England World Cup squad
England have announced their 15 man squad for the World Cup:
- Michael Vaughan (capt)
- Ed Joyce
- Ian Bell
- Andrew Strauss
- Kevin Pietersen
- Paul Collingwood
- Andrew Flintoff
- Paul Nixon (wk)
- Ravinder Bopara
- Jamie Dalrymple
- Monty Panesar
- Jon Lewis
- James Anderson
- Liam Plunkett
- Sajid Mahmood
There are one or two obvious things about this squad: 1) Vaughan is in it, despite all his recent injury concerns. Certainly Vaughan is the best man for the job in terms of captaincy, but is form on the field is not debatable - he’s out of form, and is an injury risk. In one day cricket, you can’t have one man filling a spot who is not physically available on the field. If there is any doubt over Vaughan’s fitness then he should not be on the tour. I quite like the thought of Vaughan as a sort “consultant captain” but only if it could be done in such a way that Vaughan is not captaining the side. There should be one very clear picture of exactly who is the captain of the side, which at the moment does not exist with England. But if Vaughan could coach Strauss as captain, then it could be a winning combination. 2) Nixon has retained the gloves as ‘keeper. I still can’t understand how he was ever given them in the first place, and despite England winning the CB Trophy, he has not shown any more talent than any of the other players in contention for the position. Except for the ability to talk s**t non-stop for 50 overs. Nixon’s inclusion, however, is not a plan for the future. At 36 years old, he has an extremely limited shelf life and not enough skills to back it up. It seems Chris Read is going to have to settle for the fact that he won’t play for England at least until Fletcher leaves and Geraint Jones has had his shot. But even still, they should still have a younger player, such as James Foster, behind the stumps. It’s practically impossible to separate any of the keepers on any respective skills, so why choose Nixon? I can’t understand it.
Mal Loye also gets the arse, in favour of Ravi Bopara. Interesting decision, but not the be all. I think Loye offered a real one day talent at the top of the order, the type of guy who either scores heavily or is out second ball, whereas Bopara offers an option with the ball. My problem with Bopara is that he, like Dalrymple, is a so-called “bits and pieces” player. I like all-rounders, such as Flintoff, but I’m not in favour of players who do a bit of this and a bit of that. Sure, KP and Collingwood do bowl a bit, but then they’re also proven international batsmen. Dalrymple is a perfect example - he’s neither a bowler nor a batsmen, but does both well enough to get a place in the side. All that does is highlight how few really talented individuals we have in the ranks. In fact, one such individual has missed out in favour of these non-specialist players - Stuart Broad. Yes, he’s young and a bit raw but the World Cup experience would be great for him.
Overall verdict is that it’s a reasonable side. If Vaughan can stay fit for the entire tournament, it might even do well. But as soon as he gets injured, I believe it will become ragged round the edges. The inclusion of Bopara, Nixon and Dalrymple are gambles, but then any of the people who would replace them would be gambles. However, I would still preferred to have seen Loye, Read and Broad there, if only because each of those players are most likely to be mainstays of the English side for years to come.
We shall, of course, see.
For more coverage of the World Cup sides, check out Cricinfo’s excellent coverage.
Tags: England, england-world-cup-squad, flintoff, nixon, read, vaughan, World-Cup-2007Related Stories
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