Beware the Talkers. Hire Walkers.

Ten months on from England’s capitulation at the cricket world cup, we can finally put the team’s abject performance into some kind of perspective. The team didn’t lose because Peter Moores was crap, or because we played an archaic style of cricket, we lost because we were, erm, English.

It’s now more than apparent that English sportsmen and the knockout stages of world cups don’t mix. We just don’t like them very much. As a nation we very much prefer what I call the baseball rule: three misses and out. It’s better for everyone if the England team turn up, embarrass themselves, and then go home. Everyone knows where they stand that way. It’s a comfortable fit.

It has been a thoroughly depressing time for English sport recently. Our football team is crap; our rugby team is even craper; and our cricket team has some big challenges ahead.

However, I actually think the cricket team is in a much better place than the others – mainly because we have competent, proven management team in place. I like Roy Hodgson, and think he’s done a better job than Harry Redknapp would’ve done, but you get the feeling he’s yesterday’s man. His considerable achievements in the game were some time ago now, and although I still find him insightful he’s about as dynamic as a haddock.

I’m a signed up member of the Trevor Bayliss fan club though. He’s a world-class operator who has gilded CV, a bucket-load of worth of experience, and a track record of getting the most out of his players. You could say he’s the ant-Moores or the anti-Lancaster.

With every passing day, Andrew Strauss’ decision to sack Peter Moores before this summer’s test matches looks better and better. He wasn’t fooled by the management speak – the kind of thing that makes Giles Clarke, Paul Downton and Ian bloody Richie (the head of the RFU) go weak at the knees – he looked at things pragmatically.

Strauss didn’t want England to go into the Ashes, the showpiece event on the cricketing calendar, with a lightweight head coach. Strauss didn’t give a monkey’s that Peter Moores was ‘likeable’ – which is apparently Stuart Lancaster’s only credential – he was hard nosed and pragmatic. Strauss only cared about experience and cricketing IQ. He even spurned Jason Gillespie, who seemed to be flavour of the month, because Bayliss’ CV was longer and shinier.

I say ‘bravo’ to Andrew Strauss. I also say ‘boo’ to the suits that appointed Moores last year and preferred Stuart Lancaster, a youth coach who had won just two premiership matches in his entire career, to world cup winners like Jake White.

Is it any coincidence that England won the Ashes because we had a good coach with a sparkling track record? Of course not.

Is it any coincidence that English teams bomb badly, and perform without cohesion, intelligence or composure, when we have poor coaches who are out of their depth? I refer you to my previous answer.

I hope that the top brass of all English sporting bodies are watching and learning. When it comes to the national team don’t gamble on a novice; don’t gamble on someone who has failed in the job beforehand; don’t gamble on someone who tried but struggled in his sport’s top league; don’t gamble on someone with about as much experience of international sport as you or I.

In other words, engage your bloody brains. Don’t mistake patriotic clichés, management speak, and some nebulous concept of ‘culture’ or ‘discipline’, for the ability to think clearly and make sound decisions under pressure.

Talking the talk is one thing. Walking the walk is a completely different matter.

James Morgan

@DoctorCopy

20 comments

  • RFU Chief Exec Ian Ritchie, when commenting on the performance of the rugby team, was quoted as saying “The key thing is to take the learnings and move on…”

    Does that sound familiar at all to any followers of cricket? Remember, the ECB look up to the RFU as a shining example of how to run your national team – lots of nonsense about “culture” and “reconnecting with the public.”

    Trevor Bayliss may well be an excellent coach, but the environment he works in still smells a lot like crap.

    • “Take the learnings…”
      Really ?

      In 2007, the New Zealand Rugby Union asked a major law firm to conduct an exhaustive, external review of its French World Cup trauma. More than 50 interviews resulted in a comprehensive, at times brutally honest, assessment of where the All Blacks had gone wrong and how to put it right. Four years later they won the World Cup.

      Can’t see Andrew and Ritchie submitting themselves to that kind of scrutiny.
      Someone might suggest that they resign.

  • “Is it any coincidence that English teams bomb badly, and perform without cohesion, intelligence or composure, when we have poor coaches who are out of their depth?”

    Didn’t seem to work for the Football Team when they appointed Sven G E or Fabio Capello, both proven managers, though, did it?

    • Well yes, you also need talent. One could argue Sven’s success at club level stemmed from the enormous cheque book he wielded. At least he got England out of the group stages though! It’s very difficult to argue that experience and credentials as a coach are irrelevant.

      • Sven had a good record at some relatively poor clubs.
        I think his performance was about what we should expect from the talent available. A bit more luck with injuries could have helped him out. (And we need to recognise that in football, we’re up against teams with bigger player bases and some with equal resources.)

      • I have nothing much against Sven (as a Manager), nor even Fabio – they did as well as could be expected. The truth is that England weren’t (& aren’t) very good, and are further handicapped by the immense pressure of national expectations. The problem goes much deeper than simply choosing the wrong coaches…

    • That’s what a lot of people thought when Capello was removed. We’d got used to being quarter finalists who might go further with a bit of luck. And then we decided to appoint an English manager who’d never won anything. It didn’t go well…

    • Eddie Jones is a fine coach but I’d prefer and English or British based canidate working with a Southern Hemisphere assistant. If the right English candidate isn’t available though, I wouldn’t have a problem going foreign. Bayliss is an Aussie after all.

      • Eddie Jones should have gone hand in hand with Martin Johnson, that was a huge missed opportunity. I would probably have someone who is a bit younger instead.

          • I’d be happy to see Eddie Jones too – but I can’t help thinking we’re all missing the point. In all the words I’ve read this week no one has asked the question that, I think, goes to the heart of the matter.
            How many of this England team, at their best, would get into the best XV in the world?
            I can’t think of one. And that – more than selection or tactics – explains why we are where we are.

            • I think that’s an exaggeration of the issue Kev. The main point, which I’ve seen discussed on Sky, is whether England played to their potential ie did the coaches get the most out of the resources available. The answer is a resounding no. England might not have players capable of playing for the All Blacks, but we still have some very, very good players – some of which weren’t even picked in the starting XV. Eddie Jones has got Japan playing as a unit and surpassing expectations. They’re worse than South Africa in every position yet still beat them. As Stuart Barnes said on Sunday, would Lancaster & Co have got so much out of Japan? Absolutely not.

              England have by far the poorest coaching team of all the home nations. Ireland, Wales and Scotland all have top guys with excellent proven records in domestic and European rugby. England had a youth coach and an ex rugby league player in charge. How can that not make a difference?

              • James,
                I do take the point. I just think the emphasis on coaches rather than players is overdone and possibly leads to a situation where players don’t take enough responsibility for their own performance – which in turn contributes to that lack of performance.
                I admit I come to this discussion as a frustrated England football fan who has seen us go through every kind of coach, and still be awful at every major tournament. I also look at Australia, whose teams usually get the very best out of themselves while ours, historically, do not. Why is that?

  • One quality Lancaster and Moores shared (but not Hodgson which is why I wouldn’t quite bracket him with them) is a lack of experience in different cultures. Both had not stepped outside the parochial world of English sport.

    The vast majority of successful elite coaches have experience of different leagues and different formats (if they exist in their sport). Farbrace has experience with Sri Lanka and look how things improved under him. It doesn’t guarantee success but it sure helps.

    Many coaches (and indeed players) from other countries go abroad not just to become better but, frankly, because they can make more money. In an odd way, the amount of money sloshing around English sport has damaged those involved because not many are likely to earn more overseas and therefore are less inclined to take the risk of going.

  • Speaking of ‘talkers’, a masterful (aka desperate) piece of spin from Ritchie:
    “We are being judged on the result of two matches…”
    (!)

    • He obviously hasn’t watched the last 4 years. Idiot. The irony here is that Lancaster was appointed on the basis of two results, at the end of his stint as caretaker. He ignored the first three games when England were very poor. No six nations titles in 4 tries. Worse than Martin Johnson.

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