England need to tame South Africa batting power
Morgan seeks boost for Champions Trophy Amla and De Villiers are dangers on a dry pitch
Never, in 46 years of playing internationals, have England’s one-day cricketers been so certain as they are now, little more than a week before the start of the Champions Trophy. Never so certain of their strategy. Never so certain of their starting XI, so there is no place for Jonny Bairstow. Never so certain of their individual roles of how to bat, when to bowl and where to field.
All England need is the confidence of winning, to help them feel certain of success in the Champions Trophy, and that can only come in their three-match series against South Africa which starts at Headingley this afternoon.
A series win is essential – preferably a clean sweep – for England’s tyres to be fully inflated when they take on Bangladesh on June 1, to be followed by further qualifiers against Australia and New Zealand, one of which must be won.
England have won their past six one-dayers but South Africa’s batsmen are of vastly greater calibre than those of West Indies or Ireland and 50-over cricket, it could well be argued, is their optimal format.
Quinton de Kock is not only their wicketkeeper – with his boyish grin and shin pads tucked inside his trousers – but South Africa’s opening batsman, and, at the age of 24, he has scored 12 centuries in one-day internationals. None of England’s batsmen can match that: Joe Root and Eoin Morgan come closest with nine each.
On a dry Headingley pitch, South Africa’s batsmen will keep on coming. Hashim Amla and AB de Villiers have been doing the repertory theatre of the Indian Premier League – Amla in a leading role as he scored two 20-over centuries in the 10th edition, De Villiers less of a star than he has usually been with his pyrotechnic hitting.
A certain weariness affects South Africa’s one-day captain, which may be shelved for the next month before he misses the Test series. Nevertheless, De Villiers and Amla have both scored 24 one-day hundreds.
In other departments, however, England are ahead of South Africa. The hosts are younger and sharper in the field. South Africa’s attack is not what it was and not what it could be.
Dale Steyn, though never primarily a white-ball bowler, has a shoulder injury which might spell the end of arguably the finest fast bowler this century; Kyle Abbott, just as he had become acclimatised to international cricket, left for the greater security of a Kolpak player for Hampshire; and Ryan Mclaren, once a Kolpak but an overseas player for Lancashire this season, has been ignored. Kagiso Rabada, Morne Morkel and Imran Tahir can be inked in for a full allotment. So, too, perhaps, Chris Morris, although he is on his first tour of England. Their fifth bowler can be targeted, and will be, by the finest one-day squad England have assembled since 1971.