Arthur Crabtree wrote: Sorry, I thought I read a negative tone about those being brought in, but you were contrasting the chances being given to the medium pacer against the fast bowlers.
Fletch thought Saj and Plunkett would bowl reverse swing on flat Asian pitches, and Lewis would be murdered. We never found out. Certainly, Lewis might as well not been picked for the chance he got, but he did play in ODIs, where he was primarily a new ball bowler. Perhaps he didn't impress in those and got shuffled in Tests. Fletch felt that Hoggy needed protection in conditions where the ball was doing little, maybe he thought he couldn't hide two medium pacers. Lewis got to play at Trent Bridge, an obvious pick for local conditions.
No worries Arthur. I accept that could be a problem to be one dimensional and having some pace has its uses, but in trying to find a way around it more problems were created.
I remember posting on 606 about the away tours of 2005-06 that England were on the cusp of a disaster. I was categorically destroyed for that article, I think I got a 1 star rating from about 100 review Which was good even for me! You might be able to find it here, but a similar thing happened before the 2013 away Ashes series.
Flower and Fletcher when faced with an ageing team and needing to rebuild, both became over-confident by their earlier successes and justified a series of incredibly bad selection bungles. And they didnt learn when the warning signs were there.