Negative attitude hurts England

Fantastic test match, and all credit to the obdurate West Indies batting, especially numbers ten and eleven at the end, but no two ways about it this is a game that England should have won. That they didn’t is largely due to a concerning lack of aggressive intent when they had their opponent on the ropes.

With Harmison off colour and Flintoff crocked I don’t have any argument with the decision not to enforce the follow on, but the way they went about setting a target for the West Indies portrayed a distinct lack of killer instinct. Two hundred and eighty runs ahead on first innings the situation called for a dominant batting performance to take advantage of a demoralised West Indian side, and offer as much time as possible to win the game.

Sending in Jimmy Anderson as night watchman on the third evening sent off all the wrong signals, suddenly it was a about protecting the position we’d worked, not trying to exploit it. When the game called for quick runs on the fourth morning, Anderson scored 20 from 53 balls in 70 minutes, alongside the equally stoical Alastair Cook. With Strauss obviously set on a five hundred lead Owais Shah in for the same period as Ando would have allowed us to declare a good half hour earlier.

If we really needed a night watchman then surely a more positive move would have been to send in say Graeme Swann or Stuart Broad, players who would have been able to push on in the morning and play a few attacking shots against the Windies opening bowlers.

Following a similar passive batting performance in India where England allowed the momentum of the game at Chennai to shift on the fourth day leading in Sehwag’s match winning performance, it’s a trend that needs to be addressed.

All said though there were some real pluses from the match. Broad looks to be growing into a genuine test match performer at just the right time, Owais Shah brings more belief and momentum to the batting line up, and Swann picked up where he left off in India and must have established himself as the number one spinner for the foreseeable future. Sidebottom in for the uninspiring Harmison at Barbabos and fingers crossed Fred pulls through.