Category: Cricket

England Test head coach vacancy may not appeal to the Zimbabwean who is at the top of his field

That Andy Flower emerged as the favourite to take over England’s Test team so soon after Brendon McCullum’s demotion should come as no surprise. Put simply, the Zimbabwean is the leading active head coach on the circuit.

During his first spell in the job from 2009 to 2014, England won three successive Ashes series, ended a 27-year wait to win a Test series in India, and rose to No 1 in the Test rankings. The men’s white-ball team also broke its duck in global tournaments by lifting the World T20 in the Caribbean in 2010. Flower has since carved out a successful second career. In franchise cricket, his teams have won the Pakistan Super League, the Hundred, the ILT20, and the Indian Premier League (twice). When Australia broke India’s hearts by securing the 2023 World Cup, Flower was in their camp as a batting consultant.

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The sacked England Test coach reinvigorated an ailing team in 2022, but his super-aggressive style proved unsustainable

Farewell, then, to Bazball, the approach defined upon its adoption by the Collins English Dictionary in 2023 as “a style of Test cricket in which the batting side attempts to gain the initiative by playing in a highly aggressive manner”. In time the manner grew less aggressive, the attempts to gain the initiative less evident, and the results less convincing. Brendon McCullum, whose philosophies and nickname had inspired it, was always irritated by the term, describing it when he deigned to address it at all as “silly”, but while this is evidently true, Bazball without any of its defining characteristics was downright mystifying.

Ben Stokes was widely mocked in 2023 when, during a drawn home Ashes series, he said, in a speech given in the privacy of the dressing room but filmed and later released by the England and Wales Cricket Board: “What we have managed to do is we’ve managed to become a sports team that will live for ever in the memory of people who were lucky enough to witness us play cricket. What we have done is something a lot bigger than any Ashes trophy … be[ing] the team that everybody will always remember.”

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• ECB moves after Ben Stokes’s retirement

• McCullum will stay on as white-ball coach

Brendon McCullum has been sacked as the England men’s Test coach, with the England and Wales Cricket Board opting for a completely fresh start for the side following the recent retirement of the red-ball captain, Ben Stokes. The decision came one day after McCullum guided England to the top of the T20 rankings, and he will continue to coach the men’s white-ball teams.

McCullum said he was “gutted” after being told his services are no longer required, and he will not be involved in preparations for the three-match series against Pakistan in August and September, by which time the ECB hope to have appointed a replacement.

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Updates from the series finale (2.30pm BST start)
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1st over: England 4-0 (Salt 2, Buttler 1) Another quiet opening over for England with the bat. Arshdeep Singh is swinging the ball with his left-arm efforts, and neither Salt nor Buttler tries anything expansive.

Looks like we’re finally going to get a game.

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With content-stacking and spoiler-avoiding, a fan with the right subscriptions can expect to enjoy 13 uninterrupted hours on the sofa on Saturday

Start practising those excuses. For England fans, this Saturday is one of those that demands serious thought, by which I mean how to wheedle out of prior engagements and family obligations. No fewer than four of the national teams are in action, and to catch all the matches will require time, dedication and some nifty work with a TV recorder. How else can you expect to navigate the problem of the rugby team’s Fiji fixture kicking off only 20 minutes before the men’s T20 against India?

With some judicious content-stacking and spoiler-avoiding, however, a fan with the right subscriptions can expect to enjoy 13 uninterrupted hours on the sofa – starting with the morning session of the women’s Test and climaxing with a late-night footballing knockout against Norway. Nor is England the only game in town: there are three other home nations rugby matches to be watched, a Wimbledon women’s singles final, and the Tour de France.

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Now based in London and gaining respite from relentless attention at home, Indian legend still has the form and aura that make him the main attraction

In a sporting summer that is challenging even the most voracious appetites, the one-day international series between England and India that gets under way next Tuesday could be viewed as the wafer-thin mint that tips people over the edge.

But for all that 50-over cricket is on the retreat, and its World Cup is still 15 months away, it is worth loosening the belt a further notch or two for this one. Virat Kohli will be back smouldering in blue for the tourists, in what will probably be the last chance to watch one of the all-time greats bat in this country.

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