The killer line from Ravi Shastri came in the middle of an England collapse that condemned them to another heavy defeat in the final ODI in Ahmedabad and a series whitewash in India. “They’ve improved on this tour,” said Shastri. “In golf.”
It followed a long discussion on commentary with Kevin Pietersen about the tourists’ lack of preparation under the laidback coaching of Brendon McCullum, who took over the leadership of all England’s sides last month.
The chat centred around a rumour the commentators had heard, namely England had only had one net session since arriving in India in mid-January. Despite this later being confirmed to The i Paper as untrue, the genie had left the bottle and fans piled in on social media about a lack of professionalism.
Five genuine reasons England can win the Champions Trophy - no, really
Read MoreThe truth is England practised regularly during the five-match T20 series that kicked off the tour. They lost that 4-1 by the way. They also netted on the eve of the one-day series that started last Thursday. But they hadn’t practised in the week since. A week that has seen numerous players go down with injury.
Some slack must be cut for a squad who have been zig-zagging across India over the past three weeks during a gruelling schedule that leaves little time in between matches.
Still, the fact they had found time to play golf doesn’t look great. The reasoning – players need an outlet away from the game to clear their heads – is sound. But when you’ve lost seven games out of eight and said some stupid things publicly, fans are going to pile in. To this end, Ben Duckett’s words this week did not help. “If we lose 3-0 to India, I don’t care as long as we beat them in the final in the Champions Trophy,” he said.
The truth is England have no chance in the Champions Trophy unless they pick up form dramatically. There’s little time. They kick off their campaign against Australia on Saturday week.
But the real story here is England piling pressure on themselves. Just as it was during their dreadful 2023 ODI World Cup in India, their obsession with golf is killing them when it comes to public perception.
It doesn’t matter Australia’s players played even more golf during that tournament. They won it. And until results improve it would serve England well to stay off the greens, practice more and show a little humility when speaking publicly. Otherwise the cross-format Bazball project could turn very ugly, very quickly.
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