Nasser Hussain has said he has “never seen England play as badly” as they have done in the 2023 World Cup, but urged the players not to be given a “cop-out” by directing criticism on the structure of English domestic cricket.
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England were thumped by eight wickets by Sri Lanka as they slumped to their third consecutive defeat and fourth out of five in the tournament. Having made three changes to their XI following the loss to South Africa, they were bowled out for 156 before Sri Lanka chased down the target with 25 overs remaining.
After the match, Hussain said: “Back to back, I’ve not seen England play as badly as that. They’ve changed their tactics, they’ve gone back to their all-rounders. They changed the toss, they batted first. So it shows really that tactics are important, the team is important, what you do at the toss is important, but the most important thing in any sport and in cricket in particular, is having players at the top of their game, especially in a World Cup.
“If you walk in that dressing room now and asked them to put their hand on their heart and say, are you in good nick? I reckon maybe one or two could say that. They have all collapsed as a unit and their form has deserted them. Compare that to South Africa and their batting lineup, everyone’s in nick. You look at India and their batting lineup, Rohit, KL Rahul, Virat Kohli, Shubman Gill – all in nick.
“Some of those cricketers on that park today would go in your best ever England white ball XI. It’s just been a bridge too far for most of them.”
Some of the criticism of England’s performance to date in the tournament has centred on the lack of focus on domestic 50-over cricket in the English domestic season. With the ring-fencing of the Hundred, the One Day Cup has taken a back-seat and doesn’t feature most county’s first XIs, let alone international players. It’s a similar story at international level with several of England’s squad, including Joe Root, Jonny Bairstow, and Ben Stokes, hadn’t played ODI cricket for over a year until the pre-tournament warm-up series against New Zealand.
“What I don’t like is giving players a cop out,” said Hussain. “And I feel like sometimes we do that in English cricket. When we win the 50-over World Cup and the 20-over World Cup, aren’t they great? We’re brilliant. And when the wheels come of it’s the structure. It’s the structure of English cricket, we’re a disgrace. We play 20-over cricket, we play 100-ball cricket, we don’t play enough 50-over cricket.
“How much 50-over cricket domestically has Virat Kohli played? Or Heinrich Klaasen or anyone out here? They don’t play domestic 50-over cricket, they learn from T20 franchises around the world. That’s what’s made this great side over the last six years, travelling round the world playing T20 franchises. It’s such a lame excuse.
“You’re giving the players a cop out when you blame the structure. The structure that made them world champions, it is exactly the same structure. Yeah, you may have taken the eye off the ball a little bit and not given them enough practice and games going into the tournament. But it was the structure that produced them, so when they mess up, they mess up, not the structure. It’s always county cricket, it’s the Hundred, it’s the Blast – Root had to answer a question on maybe we get rid of the Blast – that’s what’s made our cricketers. County cricket makes the cricketers that we are. Whether it be the Hundred, the Blast, 50-over cricket, whatever. That’s what makes them and when they fail, they take the responsibility.”
Hussain also criticised the decision-making throughout England’s campaign. “I think there’s been a lack of clarity and we touched on it after the Mumbai defeat,” he said. “We’re not going to pick Harry Brook and we’re going to pick Jason Roy in the initial squad against New Zealand and then Matthew Mott saying to Michael Atherton, it’s not the final squad. Then Jason Roy has a few back niggles and Brook does come back in. Then you go to Ben Stokes and Ben Stokes comes out here and doesn’t play a few games. Then was he fit for Afghanistan, could he have come in then? The tournament’s going away from them, he’s out here, he’s come out of retirement, can you get on the park?
“Then they make three changes, unheard of for an England side, three changes. Then twice they bowled in the heat, and are absolutely gone on their feet. The sort of decision making that is an area in any defeat in any World Cup you can learn from so you don’t make the same mistakes next time around. There was definitely more clarity in 2019 off the field and decision making was better in 2019 than it’s been in 2019. Rob Key admitted that, he said they’ve got decisions wrong and when you’re in a World Cup and you look at some of these sides and you get the decisions wrong, you’ll come unstuck.”
