Nick Wright previews this weekend's clash between York City Knights and Hull FC
Alex Reid looks at whether the once ever-present appearance of English clubs in the later stages of the Champions League is set to become a thing of the past
Craig Dobson looks at QPR's decision to sack Neil Warnock and replace him with Mark Hughes
James Tompkinson reviews an excellent pre-season victory for the York City Knights against Yorkshire rivals Leeds Rhinos
Firstly, the defeat to Ireland last Wednesday. Much has been written during the week about the way England conducted themselves during this match and the reasons as to why they lost the game. I’ve heard the argument that England didn’t do much wrong. That they set a good score of 328, and had the game taken away from them by an unbelievable innings from Kevin O’Brien. Yes, O’Brien’s innings was spectacular, and to be honest, it’s difficult not to laud the performance of someone who smashes 113 off 60 balls and records the fastest ever World Cup century. It was a truly memorable innings from a new Irish cricketing hero.
It’s fair to say that O’Brien’s performance took the game away from England, but Andrew Strauss’ men did an awful lot to help him. England’s bowling and fielding was diabolical, especially in the latter stages of the Ireland innings. To drop five catches at the highest level is not good enough, and England’s bowlers didn’t bowl with their brains when O’Brien got going. His innings was based solely on picking balls up that were on a full length and smashing them into the leg side boundary. The seamers should have bowled more bouncers and yorkers, and also mixed their pace up far more, rather than giving O’Brien balls to hit. Another problem was that of complacency. When England had Ireland at 111-5, they were guilty of thinking the game was over, and concentration levels dropped. Ireland showed more heart, passion and commitment than their English counterparts, and that showed through and helped them to victory.
Fast forward four days to England’s game against South Africa and everything was a little different. The England batting machine that had been so prevalent in the previous three games faltered on a very difficult wicket in Chennai, and it was only thanks to a man of the match winning 60 runs from Ravi Bopara that England got to a score of 171. It should have been easy for South Africa, but the team that are rapidly gaining a reputation as being the ‘chokers’ of world cricket faltered under the pressure exerted on them by a much improved England bowling and fielding unit and eventually fell six runs short of England’s total.
It was difficult to single out a single England bowler to praise in this game. Graeme Swann was exceptionally accurate and caused all sorts of problems for the South African top order, and James Anderson showed glimpses of the form that he showed in the Ashes, producing an absolutely spectacular ball to dismiss AB De Villiers. However, if I had to single out one bowler, it would be Stuart Broad. Figures of 4-15 speak for themselves, but what was more impressive was the calmness and composure that Broad showed when bowling at the end of the South African innings.
England now face a tricky match against Bangladesh before playing the West Indies in their final group game. They will also be without the influential figures of Kevin Pietersen and Stuart Broad, who have both been ruled of the tournament through injury and replaced with Eoin Morgan and Chris Tremlett.
Who ever said anything about a dull World Cup?
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