Whitewash on cards if players truly believe
England must show a ruthless streak under Root and go out to beat the South Africans 4-0 England deep down know they are a better side so they should not let them off the hook
England should go on and beat South Africa 4-0 in this series. My message to them is believe you can do it and go and do it. I have no doubt they can whitewash them and the way forward for English cricket under a new captain is to be ruthless when on top.
When the great Australian sides got you down, they kicked you hard. England deep down know they are a better side than South Africa so now they should not let them off the hook.
Winning and not giving the opposition a sniff should be the way forward for English cricket under a new captain.
They just need to keep saying to themselves, “We are better than them, we are going to beat them”. They do not have to shout it out to the world. Just keep it to themselves and then go out and do it.
This match has not solved every problem in the book. England are no closer to knowing if they have found batsmen at numbers two, three and five. We will find out more about that as the summer goes on.
But the most important thing under new captain Joe Root is they outplayed South Africa in every area. England always looked a better side on paper, but the gulf between the teams proved to be far bigger than I expected.
On a very dry surface, the toss was priceless and decisive. But England were good enough to grab that bit of luck and make it work for them.
Root had a slice of luck and was dropped on 16 in the gully, but everybody needs a bit of good fortune. The fact is he played well enough to make them pay for it by scoring 190.
Moeen Ali’s innings was superb, a fluent 87 that killed the South Africans at the end of England’s first innings.
But I do not think anybody expected South Africa to collapse the way they did in the second innings. They had no idea how to play the turning ball.
Nearly all of them played back, chest front on with both shoulders square pointing down the pitch instead of staying sideways on. Being square on restricts your movement, you need to be side on to ride with the spin. Whenever the ball kept low, jumped or turned, they did not have a clue how to play it.
The problem with modern-day batsmen is they play on uniform, flat, easy batting pitches most of the time around the world.
It encourages lots of shots with less emphasis on technique against slow bowlers who don’t turn the ball. Players everywhere see very few spinning pitches unless they are playing in India. And we saw what happened to England and South Africa when they last played in India. They were both thrashed.
Players hardly see turning pitches in county cricket, or South African provincial cricket either, so there is no way for them to get a grounding against spin to learn the patience required, the technique, the discipline and the selection of shot.
The influence of one-day cricket has left the modern batsmen expecting to play shots every other ball. You cannot do that on turning pitches and that is why South Africa fell in a heap. It was not an easy pitch, but they should have done better than all out for 119. This was a wonderful cricket pitch that encouraged the seamers with a little bit of movement, and then turned. It brought all the spinners into the game early, which was better for supporters than a high-scoring boring match, and I hope we get more pitches like this.
It is better cricket today on these sorts of surfaces than when I played and both teams were scoring 500 and matches were drawn. It is better for spectators because it brings all types of players into the game.
Moeen Ali bowled very well. Most of the time he has bowled for England, he has been a bit of a golden arm but there is a different type of pressure on you when the ball is turning and you are expected to bowl teams out.
He coped well with that expectation and delivered for his team. He takes wickets because he spins the ball. You are always going to concede a few runs when you turn the ball but you have to bowl wicket-taking deliveries to get people out.
He is a slightly better batsman than he is a bowler but it does not matter. He is a very good cricketer, and he is growing in stature and maturity. If I could change one thing for the second Test at Trent Bridge this week, it would be to pick Adil Rashid for Liam Dawson.
Liam is an efficient cricketer but he does not strike me as a match-winning cricketer.
Rashid is a match-winning bowler. He took 23 wickets in India against much better players of spin than this South African lot.
There is every chance Nottingham will be flatter and it will not turn. Then you have to winkle people out and the wrist spinner is better at doing that than a finger spinner like Dawson.
It is good for Root that he won his first Test as captain, but I am not going to judge him on just a single game.
I don’t judge a batsman or bowler purely on one Test match and we need to see more of Root leading the side.
But I am confident he will be fine. He has always been a quick learner ever since he was with Yorkshire as a youngster. He will learn quickly as a captain too. Most importantly he has started with a victory and that gives you so much confidence.