Collingwood to help out Cook as No2
• Collingwood’s experience vital for first-time captain Cook
• Former captain Kevin Pietersen remains in the ranks
Paul Collingwood abandoned the England one-day captaincy because he found it so tiring that it was putting his international future at risk. But responsibility can be hard to cast aside entirely and, as well as the onerous role of Twenty20 captain, he has now also been confirmed as Alastair Cook’s vice-captain in Bangladesh.
Andy Flower’s confirmation today that he had persuaded Collingwood to accept the job puts an end to speculation that Kevin Pietersen might be offered it as a show of forgiveness after his demand as captain more than a year ago that Peter Moores should be sacked as coach, an ultimatum that caused both men to lose office.
Flower claimed, convincingly, that Collingwood had always been the favoured choice and that there had definitely been no veto of Pietersen, even though senior ECB officials – the chief executive, David Collier, Giles Clarke, chairman, and the manager of England cricket, Hugh Morris – were all present in Dubai and Morris, as well as Cook and the selectors, were consulted. “It was a simple cricketing decision,” Flower said.
Stop-gap, safeguard, senior pro: Flower will have used many such words to convince Collingwood that becoming vice-captain to Cook in Bangladesh will not be too demanding. Bangladesh, whom England face in three ODIs and two Tests, are the weakest international side but keeping body and soul together in demanding surroundings is England’s first task if they are to achieve an expected victory.
As late as last night after England had lost their second Twenty20 international against Pakistan by four wickets, so leaving the series shared at 1-1, Collingwood had suggested, perhaps more in hope than expectation, that England did not always bother with a vice-captain. But this is Cook’s first series in charge as he stands in for the rested Andrew Strauss. He needs guidance and Collingwood, the epitome of good standards, provides more grounded counsel than most. And, Flower argued, it will also benefit Collingwood.
“It’s true that England sides in the past haven’t bothered nominating a vice-captain,” Flower said, “but we’d like Colly to do it on this tour for both one-dayers and the Tests. It does take a while to get up to speed as captain, so the more you get used to thinking in that way, the better. With some of the Twenty20 cricket we’ve played, with Colly captaining, he’s feeling more comfortable.
“The last time Colly captained the one-day team it took quite a lot out of him and he doesn’t want to put his name forward in a medium to long-term capacity for the captaincy, but he knows this would only be a stop-gap measure if Cook was injured. If someone gets injured he’s quite happy to step into the breach.”
The additional demands should not be exaggerated. Cook might have been vice-captain to Strauss, but it is Collingwood who Strauss has leant on just as heavily. The real adjustment to be made in Bangladesh is Cook’s, what Flower called “the eternal challenge for cricket captains” — to lead the side well without letting your own game suffer.
Pietersen looks in good order again. His consultations about his batting with England’s former coach Duncan Fletcher have passed off well, his achilles is pain free again after an operation and any sense of betrayal over his sacking as England captain is beginning to recede. More than most, his game is based on feel-good and he is beginning to look content again.
Both his innings in Dubai were intelligent affairs, the first as second fiddle to Eoin Morgan in a well-timed run chase, the second more dominant, the old Pietersen, an innings that was upstaged only at the end by a brilliant bout of hitting by Pakistan’s Abdul Razzaq.
Flower conceded that he was “slightly concerned” over England’s slow starts in Twenty20, which has led to the late inclusion of Craig Kieswetter for the Bangladesh one-day series. That he will play in at least some of the 50-overs matches, with a view to considering his inclusion for the Twenty20 World Cup in the West Indies in the spring, is certain, perhaps beginning with a warm-up match against a BCB XI in Fatullah on Tuesday. “He has shown the sort of hard-hitting capability that we need at the top of the order,” Flower said.
Teams will fear Pietersen again – Flower
• Pietersen in England’s Twenty20 squad to face Abu Dhabi
• Batsman failed to impress consistently on South Africa tour
Andy Flower says Kevin Pietersen has a chance to re-establish himself as one of the game’s most feared batsmen over the next six weeks.
Pietersen missed the culmination of last summer’s Ashes series with an achilles injury and when he returned to the team for the tour of his native South Africa this winter, he was short of his best.
Pietersen is part of the Twenty20 squad in the UAE where England will face the Lions in Abu Dhabi on Wednesday before playing two matches against the world champions Pakistan in Dubai.
The squad then move on to Bangladesh for two Tests and three one-day internationals. The team director sees the trip as an ideal setting for Pietersen to get back amongst the big runs.
“He’s very hungry, he had quite a chunk of time out of international cricket and he’s come back hungry,” said Flower.
“Things didn’t go perfectly well for him in South Africa but he did make some contributions, especially at the start of the series. It was a difficult challenge for him to come back from playing cricket to facing the South African attack on sporty wickets. It was difficult for him.
“This is an opportunity for him to get some serious time in the middle and for him to start contributing again in his dominant way in England victories.”
Mike Selvey: Plans no match for an on-field education
England must improve their decision making and the best way they could do that is by playing
Crikey, there was a resonance yesterday morning when I read Paul Rees’s piece in these pages on England’s rugby coaching and how in the opinion of many, automaton players are being created, incapable of initiative, and fearful of creativity at the expense of the “gameplan”. “Time,” trumpeted the headline, summarising the views of such as Lawrence Dallaglio, Brian Ashton, Neil Jenkins and Andy Robinson, “for coaches to let players think for themselves”.
Last Monday, I attended an ECB strategy seminar at a hotel near Stratford-upon-Avon, primarily to discuss all aspects of one-day international cricket. In the course of it, however, Andy Flower, on the panel for one of the four segments of the day, was asked whether his back-up staff, which in South Africa roughly matched his players man for man, was too unwieldy, and unjustifiable. His considered response pretty much matched the rugby views expressed: that he had no position that he felt was superfluous to requirement but that within that framework it was vital that none of the coaches took away the responsibility of the players to think for themselves. It makes me wonder now whether the coaches themselves have had a seminar recently such is the singular nature of these sentiments.
They are all correct, though, in my view. Coaching works at a variety of levels, of course, instilling basics and enthusiasm at the bottom end while fine-tuning and mentoring at the top end. “Coming out all right?” Shane Warne would ask Terry Jenner on one of his occasional check-ups with his own mentor. “Looks fine to me,” Jenner would say. And that, minimalistically, was it. It takes skill, though, to spot when something is right as much as it does to pick out faults: Holmes’s dog that didn’t bark.
We got an example of prescriptive thinking at the Melbourne Cricket Ground in 2006, when a member found on the floor a copy of England’s bowling plans – their “dodgy dossier” – and stuck it in the public domain. It detailed how they intended to deal with each batsman, which plans, if executed properly, would mean that Australia would scarcely muster double figures between them. Of particular memory, apart from the worrying fact that “nick” was spelt with an additional “k”, was the “bouncer essential” observation for Andrew Symonds. True as this may have been, it was mortifying to see, for five and a half hours, a man set deep on the hook for each of his 156 runs, during which time, despite many invitations to do so, he did not attempt the stroke once. The plans did not cater for that but there was no plan B.
By and large, I think we seem to be getting the right coaching balance at elite level. Indeed, one of the common threads between Flower and Andrew Strauss has been the emphasis on individuals taking responsibility for themselves. There is a recognition that to progress further, England cricketers need to become yet more fit, technically efficient and mentally strong. But beyond that, and as crucial as any of the aforementioned may be, their decision making has to improve. This comes largely through playing, learning on the hoof, and not through the rigid constraints of preconceived, inflexible plans devised on the laptop.
There is an education to be had on the field of play. In an age before technical analysis was spoonfed, bowlers were reliant on their own observational powers to assess a batsman. The basic first, if it was an unfamiliar player: right or left handed (glove tells you that as he walks out); which hand does he hold the bat in (top hand, or bottom in other words); height (tall will be front foot by nature, short are generally cutters and pullers); how does he conduct himself (confident, diffident?); what guard do they take (leg-stump, for example, perhaps means they want to stay a little leg-side, so an off-side player by inclination); how and where do they hold the bat (hands together at the top of the handle would indicate pendulum shots and strong leverage, like Adam Gilchrist, while hands at the bottom or split would show a bottom-hand dominance, so back-foot cross-bat shots and bottom-hand steering drives). All that before a batsman has hit a delivery and without the benefit of wagon-wheel run-scoring charts or video analysis.
Bowlers become expert in reading body language. It took Warne a while to understand, for example, when Carl Hooper was coming down the pitch, but in the end he cracked the code (he stopped tapping his bat and glanced at the crease apparently). From this, the bowler understands fundamentally the line to bowl, to the appropriate field, and most troublesome length. Experience alone then dictates how to set up a batsman and then try for the coup de grace. Richard Hadlee could do a doctoral thesis on it.
This is the type of responsible thinking that should be encouraged, and was by the outgoing bowling coach Ottis Gibson, who is the new West Indies head coach. During his time with England, Gibson has been unassuming but has built the sort of rapport with the players enjoyed by one of his predecessors, Troy Cooley. The role is a mentoring one as well as technical. He was helped by his credibility as a bowler himself. A suitable successor will be hard to find, for a biomechanist ought not to be what England are after. It will be someone who has earned respect from having done the hard yards as an international player, a good communicator without ego, someone who understands that change for change’s sake is recipe for disaster, who can unite the footsloggers under one madcap banner. Alan Donald, Shaun Pollock, Michael Kasprowicz, Geoff Lawson, Cooley persuaded back? There aren’t too many about. Gibson will be missed.