Wounded England look to avoid more humiliation at Cricket World Cup as they face Dutch underdogs | Cricket-world-cup News

Ryan van Niekerk, the Netherlands assant coach, tried to summon the best wildlife imagery while being respectful to his next opponents, England. “From where I come from in South Africa, there’s a saying ‘Never underestimate a wounded buffalo’.”In a fast-forgetting world that has quickly taken the crown off English heads to polish it and keep it ready for the next champions, the Dutch wanted to pay obeisance to the fading power. “England are world champions. It’s a similar group to the one that won. And England are preparing as they know how,” Van Niekerk would add.
The World Cup title is England’s pride. The Dutch are about to find out if the buffalo is wounded enough.
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There must be remnants of giddy glee at having won the World Cup finally in 2019; dredges of pride in having played unapologetic attacking cricket at a point in time, and snatches of memory of having been white-ball overlords just last November. But all of that lies mothballed and unused somewhere in England, and certainly didn’t travel to India this time around.
It was going to be cricketingly impossible to top the drama of the 2019 triumph, secured after playing easily the most exciting final in World Cup hory. But England didn’t need to make their title defence completely burlesque for the watching world.
New Zealand landed up in Ahmedabad for the first match of the World Cup and swatted them aside in such a clinical manner that it couldn’t even be dignified as revenge. Afghanan, who don’t share a colonial past like most of the countries in this tournament, coolly showed them up in Delhi proving one didn’t even need vestiges of the game’s hory to be good at it.
India teased England in Lucknow, but no one had the heart to taunt the unravelling side then. And it was old foes Australia who casually knocked them out, again in a game that couldn’t even be called a fracas, let alone a battle.
Ben Stokes owned up to the team being ‘crap’. One felt bad for the English press pack who would struggle to find more than two-three words of a silly hashtag, for there was nothing gloriously gone wrong to pen lilting laments. It was just inglorious and prosaic losses of a bottom-placed team that sleep-walked across India, like zombies who aren’t even subject matter for a cinematic apocalypse.
Look to the future
The poor run could end against The Netherlands, who cleaved open South Africa’s festering chase-wounds. But the clutch Dutch offer no respite in their penultimate outing to the stragglers. England have a Champions Trophy 2025 spot – for which they need a top-8 finish – to fight for, as their stay in India prolongs.
They were asked about four-year plans, because that’s the English thing to do – draw out long-term plans. Assant coach Carl Hopkinson, assigned to explain the inexplicable implosion, stressed they’d like to first think of the match against the Dutch. “And we want to think about Pakan next. These are two important games we need to win,” he’d say waving away the morose, trading it for a bit of meaning to life.
Hopkinson’s go-to phrase was England “haven’t executed under pressure when they needed to in key moments.” For a team that didn’t want to label this the title ‘defence’ because it didn’t have an attacking ring to it, Hopkinson’s defence was all about what they had done in the past, albeit wretchedly the most recent past.Most Read
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“We were a team known for executing under pressure, skillful and talented.” Note: were.
England basically landed up in India, banking on having been brilliant in the past, hoping the world would continue in the same vein of playing its bit-part, while a shadow of their attacking cricket flailed about hoping to recreate those times. Literally, no one else was frozen in time, and got a move-on.
Ben Stokes is due for surgery on his left knee, and Hopkinson was asked if he would push off early to be ready in time for the Tests against India. “Ben is about winning games for England. That’s what he’s about,” the coach would say, adding he wouldn’t go back. The Netherlands might not be terribly afraid or quake in their boots upon hearing that, though Stokes will best strap on the sharp horns of a wounded buffalo. Just how much fight is left in Jos Buttler, no one knows. But England is literally fighting to stay eligible to turn up for the next one. Did they really win the World Cup once upon a time?