Mark Butcher criticises England for their loss in the third Test against Sri Lanka at home

Former England batter Mark Butcher has criticised the side's batting after their heavy defeat against Sri Lanka during the recently concluded Oval Test. 

Despite losing the series, Sri Lanka won the third and final match by eight wickets, to register their first Test win in England in over a decade. Pathum Nissanka was their hero, for his knocks of 64 and 127.

Speaking on the Wisden Cricket Podcast, Butcher was in all praise for the visitors. At the same time, he blamed England's batting as a reason for their loss, saying it there was an "end of term feel" about their approach.

"I have to say England’s batting on both occasions was end of term, gung ho, slapdash, all the bad adjectives that you could come up with about the way that England played from day two onwards in the match really. So they [Sri Lanka] were aided and abetted by a team that kind of played as though the victory was a foregone conclusion and kind of went at it like that," Butcher said.

England were 221-3 on day one but were bundled out for 325, as their over-aggressive approach backfired, allowing the tourists to claw back in the game. Sri Lanka in response made 263 before skittling out the hosts for 156 in their second innings, thanks to Lahiru Kumara (4-21) and Vishwa Fernando (3-40).

On England's collapse, Butcher said: "The annoying thing about it for me is that throughout the previous five test matches England have been very prepared to be pragmatic and play game situations.

"And then you know once you'd earned the right to be a bit more expansive and go back to Bazball 1.0 then do it. But the lead was only 60, the ball was moving around and they kind of came out and played like they had 260 on the board instead.

"Then Sri Lanka as we've mentioned before bowled brilliantly, knocking over Joe Root and Harry Brook with two in swingers. Vishwa Fernando, who up until this test match or that afternoon anyway had looked absolutely insipid as a left-arm swing bowler. And suddenly before you know it, you're in big big trouble.

"That's what's annoyed me really, the fact that they actually made strides to kind of remove that sort of unnecessary risk-taking from the game in order to get the job done, get themselves into a position where they were infallible and were going win it and that. I hope that's annoyed them too."

Butcher slams England's field placements

Butcher was also critical of England’s field placements, claiming they lost the plot by choosing to over-attack in the fourth innings: "After being bowled out in 34 overs, they come out with fields on day four as if Michael Holding is bowling, the ball's reverse swinging all over, with five slips and gaps all over the place.

"Sri Lanka had knocked off 90 before you blinked and there was a naivety in all of that. The game was still there to be won but it kind of was like ‘No no we're England, we're going to attack no matter what’ and before you knew it, the game was up before stumps last night.

"So things for them to think about, things for Ollie Pope to think about as a stand-in skipper: ‘Was I too carried away with the idea of us being sort of superior as a team that we kind of took them a bit lightly and over attacked and overdid things?’

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"But I'm sure and I hope that there will be a debrief that comes with this test match loss and to look at ‘Okay you know we we cannot afford to kind of pretend that the other team isn't there and that we're just going to steamroll people'.

"Nissanka has played a brilliant innings there but he didn't do anything out of the ordinary. The odd bad ball that came along, he knocked it away with great style and aplomb. In the first 40 or 50 runs that he made, he barely had to do a thing. There were just gaps everywhere. Just pushing forward to balls, they disappeared down the ground for four.

"If you were going to win the game, you had to put them under some sort of scoring pressure. Build dots, bowl maidens, and the fields that were set did not allow them to be able to do that even if you bowled perfectly. I think it was naive at best."

He was not the only one to do so as former England captain Michael Vaughan had also pointed out the tactical blunders England committed as a fielding unit, opining the field placements were "over-aggressive".

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