BALANCING ACT CAN BE KEY TO SERIES VICTORY
AS ENGLAND celebrated a victory that put them within touching distance of their first home series win over South Africa in almost 20 years, the euphoria came with a health warning.
Time and again over the past three years, that warning has made little impact. Pride, England have discovered with worrying regularity, comes before a fall.
The topsy-turvy nature of this series is just one example of their tendency to alternate between the excellent and the execrable. Joe Root’s team won the first Test at Lord’s by 211 runs, lost the second at Trent Bridge by 340 and have won the third at The Oval by 239.
The defeat in Nottingham was the eighth time since 2014 they had followed a Test victory with a loss. The fourth Test begins in Manchester on Friday with selectors ignoring calls to drop Keaton Jennings. Steven Finn will replace the injured Mark Wood and if they repeat the win-loss trend at Old Trafford, they will blow their chance of winning Root’s first series in charge.
Asked how he would prevent another slip-up, England’s captain began to smile before the question had ended. The same thought was clearly on his mind: ‘We’ve not done things by halves in this series.’
In fact, there’s one good reason for believing England can head north and win. That reason is tempo.
Slammed by Michael Vaughan for ‘disrespecting’ the demands of Test batting at Trent Bridge, where they were bowled out twice in the equivalent of a day’s play, England found the perfect rhythm at The Oval.
As Root put it: ‘To come out of a difficult week, win the toss on a wicket which was bowler-friendly and play how we did — with (Alastair) Cooky showing us all how it was done at the top — was fantastic.
‘The whole first day, at no point did we get ourselves out. We made them get us out, and we still scored at three-and-a-half an over — which shows we’re always going to be able to move the board forward.
‘Then the way Ben (Stokes) came out and played was outstanding. He got us into a really strong position. Then, thankfully, the cloud cover was there for the bowlers and they made real use of it.’
It is as if a penny has dropped — and, some would say, not before time.
Such has been the emphasis on positive cricket, and so well has it served England with the white ball, that the sight of batsmen shouldering arms under cloudy skies over four-and-a-half days in south London felt like a throwback.
When Stokes said his century was the hardest earned of his Test career, he did so with a satisfied glow.
Even coach Trevor Bayliss, the brains behind England’s aggressive intent, implied one size doesn’t always fit all. ‘It’s on us to back this up in Manchester,’ he said.