A new-ball partner for Woakes, whether Wood has a role and back-up batting at the top of the order are among the issuesEngland play 11 one-day internationals and two international warm-up matches before the World Cup starts on 30 May, but this five-match series is the last before they must announce their 15-man squad. A 16th space would allow them to cover all bases, but 15 means a corner needs to be cut. They are likely to want two spare seam bowlers, especially as those players are most susceptible to injury, which means they will have to sacrifice either a second back-up batsman (Alex Hales will be the first) or a back-up spinner. Or they could cheat. That’s what they...
Much has changed since the debacle of 2015, not least the settling on two spinners who can help control a gameWith a home World Cup swiftly followed by a home Ashes series the summer of 2019 has the potential to rival the greatest in the history of the English game and also to be among its most crushing disappointments.The home side are the favourites to win both competitions and the England and Wales Cricket Board chief executive, Tom Harrison, has declared himself “giddy with excitement” about the “once in a generation opportunity” the coming months represent. Related: Cameron Bancroft lasts three balls on return from nine-month absence When is it happening? Continue reading...
Who would World Cup opposition openers least want to face on a nibbly early-summer morning? Anderson, Wood or Stone?If I had to draw up a top-five list of eccentric 20th-century British army officers Jack Churchill would definitely be up there, at the very least in the mix. A male model, film actor and expert archer and fencer, “Fighting Jack” was also the last British soldier to insist on marching into battle with a sword, longbow and a set of bagpipes, as he did to great effect against the mechanised might of the Third Reich.Churchill used his bow and arrow to lead a successful ambush of a German patrol in northern France in May 1940, an act that helped him win...
In March 10 sides will fight for two remaining places at the 2019 tournament and in-form Ireland face a tough battle to qualifyOn Thursday, Ireland play a Northerns/Easterns XI in Pretoria. This is the opening skirmish in a battle of the utmost importance, with qualification for next year’s World Cup at stake, the decision to shrink the tournament to just 10 participants about to yield its first significant victims.There were 12 teams in 1996 and 1999, 14 in 2003, 16 in 2007 and 14 again in 2011. Before that event the decision was made to reduce the 2015 field to 10, a move derided by the then Ireland captain William Porterfield as “an absolute joke” and “an absolute disgrace”. The...