During the rain delay of the Sydney Ashes Test between Australia and England the ABC played an interview conducted by the BBC’s Simon Mann with the Managing Director of England Cricket, Ashley Giles. For any England fans that heard the interview it should have triggered alarm bells.
Giles was appointed to the role in December 2018. At the time the ECB’s Chief Executive, Tom Harrison, as you would expect claimed that Giles was “the standout candidate amongst a very strong field.” How often do we hear that from CEO’s or the Chair of a board in sport when a key appointment is made?
Giles replaced Andrew Strauss, who following a reorganisation at the ECB which saw Paul Downton’s role of managing director made redundant was appointed to the newly created role of director of England cricket in May 2015.
Downtown, who following his retirement from cricket after a freak injury in 1991 worked as a stockbroker in the City before returning to cricket in 2013 when aged 56 had come to his role with a great deal of outside experience. Strauss had retired from Cricket in August 2012, and was just 38 when he took on the new role.
He is remembered for sacking England coach Peter Moores and appointing Trevor Bayliss; a decision many will question with the benefit of hindsight. He also encouraged a greater emphasis to be given to limited overs cricket. Some will say that this paid dividends with England winning the 2019 World Cup.
Giles when appointed was older than Strauss at 45, but as The Guardian reported at the time of his appointment “He has flitted around several of the key posts in English cricket, as Warwickshire’s coach, as a Test selector and as England’s ODI/T20 coach during Andy Flower’s stewardship.” Giles was then in charge at Lancashire before a returning to Edgbaston as their sport director in 2017. He had clearly done his fair share of job-hopping never staying anywhere long enough to be able to truly judge if he had been effective. A fairly normal situation in sports administration.
Upon his appointment he was quoted as saying, “I believe it is important to have a strong international set-up, which is showing great promise in what will be a significant year for our red- and white-ball teams leading into the ICC’s Men’s Cricket World Cup this summer and the Ashes. The next 12 months could transform the game like no other in recent memory.”
It must be pointed out that the preparation for the 2019 Cricket World Cup had been done on Strauss’s watch. So Giles’s focus was the T20 World Cup and the current Ashes series. The 2019 Ashes series did not go as England had hoped with the series drawn two-all, and Australia retaining the urn.
Giles then had to face the Covid pandemic and In 2020 the new domestic structure that has been constructed by an ECB committee under the chairmanship of Wasim Khan. A format that at the time was predicted by many in cricket circles said would result in England struggling to maintain its current standards in Test and 50-over cricket.
It was revealed that the England men have 32 fixtures lined up from the start of this year until September 2022. This will see the team play 11 T20 Internationals, 9 One Day Internationals and 12 Test Matches. Presuming that each Test match goes five days, which is unlikely, this equates to 80 days of International cricket in 224 days.
England will tour Pakistan from September to December in 2022, but fixtures are not available at this point in time. They head to the West Indies after Australia and have a short trip to the Netherlands in June for three One Day Internationals.
In his interview with Mann, Giles talked a great deal about player management, and how the top players needed rest and have time away from Cricket. We have heard this line before, and unfortunately today it carries very little weight. He then bemoaned the amount of international cricket that the players were being asked to play, and that it was a tough schedule. Which on the surface sounds reasonable, but not when you look at the big picture and one word, “money.”
The whole mess that England Cricket finds itself in comes down to money. A centrally contracted Test match player with the ECB is believed to be on UKL625,000 a year. If they play ODI cricket as well and are on a central contract that amount goes up by another UKL275,000. This does not include any other income from sponsors, their county or the IPL, if they play in that. With those additions it has been reported that some players are earning around USD$2million a year.
If you are going to pay these sort of wages you need to have your employees playing, because if they are not playing there is no income to cover the costs of those contracts. So if Ashley Giles wants to lessen the load on the International players, he is going to probably have to talk about lessening the value of the contracts first.
Based on many of the comments being made following the team’s performances in Australia, fans would like to see these centralised contracts to become performance based. In other words if you do not perform to the highest level expected and the team is not competitive or winning you are not going to be paid top dollar. It is hard top argue against such proposals as sport is after all performance based, you are judged on your results.
To those earning much less and going to work every day these sort of numbers for 80 days work and your wife or girlfriend being flown out to join you on tour seems a pretty good wicket to be on, if you will excuse the analogy. Especially when the base salary for a County cricketer starts at UKL27,500.
The money issue goes far far deeper into the game in England.
Giles tried to take the heat off the players and his cast of coaches in Australia by saying that everyone knows it’s a hard place to come and win. He backed this up by the comment that England has only won in Australia twice in 34 years. What this shows is a glaring flaw in the management of English cricket that repeatedly England send players who struggle in Australia, or whose technique will ensure they struggle. They do not have the right preparation, and have not learned from any lessons from the past. By comparison to England’s two Ashes series wins in 34 Years, which is ten tours, Australia has won four series and drawn one in England in the same period and on nine tours. On four tours to Australia in that same time period England has failed to win a single Test in a series. Only once in the same time has Australia failed to win a Test in the Series in England, and that was in 2013.
What is interesting is to look at the structure of the English game back in 1987. The County Championship which is a four day competition consisted of 17 teams in one league and they played 216 games in the season. In addition there was the Nat West Trophy which was a 60 over competition where another 30 games were played, the Benson and Hedges Championship, a 55 over competition where 47 games were played. There was also the Sunday League competition which was a 40-over match and saw 136 matches played.
Fast forward to recent times. In 2021 the County Championship which is now two divisions of nine teams 126 games were played. The National League which is the name of the old Sunday League is a 50 over competition now, and saw 76 games played. Then there is the T20 competition which saw teams play 131 games. So despite having more teams playing professionally they are now playing less cricket, 96 games less.
Now there are plenty who will argue that back in 1987 that was too much cricket and players prayed for rain to have a day off, but before the dawn of T20 cricket and centralised contracts players would get plenty of time in the middle, playing cricket. Playing the sport they were paid to play and honing their skills.
Now those on centralised contracts are often not even playing in these competitions, certainly not the County Championship.
As covered in Is Centralised Contracts the Cause of England’s Cricketing Woes the Centralised Contract came into England Cricket in 2000. In June 2003 Surrey Lions played Warwickshire Bears in the first T20 Count match. In what was known as the Twenty20 cup, 48 matches were played in what was intended to be a bit of light-hearted entertainment.
In six years the number had grown to 97 games and by 2019 it had risen to 133 games. While T20 had risen, the County Championship had been reduced to 98 games from having been 144 up until 2017. That did rise back to 126 in 2021. However this shows that the opportunities for any cricketer with Test match aspirations to showcase their skills has been greatly prohibited. Thanks to the two divisions players only played 14 four day games between April and September, a period of six months. That is 64 days of the longer version of the game in 175 days, and that is assuming all the games go four days.
The key factor here is the Counties and England Cricket will tell you that County Championship matches do not pay the bills. The shorter versions of the game pulls in people and generates revenue. However as many of the shorter versions are finding fan interest is now on the wane. Why? Because there is too much of it. It is hard to keep track of so many games and with so many games the novelty has worn off.
What was the reason behind the increase in the number of these shorter versions of the game? Was it greed, a grab for more money? Or was it desperation? The game was still rupturing financially because of the wages paid to the drawcard players and it was hoped that more of these games would help cover the shortfall?
The centrally contracted players not being available for their county sides is also proving to be a double-edged sword for English cricket. With these top line English players not available the County sides look to bring in big name players from other nations. These players then gain valuable experience of playing in England and come back with their national teams and do well against England.
Thirty years ago the same thing happened in reverse. Talented young county cricketers came out and played Grade cricket in Australia. Many returned to great success with the England Test team. Alec Stewart who played for Midland Guildford ended up with a test batting average of 54.99 in Australia. Robin Smith who played for South Perth finished with a batting average of 40.89 in Australia. Zak Crawley now opening the batting for England came over and played in the Suburban Turf competition for Wembley Districts in 2016/17 and averaged 53.38. However this is not as high a standard competition as the WACA Grade competition that Smith and Stewart played in. It will have had its benefits but time will tell how beneficial it has been. Crawley did however play Grade cricket in New South Wales.
Some of England’s players have come across to play in the Big Bash League, another T20 competition. How much is playing in that going to help them on an Ashes Tour? Do they not already play enough T20 cricket? Once again are they only coming for the money?
Probably more intriguing is looking at when most of the current touring party made their county debuts and the cricket being played. Eight players made their county debuts before 2010, Anderson (02), Broad (05), Woakes and Malan (06), Root (07) Bairstow (08) with Buttler and Stokes debuting in 2009. In 2009 there were 144 County Championship matches per season as well as 72 National League matches, 87 50-over matches and 97 T20 games.
The remaining players all made their county debuts after 2010. Burns debuted in 2011 as did Wood. Leach and Overton in 2012, Robinson in 2013, Lawrence 2015, Hameed Habeeb, Ollie Pope and Dom Bess in 2016 and Zak Crawley in 2017. By the time 2017 came around there were now only 98 County Championship matches, 79 National League games and 133 T20 games per season. A clear shift in the type of game played and the skills required. So is it really any surprise that the team has been under the cosh in Australia? Is it fair to blame the players, especially when it appears it is the structure that is to blame?
When you add in the fact that three players in the touring side have won over 100 caps for England, Root, Anderson and Broad, and only three other players have over 50 caps – Buttler, Stokes and Bairstow – you realise that this is an extremely inexperienced side. Only Burns and Woakes have over 30 tests matches under their belt.
So knowing that this is an extremely inexperienced side what was done to help prepare them for the series? Giles said in the interview that he has not heard anyone say that these were not the best players England could have picked, if that is the case then the buck stops with the management. The blame has to lie with Giles and those below him who failed to recognise this and failed to prepare the players adequately. As mentioned there is a cast of coaches here in Australia, in fact more support staff than players. What have they been doing to try and sort out the constant errors being made in terms of shot selection, the length being bowled and the field placings? Also who was responsible for signing off on the tour schedule, which was always going to disadvantage the team, especially one that is under prepared?
The final irony is that the Ashes urn remains in England at Lords. The term originated in a satirical obituary published in The Sporting Times, immediately after Australia’s 1882 victory at The Oval. This was Australia’s first Test win on English soil. The obituary stated that English cricket had died, “the body will be cremated and the ashes taken to Australia.”
In 1882/83 England captain Ivo Bligh vowed to “regain those ashes”. The English media then reported that this tour was the quest to regain the Ashes. With England 2-0 up in the series when they arrived in Melbourne three women including Florence Murphy who would become Bligh’s wife presented Bligh a small Urn of Ashes the myth was born.
There have been 72 Ashes Series and in terms of success the results have been fairly even with Australia winning 34 and England 32 and six drawn series. Since the end of the World War II Australia has won 21 Ashes series, 13 at home and 8 in England. England has won 14 series, nine at home and four in Australia. There have been 6 series drawn in this time period.
This is far from an impressive record for England, but the Ashes have frequently been hard fought contests, and they have brought out the best in those selected to represent each nation. Reputations have been made in an Ashes series.
There have been in a world that loves hyperbole frequent claims that the visiting team to arrive on an Ashes Tour is the worst to ever leave its homeland, but sadly in 2021/22 this may well prove to be the case for England, as another drubbing looks to be on the cards. Yet possibly more so than any other team in 140 years this team does appear to embody the obituary from 1882.
The burning question from those who love the game and the Ashes contest is do England cricket have the right people in the key positions with the right experience to resuscitate the game and the team? Listening to Ashley Giles interview he did little to convince those who care that they do.
In the words of Albert Einstein if you insert the word “cricket” ahead of the word “world” he has some pertinent advice for those running the game, and in charge of the England team. “The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.”
