Quick Singles

England have some rather interesting selection issues coming up in the next few days. They first need to finalise their strategy for the upcoming World Cup, select an eleven for their upcoming fixture and get their World Cup squad. England played through the Twenty20 competition with five batsman (inc keeper) an all rounder and five bowlers and transported this formula into one day internationals following their successes. Towards the end of the English summer they did revert to six batsman at the expense of the all rounder, which reduces the variety in the bowling attack but does add a little bit of backbone fifty overs is quite a lot of cricket but when batting you need to make every ball count.

England seem set fair on the five specialist bowlers which is fairly unique in one day cricket, even Australia balance their team with a genuine all rounder in Shane Watson. The success of playing Luke Wright as a dedicated bit ‘n’ pieces all rounder at the Twenty20 World Cup lead to them translating that role directly into one day internationals but with marginal success in bowling and batting. I really can’t see him continuing in the team but play a specialist batsman and you leave the bowlers short if one of them is hit out of the attack and face having to get Pietersen to roll his arm over. Bopara appears to me at least the natural choice, he proved himself a good finisher at the back end of last summer and a reasonable bowler but they left him at home for this tour. I’d also like to throw in Samit Patel a wild card entry he has test match standard batting and his bowling adds a useful spin option. But it frankly comes down to how big his Christmas dinner was as he’s not been playing any cricket since the end of the summer.

In the World Cup squad we’re definitely going to see Broad, Anderson, Swann, Bresnan and Yardy. There could be up to three more given, a spin backup option would seem essential; the preferred option would appear to be James Tredwell but they could also take Patel for of a more all round option. You’d be then looking for two pace bowlers given their appearance in the Twenty20 Woakes and Shadzad would seem logical choices but their wayward bowling would be even less affordable in one day games. Woakes in particular is just too green and I would like to see Chris Tremlett in the squad who proved in the tests that he has the discipline for any international cricket, the question is does he have the variation required for the limited overs game?

For the upcoming series with Australia it seems for the most part we will see six specialist batsman (including the keeper) which makes life easier for the selectors. Strauss and Davies will open with Pietersen, Bell, Collingwood and Morgan making up the middle order on pure batting form Trott would come in for Collingwood but Colly is the better all round cricketer and his bowling will be a vital extra. You could argue for the inclusion of a player with a greater all round talent but given the quality of England’s batsman it’s hard to argue against any excluding any of the current seven, Prior has a legitimate case to press for inclusion but his one day career has been punctuated with disappointment and Davies deserves his chance.

In summary my preferred squad would be:

Strauss (c), Davies (w), Pietersen, Bell, Collingwood, Morgan, Trott, Broad, Anderson, Swann, Bresnan, Yardy, Tredwell, Tremlett, Shadzad