Now take fearless mentality into the big events
We’ve criticised english one-day cricket for decades for being pedestrian and old-fashioned but what we’ve seen in the last 18 months since the World Cup has been remarkable.
Under eoin Morgan’s captaincy, england have been transformed into the epitome of a multi-skilled and powerful one-day side. Their ability to hit the ball in different areas with different styles of players makes this a very dynamic batting line-up.
Sometimes, as at Trent Bridge yesterday, they are almost impossible to bowl at.
Six of england’s eight highest one-day international totals have come since the World Cup. These players were available before that tournament and people were saying they should be picked but the management chose not to.
But it’s amazing what can be achieved when a team changes its mindset and dynamic players are picked and properly backed. A huge amount of credit should go to Morgan and the coaches for that. I remember speaking to eoin at the Ageas Bowl after england had been bowled out inside 50 overs last year and I asked him if he was cross they hadn’t batted out their allotted overs. His answer was emphatically ‘no’ as he was clear he didn’t want his team to go back to the old-fashioned mentality of keeping wickets intact.
He wants his players to be fearless. That cultural change is complete and the exciting thing is that it’s filtered down through the ranks of english cricket.
Look at the Lions, with guys like Sam Billings and Ben Duckett making huge scores in limitedovers cricket, and the fact that players like Jonny Bairstow can’t get into the 50-over side shows the strength in depth.
I get slightly frustrated at some of the old-school commentators who talk about ‘getting the yorker in’ when players like Jos Buttler have the ability to get down on one knee and scoop you over the boundary. He can make a good yorker into a full toss and the ball disappears over the keeper’s head.
The genie is out of the bottle now, there is no turning back. The only thing left for this team to prove is that they can reproduce this style of cricket in tournaments where the pressures are slightly different. The fear of failure is more tangible in tournaments and they have to carry on this mentality of fearless cricket.
If they can do that, who knows what this team is capable of.