ONE GAME FROM THE SACK
After losing nearly half his matches since taking over as England coach in 2015, Trevor Bayliss is...
England have just suffered one of their worst defeats for years and suddenly Friday’s second Test against Pakistan has become a makeor-break one for coach Trevor Bayliss, while also having huge implications for captain Joe Root. Cricket Correspondent Paul newman looks at what is going wrong for the pair and what will happen next if they do not put it right at Headingley:
HAS WHITE-BALL JOY COME AT A COST?
andrew Strauss made it clear the priority was improving England’s desperate white-ball cricket when he appointed Trevor Bayliss three years ago in the aftermath of another World Cup failure, and in that regard the australian has been an overwhelming success. But nobody expected it to come at the cost of the Test game, which still matters so much to English supporters.
Strauss liked the fact Bayliss was calm and wanted to give responsibility to the players, a coach with a very different personality from his predecessors, andy Flower and Peter Moores. But after the early Test success in the 2015 ashes and the victory in South africa that followed it, the ‘Trevolution’ has been derailed and Bayliss’s strengths could be seen as weaknesses, at least in the longer game. He has always encouraged positive play but that has led to reckless Test cricket.
HE’S NO FLETCHER...
What Strauss really wanted was a coach like duncan Fletcher who was held in the highest regard by his players and considered himself a facilitator and consultant to the captain rather than the main man. The thing is, in nasser Hussain and Michael Vaughan, Fletcher had the perfect captains to lead the way with the coach on hand to quietly pass on his wisdom. Bayliss and alastair Cook never appeared a marriage made in cricketing heaven and it was perceived Joe Root would be a much better fit. So far that just has not been the case.
...AND ROOT’S NO MORGAN
a current England batsman involved in both white- and redball teams said during the winter that the big difference between the two set-ups is the captain. In Eoin Morgan, England’s limited-overs teams have a clear and decisive leader who knows exactly what he wants and gets that message across. The result is a working relationship with Bayliss that has seen England produce some of their best ever one-day performances.
Morgan even pulled out of the trip to Bangladesh, yet none of
his players seemed to have a bad word to say about it and welcomed him back with open arms. In contrast, the brutal truth is Root has had a shocking first year as Test skipper. Tactically he has been all over the place, while leadership has appeared to have a detrimental effect on his batting rather than inspire it. He has also shown a less than perfect eye for a player in his insistence that gary Ballance should play last year and that Mark Stoneman should feature at lord’s.
CAPTAIN WAS THROWN IN AT THE DEEP END
Root has lost eight of his 15 Tests in charge and clearly has much to learn. The original plan was for him to take over from Cook after last winter’s ashes but his promotion was accelerated when it became clear in India a year earlier that Cook’s race was run. Root wasn’t ready but England’s best players get no real leadership experience now before being thrown in at the deep end and told to learn at the highest level.
There is no suggestion Root is under pressure even though, intriguingly, new national selector Ed Smith wrote a piece in the
Sunday Times last year questioning Root’s leadership credentials and floating the idea of Jos Buttler as a potential Test captain. It really would have to get bad for England to consider something so radical just yet but Buttler certainly looked a natural leader when standing in for Morgan in one- day cricket in Bangladesh. The bottom line is Root needs to get better, starting with big match- defining centuries so he can at least lead by example.
RESULTS COULD FORCE ECB’S HAND
We all know how it works. Someone’s head is never far from the block. England have a new national selector in Smith and an inexperienced captain in Root. They are not going to be jettisoned now. It is Bayliss whose neck is on the line and it is difficult to see how he could possibly carry on in Test cricket should England lose in leeds. alas, there is a power vacuum at the top. Strauss is on compassionate leave and it would be asking a lot for Flower, his caretaker as director of England cricket, to sack Bayliss.
ECB chief executive Tom Harrison would have to get involved if things get worse, while a call would no doubt go in to Strauss even while he looks after his wife Ruth, who is battling cancer. There is an acceptance by Strauss that the role will have to be split next year after the ashes, when Bayliss goes, but there is no appetite at the ECB for it to happen before then. The trouble for Strauss and the ECB is that their hand is being forced by unacceptable results.
THE ALTERNATIVES
There is no shortage of contenders should Bayliss go now, not least in the England dressing room. It is not like football. The backroom staff do not have to leave with the main man. But where it is like football is that England are going round in circles. Flower, a foreign disciplinarian and a highly successful one, was followed by a homegrown man in Moores and then a more relaxed australian. Fabio Capello, Steve McClaren and Sven-goran Eriksson anyone?
So who would be gareth Southgate? Bayliss’s no 2 Paul Farbrace is highly regarded and has turned down a host of offers, most recently a very lucrative approach from Bangladesh.
He also coached Sri lanka to World Twenty20 and asia Cup successes before throwing in his lot with England four years ago and starting the one-day revolution with Morgan before Bayliss
arrived. He could be the perfect man to take extra responsibility for Test cricket now. There is also another strong candidate in new bowling coach Chris Silverwood, who led Essex to an extraordinary Championship triumph last season, but it may be too early for him.
Then there is another intriguing South African option . . .
OVER TO ARTHUR?
Mickey Arthur could not have chosen a better time to prove his credentials than by leading Pakistan to a famous triumph at Lord’s. The former South Africa and Australia coach led Pakistan to a hugely impressive Champions Trophy victory last year and is now on the brink of an even better Test series win.
He has done it by preparing his team properly, too, and ensuring they were ready to show England how to exploit early- season conditions at Lord’s. Arthur has even emerged with credit from the Australian match-fixing scandal because it has become clear he tried to change their toxic culture but met with resistance from the Aussie board.
Arthur played down his desire to succeed Bayliss next year when asked about it by Sportsmail before the first Test and is relishing working with Pakistan. But he is also said privately to be ‘desperate’ to work in England, either with the national team or a strong county.
That time may come sooner than he could possibly have imagined because Bayliss’s Test position will surely be untenable should England lose at Headingley. To avoid that, Root has to channel his inner Hussain and Bayliss has to prove he can be more than a Mr Nice Guy. The stakes are suddenly very high.