious glances at England, who have won 18 out of 20.

Steve Smith has twice talked of copying England in this series, picking himself out to play the Joe Root role of anchoring the innings. But there is just not the same consistency about Australia’s cricket, with chopping and changing in selection and tactics.

After winning the toss in the last game in Sydney, Smith put England in because they prefer to chase, but he should have known the pitch at the SCG slows up under the lights. Instead of doing what was best for his own team, he did what he thought was worse for England.

Smith looks weary, too, whereas Morgan is fresh. A couple of new coaches have also helped to lift everyone. Chris Woakes has complimented Graham Thorpe’s impact on his batting since the Ashes and Mark Wood believes Chris Silverwood has enabled David Willey to get his swing back.

The big step forward, however, has been how they have adapted to conditions. In the past, England have been brilliant on flat pitches but failed to recalibrate their tactics on trickier surfaces.

They were bowled out by South African Kagiso Rabada’s swing at Lord’s last summer and could not rein in their attacking style when Pakistan got the better of them on a slow pitch in Cardiff.

But in Sydney on Sunday they readjusted to a two-paced pitch and proved there is more than one way to a 300-run total, with Jos Buttler playing the best ODI innings of his career.

With Morgan, England have a one-day captain solely focused on white-ball cricket.

He has not played first-class cricket since July 2015 and is unlikely to do so again. He spends his life on the road in coloured clothing and sees winning the World Cup in 2019 as the culmination of his career.

His masterful handling of his bowlers has been his greatest strength, juggling them in Sydney when Liam Plunkett broke down, and has known when to use his spinners throughout the series.

‘‘Morgan is such a good captain: the way he leads, the way he speaks,’’ said Wood.

‘‘Every game that we’ve played, we’ve not been happy with the overall performance, although we’ve been happy with the win.

‘‘We’re always looking to try and strive for that ‘perfect game’.’’

England lack the one superstar bowler that is often needed to win a World Cup. Australia had Mitchell Starc in 2015, and a galaxy of greats in the 2000s when they dominated white-ball cricket.

Wood, with his pace, could be that gun bowler if he stays fit, but knows he needs to add more skills to his game and is working on improving his slower ball.

Morgan is now targeting a whitewash, a remarkable turnaround for a team pilloried when they lost their last ODI in Adelaide to Bangladesh and crashed out of the World Cup.

Back then they were accused of being obsessed with data and batting with a handbrake on. Now the only data that matters is how many games they have won.