England get selection right at last
Aug 6 2008 By Jack Bannister
At long last the captain and coach have picked the best England team from the 13-man squad handed to them by the selectors.
The resignation by Michael Vaughan cleared the way for a choice based upon merit, and Kevin Pietersen has already made his mark by naming Andrew Flintoff to bat at six against South Africa at The Oval.
When the all-rounder returned two Tests ago he was wrongly accommodated at seven with Tim Ambrose preceding him before he dropped two places at Edgbaston.
The Warwickshire man aggregated an unconvincing 89 runs in the second and third Tests and must be considered fortunate to play in the Fourth Test, especially as he has been dropped for the one-day series.
Pietersen and Flintoff have not always seen eye to eye in the last three years but both today’s final selection and the naming of the all-rounder at six is a promising start to what is generally agreed to be the biggest captaincy gamble since.... well, Flintoff in Australia and Sir Ian Botham 25 years previously.
Steve Harmison returns but as one of five bowlers which should always be the case after his last Test performance against New Zealand in Hamilton in March. Pietersen must know that a captain is only as good as the attack he has to work with - he has seen at close quarters the trouble that Vaughan stoked up for himself with only four bowlers.
Stuart Broad deservedly returns, both as a fifth bowler and a batsman who adds considerable ballast to the middle-lower order. That means Ravi Bopara does not play - a situation that could not have arisen if Vaughan was still captain because Paul Collingwood’s century at Edgbaston settled that argument.
Therefore, if Vaughan was still captain, he would have picked another four-man attack, unless he could face another batsman and tell them they were dropped while a runless captain stayed.
The new captain cannot possibly be judged on one match but all interested parties will note how he deals with the shifting sands of a Test match. Unlike Twenty20 and ODIs, where there are few captaincy posers except to avoid miscounting each bowler’s ration, each day in the field is full of nuances that can easily be ignored if the leader loses concentration.
Most Test matches are attritional and can be won or lost when a defining moment in a session or even a day is recognised. Good captains know when to sit in and when to attack, and that only comes with experience.
Pietersen is a gung ho character on and off the field but now he has to think for his team for two or three days in the field in a Test. Also, he has to think of other players when he is batting. He insists that nothing will change the way he plays, which stems from a magnificent technique – unorthodox in many ways – and an instinctive desire to dominate
A so-called “dead” Test will also cloud any judgment on Pietersen’s leadership. Not that South Africa will relax but, as Australia have shown more than once in recent years when a series is won, a final Test can create a sub-conscious approach in which the last drop of blood is held back. If this series was alive, the betting is that Dale Steyn would have played.
On a wider basis, there is no such thing as a meaningless Test - each of the 22 players will bust a gut to keep his place, and this South African team has two back-to-back series against Australia to follow this tour. England have demanding tours of India and West Indies to come, apart from the Twenty20 millions that has not escaped any cricketer’s attention.
Full marks to Pietersen for having his way with final selection and, more important, in the balance of the side to give him five batsmen and five bowlers.
