Looking on the bright side, England's Test series against South Africa is shaping much like the previous three in this country: the tourists take the lead, looking a million dollars before choking at the final hurdle to allow a bedraggled home side to regroup and draw or steal the series.
That is about the only straw that an England supporter can cling to right now after one of the more miserable weeks in recent cricketing memory. It started with the Lord's draw where England ran into a brick wall, continued with the half-baked fudge that was the new 20-over EPL and finished in Leeds where England, confused and disunited, were soundly thrashed by a South African side now acclimatised to English conditions.
Ian Chappell, the former Australian captain and TV commentator, once wrote that one of the reasons England are broadly unsuccessful against Australia is their propensity to over-analyse and over-complicate the game.
Their team selection for the Headingley Test is a classic example of this. Firstly Darren Pattinson, the poor bloke. Rarely can a selection have been more roundly condemned by media and public.
There's no doubt he has bowled well for Nottinghamshire this year and on the evidence of his Test performance, he's not a bad swinger, solid-looking, dependable, decent action. But what is not apparent is the special something, the x-factor that justified picking a guy who's pushing 30, who's essentially an Australian, ahead of a long list of proven or promising other bowlers of his type.
Ottis Gibson, England's bowling coach, defended the selection on the basis of the Headingley conditions. And this is where Chappell's theory comes in. Yes, of course, it swings at Headingley but not all the time and not, as we saw, if the sun is out and in any case if the pitch is good, which it was, it takes a lot more than just bowling 80mph away swing to bowl out good batsmen. Pattinson's selection was a very long-odds gamble with no investment in the future and no Plan B.
For Michael Vaughan to distance himself so publicly from the selection is not good news. It indicates a worrying lack of unity and trust in the senior management group of the England team. It would seem that Peter Moores, the coach, and Vaughan are not entirely as one which, when times are tough, is not a sustainable position.
But more bizarre than the Pattinson pick was the decision to bat Tim Ambrose at No.6 and this is another example of the Chappell paralysis by analysis theory.
England wanted to get Andrew Flintoff back in the side, which is fair enough, and his inclusion should theoretically have the made the team stronger. But in reality it made the team weaker. The selectors got so obsessed with fitting Flintoff back in the side in exactly the right position for him that they compromised the overall balance of the team.
Neither Flintoff nor Ambrose, on form, should be batting at six but it is odd that Ambrose should almost be made a sacrificial lamb on Flintoff's behalf. As a radio commentator said during the Test, England actually have three No.7 batsmen (with Stuart Broad's continued good form with the bat) but no No.6.
England have tied themselves up in knots and go to Edgbaston next week 1-0 down and in a bit of a mess. Oh to be a fly on the wall at the next selectorial huddle.
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