Feast and Famine- Andy Flower as England Coach.

[Arthur Crabtree]

After the series in the Emirates and Sri Lanka, England had another date with spin the following winter in India. The home defeat to South Africa meant England started in Ahmedabad with six defeats in the last eleven games, and only three wins. It is one of Flower and England's great achievements that they turned around this poor run and in particular, the spectacular batting failures of the previous visit to Asia.

And yet... the decision that most haunts from the years Flower was in charge was the judgement that three seamers and one spinner (plus Samit Patel's hopeful left armers) was the right way to go in the first Test. It seems a monumental blunder (repeating that in Dubai), as foretold by many Indian journalists. English scribes' belief in Flower hadn't been shaken by a year of bad result and were confident that what worked in Australia could be a winning plan in India; reverse swing. England were slaughtered, their forlorn seam bowlers ineffective.

The second Test looked like it was going the same way with Sehwag attacking the England seamers, as he had so devastatingly in Ahmedabad. But this time, Monty Panesar, felled the charging bull, and he and Swann took nineteen wickets in the match. Cook and Pietersen showed the rest that runs could be made against the Indian spinners. KP's 186 proved to be his last truly great knock for his country.

Sehwag started dangerously in Kolkota too, but his dismissal showed the value of meticulous coaching and squeezing incremental improvements in unlikely places. He was removed by Samit Patel chasing a ball to the boundary in the company of Steven Finn whose throw ran out the Indian opener. Neither are natural fielders, and Patel was often maligned for his fitness. England won in Kolkata, and held on in Nagpur for an improbable series win. They had overcome their bete noire, spin in Asia, with successful captain Alastair Cook scoring an immense 562 runs, including three hundreds.

[Arthur Crabtree]

Ten great innings of the Flower era.

8. Alastair Cook, 122 at the Wankhede Stadium v India, 2012.
9. Kevin Pietersen, 186 at the Wankhede Stadium v India, 2012.

This was Cook's first series as the new England captain, and he responded with a mountain of runs: 176 in Ahmedabad, following on in a losing cause; this knock in Mumbai; and 190 in Kolkata. He was in a sublime run of form. Cook's innings lack chutzpah, and can struggle for individual identity. Here, against the spinners, we saw the long legged forward push, the sweep, the cut. A little like watching someone repetitively load the parts of a fried breakfast onto their fork. All the other batters were leaning on him, at least a little. It wasn't flamboyant; it was the run Bank of Cook. But you don't especially want dad to be flamboyant. You most want security.

Cook scored also in encouraging the selectors to bring Pietersen back into the side. And this is the innings that tells us why. While Cook resisted the Indians at the Wankhede for nearly six hours, Pietersen swung the game's momentum quickly back in England's favour. He dominated India with 20 fours and four sixes. While Cook showed that the Indians were human, Pietersen revealed they sweat and toil, like anyone else, even on their own pitches. If Cook could maintain this ability to keep the mavericks inside the team, together with his huge hunger for big scores, the future looked secure for his side.

[Arthur Crabtree]

Ten great bowling performances of the Flower era.

5. Graeme Swann, 4-70&4-43 at the Wankhede Stadium v India, 2012.
6.Monty Panesar, 5-129&6-81 at the Wankhede Stadium v India, 2012.

Flower and Cook's decision to pick Broad and Bresnan ahead of Panesar in Ahmedabad ranks alongside The Charge of the Light Brigade and Hussain putting Australia in at the Gabba as legendary English strategic disasters. When Sehwag mowed down the lines of English seamers, Cook had no alternative but to take it and like it. It felt a crucial moment in Mumbai when Monty bowled a similarly rampant Sehwag for 30 off 43 balls. The momentum went out of the batting, and it bought England time. Panesar and Swann knocked over the Indian top order for 119. Where there was resistance, the spinners found the solution. In the second innings, India were bowled out for 142, and the home press began to compare Swann and Panesar favourably to their own spinners. The series was now to play for and England had the right weapons to fight back.

7. Monty Panesar, 4-90 at Eden Gardens v India, 2012.

On the first morning in Kolkata, India had raced to 47 off ten overs when Sehwag was memorably run out by Finn and Patel. When Panesar ripped out the heavy scoring, long batting Cheteshwar Pujara, bowled between bat and pad, he potentially saved England ten hours of work. On a good batting pitch, this double blow was a massive hit for India. Monty was bowling a heavy ball, spinning it away on the first day pitch, but also skidding past the other side of the bat. As in UAE, he made a virtue of the low bounce, picking up many lbws and bowleds. Monty's performances in India, sixteen wickets in the two wins, showed that adaptability and variety could be Flower and Cook's allies.

[D/L]

A good read again, AC.

It may be worth remembering though, that had Anderson not dropped an easy chance from unbeaten double centurion, Pujara, early in his innings off the bowling of Bresnan, the outcome may have been a little different.

Panesar and Swann had a very good series though.

[Arthur Crabtree]

That wasn't even a chance. Anderson didn't get a hand on it, and a ball chipped to mid on feels like a slender hook to hang a whole other destiny on. The fact that Bresnan was bowling slower ball cutters with catchers in the ring hoping to entice a mishit on a first morning pitch just reinforces what a poor decision it was. There was nothing to be gained from getting an edge, as the ball wouldn't carry to slip. They could bowl at the stumps but the outfield was too lush to prep the ball for reverse away from the middle of the bat. Anderson didn't bowl at sufficient pace to get the ball to reverse usefully until the third Test in Kolkata anyway. And I don't think Broad and Bresnan were even fit. There was a perfect storm of reasons not to go into the match with three seamers.

Swann did his best, and took wickets. But he was asked to do too much.

[D/L]

As all the commentators said, it was an easy chance and Anderson should have caught it. Had he done so, the outcome may have been different.

[Arthur Crabtree]

On leaving Nagpur in December 2012, Flower and Cook took with them the great prestige of a series win in India. This was England's first since February 1985. It was their fourth win there since they travelled under Douglas Jardine in 1933...

They had been working towards this since the defeat in UAE. A year later this remarkable win didn't so much look like the perpetuation of excellence, or the great start for Cook, that Flower liked to suggest. It seemed a last, curious, irrational flicker of quality that was hard to explain.

England went to New Zealand in March 2013, and looked a desperately flat side. In this series, many of the traits were established that would beset England for the next eighteen months. The vaunted seam attack was outbowled by the opposition (here by Southee and Boult), and even Anderson was outswung. Lengths were got wrong. The batting lost attacking intent and got bogged down over long slow sessions, usually after poor starts from the top three. The top seven was out of form generally, and the lack of runs put pressure on the bowlers, who had less time to rest. In the second innings, the tiring bowlers were vulnerable to counter attack, as in Aukland when Fulton and McCullum offered an early sighting of Cook biting his nails while his seamers went into the stands. Selection was a basket case, and would remain so; England's top scorer in the series, Nick Compton, was on the scrap heap two games on.

England took a little solace, and a 0-0, from their last wicket draw in Aukland. Matt Prior simultaneously reached his peak as an England player, while making his last significant contribution to the side with a match saving ton. Swann had missed the tour to have an operation on his right elbow, but returned for the home return series. With Swann and Broad briefly fit, this was England's best cricket of the year, Joe Root invigorating the home batting. England won both Tests against a very good Kiwi side by huge margins.

Next up was a unique challenge for England. Back to back Ashes. A challenge that gradually came to resemble an ordeal.

[Arthur Crabtree]

What to do with the England win in the Ashes? 3-0 is a hell of a thumping. Home expectations were unrealistically high, so modestly were the Australians rated. It's possible that anything other than a home whitewash would seem a disappointment for many. Australia turned up with fortunes at low tide. And they were beaten at Trent Bridge, then trounced at Lord's. Thereafter they gave as good as they got, which may have offered a pointer to the events of the winter.

England prevailed with the flaws on show that would eventually lead to defeat. Swann started the series well, but gradually lost the dizzying rotations that facilitated his drift and dip. Anderson won the game for England at Trent Bridge, at the cost of his gathering exhaustion. And that was becoming a familiar story. The batters accumulated slowly and the mindset remained defensive. With the top three unreliable, the stroke players were always under pressure. The attack was till bowling dry, still joining dots. What had won games for England once was no longer working. For all of the good things in the series, an enduring image is of the batters failing to score runs off Shane Watson, bowling at a fifth stump.

There were good things. Bell was superb with the bat and no one could claim he was sheltering under the boughs of others; he was the main man. The bowlers never gave up on horrible pitches which were designed to help Swann, but probably shortened his career. As the series progressed, the Sky spinometer gave numbers to his waning powers. The Ashes ended with the depressing spectacle at the Oval, of Australia bowling their overs slowly to wreck the decent intension of Clarke's manufactured finish. We were watching a farce in the fading light.

The whitewash in the return series, and the giving up of the Ashes was a continuation a the decline evident in the home win, and more broadly, since Dubai. Australia had become a more united team under Lehmann and with a rejuvenated Mitch Johnson, they turned the contest into five WACA Tests. The Poms were either bounced out, or swung out with full reverse swinging balls. The batters couldn't get runs on the board, with only Stokes scoring a hundred in the series. There was no scoreboard pressure. When the pressure in the system falls the motor or the heart has to work harder, until it fails and the body collapses. Swann, Anderson and Broad had been the heart of the team, but by Melbourne, they had no more. Swann retired, Broad and Anderson, who had been injured throughout, were, for now, finished. England had been bullied with the bat and the ball, and in verbal exchanges. Australia didn't much like the England players and were savouring the joys of schadenfreude. It was a humiliation. And as a capitulation to pace, it made a matching set with their torture by spin in UAE. Two of their three worst batting performances ever, only two years apart.

[Arthur Crabtree]

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine ... pe=batting

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine ... pe=bowling

England's batting and bowling from Dubai to Sydney, which captures the decline better than words can. The group batting failure, and a still funtioning, but embattled bowling unit.

[Arthur Crabtree]

As an England supporter, who suckled on defeat, and was weaned on ludicrous selector and management decisions, it is tempting to devour the good times that came under Flower and shrug fatalistically at the famine. Yet Flower left a corpse behind when he stepped down. Very few in the media showed much interest in how the body got in such a state, in which room, with which weapon. The Ashes was isolated as a bad series and the aftermath of the winter with Giles in charge was instantly declared a new chapter.

Swann had been bowled until he could no more. Trott went into recess with problems related to stress. Anderson and Broad were maintained to diminishing effect. New faces had failed to thrive and established players became blunted. The selection Ashes tour party has been a fiasco. The position of Cook's opening partner had the feeling of trepidation associated with a unfamiliar actor in James Kirk's landing party. Cook carried on as captain. The bowlers were patched up. Ian Bell went into another summer talking of maturity and responsibility. New faces emerged, as they must.

Paul Downton's review of the series provoked him to draw one conclusion, that Kevin Pietersen should not play for England again. Neither Cook nor Flower took responsibility for the subjugation on the great cricket grounds of Australia. And I think that is why it's difficult to effusively acclaim the successes of Flower's regime, for all the many good things it brought. Not so much that his model proved unsustainable, but when the time came to own this enormous thrashing, he walked away. He will be coaching the England Lions later this month. Who can say he won't be back?

[Arthur Crabtree]

Just got the batting, bowling and best matches to do.

[alfie]

Very well written , Arthur

But I am not sure that your concluding remarks are quite fair to Flower. The implication that his "walking away" was somehow comparable with a rodent departing a stricken vessel doesn't seem reasonable to me : surely he was only doing what you and others wanted him to do - accepting that his effective time with this squad was done and getting out to leave a clear deck for the new master ?

I wasn't hugely enthusiastic when Flower was originally appointed. But I came to respect enormously the work he did with England , and the results he helped to obtain. To retrospectively downgrade his achievements seems a touch uncharitable , to me at any rate.

Perhaps it is still too soon to judge his years in charge ?

[Making_Splinters]

It is interesting that under all the years of Flower's tenure we were never able to find a replacement for Colly. Yet Moores has been able to get performances out of three new batsmen already.

[Arthur Crabtree]

But I am not sure that your concluding remarks are quite fair to Flower. The implication that his "walking away" was somehow comparable with a rodent departing a stricken vessel doesn't seem reasonable to me : surely he was only doing what you and others wanted him to do - accepting that his effective time with this squad was done and getting out to leave a clear deck for the new master ?

Perhaps it is still too soon to judge his years in charge ?

He didn't leave because he was complicit in the Ashes whitewash or the general tailing off of results. Or for any of the other reasons mentioned in my last post. Or because his coaching was no longer working. He left, as much as he left at all, because he felt the coaching of the different teams should be reunited and he no longer wanted to do that job. And it rankles to me that he should play a prominent part in suggesting KP was damaging to the team, without seeming to accept any responsibility himself. I may be a little harsh to Flower. Though I've praisded him too. This is obviously a very personal interpretation.

Thanks for reading. Still a bit to go.

[Arthur Crabtree]

It is interesting that under all the years of Flower's tenure we were never able to find a replacement for Colly. Yet Moores has been able to get performances out of three new batsmen already.

The inability to get new players to thrive, or their worsening of performances after a decent start, allied to a tailing off of the established players appears to represent an entire coaching failure. It wasn't yet a case of a team getting old together. And neither could they be reinvigorated by younger players. I'll be interested to hear reports from the players about the dressing room as time passes; how welcoming it was to new players in particular.

There were other quibbles I had. The treatment of Samit Patel can be justified, but to some extent he seems to have been humiliated by his time with England. The reliance on psychological profiling that was said to have led to the jettisoning of Nick Compton (plus reports of his unpopularity among the senior players) makes me feel uncomfortable.

Existence of dressing room factions remains a bit of an imponderable.