England Cricket 2025

If there is one thing that summed up the England management's attitude to preparation for going into battle it is the fielding.

England dropped 17 catches in the series. McCullum got rid of the fielding coach in 2024. He said at the end of the Ashes “We don’t have a fielding coach, it wasn’t for the lack of trying. Unfortunately, there’s lots of franchise cricket on at the moment and franchises pay a lot more.”

This is the biggest load of bullshit I have read. Unlike a fast bowling coach who needs an ongoing relationship with their charges, there is nothing individual about fielding or even keeping that a competent coach could not have provided. It is all about repetition and getting players in the right frame of mind to the extent that they are proactive and not reactive to what is going on.

Here's the thing though. As much as a fielding coach is desirable, especially from the perspective of keeping, it really isn't a necessity especially when one considers that they did actually have two people in their group who have kept on the international stage. They go by the names of McCullum and Trescothick. 

So, yes England should have had a fielding coach with them to "share the burden" but fielding drills are something that any competent coach can provide. The issue was never that. It was more that this regime did not recognise the importance of actually devoting more time to doing that. Any more than they did in playing more warm-up games. Or they do in making their players turn out more for their counties.

There is always an excuse for doing less. In case that gets in the way of the golf and the drinking. The fact that the England and the ECB covered that up (Brook was fined £30,000 for the bouncer incident) and that they are now proposing to re-introduce the midnight curfew that McCullum got rid of when he took charge says it all. 

Once the cricket becomes secondary, the team will achieve exactly that. Come second. Or, in the case, of the England Test side, come seventh which is exactly where they are, with just Bangladesh and West Indies below them in the World Test Championships. We don't prepare to fail.........

England U19s played India in a warm up game for their imminent World Cup. India scored 295-8 (50) with England responding with 196-3 (36.3) and winning by 20 runs (DLS) in the process. 

The main contributors to the victory were Durham left-arm seamer, James Minto, who returned 5-34 and James Rew, captain, keeper and middle-order match winner, with 71* (66). 

The speed with which the ECB have succeeded in doing this makes the prep that they arranged for the Ashes just gone look even sillier. 

Yes but we didn't have any coaches, apart from McCullum and Trescothick and they were far too busy doing other more important things, who know anything about keeping or fielding.

According to McCullum ("we don't have a fielding coach, but it wasn't for a lack of trying"), they did desperately try to find someone, but, unlike a bowling specialist such as David Saker, there wasn't another coach in the world let alone the whole of Australia capable of doing the job. Equally, you can't have the players doing it amongst themselves (like Smith and Pope working with each other on the keeping and the rest rotating the hitting and catching) as it's not in their central contracts to do so.  

It's just a really unfortunate set of circumstances. No one to blame whatsoever. 

fenaddick said:

Following the discussion about Italy's squad make up it's important to keep in mind that Salt, Bethell and Archer could feasibly have been lining up for the opposition tomorrow

Indeed. But the Italian squad is virtually wholly made up of players that neither were born or live in Italy simply because the criteria for playing for an associate nation is different to the requirements for playing for a full member.

For England a player must satisfy both of these:

• Citizenship & Birth: Must be a British citizen born in England or Wales, or have three years of residency (210 days/year) for three consecutive years
• Previous Cricket: The player must not have played first-class or international cricket in any Full Member Country outside England and Wales except as an overseas cricketer under local rules 

For Italy a player can qualify to play for them if they can satisfy just one of the following (there are additional things that they have to fulfil but none are particularly onerous):

• Born in the country
• Hold an Italian Passport
• resided in the relevant country for a minimum of 183 days in each of the immediately preceding four years

The fundamental difference is that you only have some sort of heritage to play for Italy. In the case of Salt, Bethell and Archer they had to fulfil that residency requirement.    

fenaddick said:

Addick Addict said:

fenaddick said:

Following the discussion about Italy's squad make up it's important to keep in mind that Salt, Bethell and Archer could feasibly have been lining up for the opposition tomorrow

Indeed. But the Italian squad is virtually wholly made up of players that neither were born or live in Italy simply because the criteria for playing for an associate nation is different to the requirements for playing for a full member.

For England a player must satisfy both of these:

• Citizenship & Birth: Must be a British citizen born in England or Wales, or have three years of residency (210 days/year) for three consecutive years
• Previous Cricket: The player must not have played first-class or international cricket in any Full Member Country outside England and Wales except as an overseas cricketer under local rules 

For Italy a player can qualify to play for them if they can satisfy just one of the following (there are additional things that they have to fulfil but none are particularly onerous):

• Born in the country
• Hold an Italian Passport
• resided in the relevant country for a minimum of 183 days in each of the immediately preceding four years

The fundamental difference is that you only have some sort of heritage to play for Italy. In the case of Salt, Bethell and Archer they had to fulfil that residency requirement.    

Oh of course, I was merely saying that England in particular make use of players that lots may (incorrectly in my opinion) consider "Non-English"

The previous Italian coach, Gareth Berg, was renowned for scouring England, Australia and South Africa, often dubbed "The Italian Job" in focusing on leveraging the relaxed eligibility rules, which allowed any player holding an Italian passport to compete for the national side. He brought in Jade Dernbach, Grant Stewart, Wayne Madsen, Joe Burns, Ben Manenti and Spencer Johnson. Some of those players, Spencer Johnson in particular, wouldn't be quite so keen to play for Italy if they had to renounce their right to play for their "home" country.

A friend of mine, Gavin Hamilton, started for Scotland, then played for England but had to wait the mandatory four years to be eligible to play for Scotland again which he did.

/Chizz said:

Addick Addict said:

WinViz really is the biggest load of "doggie do do" known to predicting the outcome of a cricket match. It showed a few overs ago the UAE having a 22% chance when the Betfair market had it at 2%.

More people should be encouraged to understand that WinViz isn't - and isn't intended to be - a method of predicting the outcomes of cricket matches. I don't think commentary teams do a good job at explaining this. 

WinViz shows you what the data says, it doesn't predict the outcome. 

More people should be encouraged to understand that it is and is intended to be a method of predicting the outcome of cricket matches,

From WinViZ themselves:

WinViz is CricViz’s win predictor. It was developed to help the casual fan understand who is winning at any given moment in the game.

This complex analysis is then translated into a simple win predictor, which can be displayed on digital platforms to support and on stadium big screens to support fan engagement.

WinViz is used by broadcasters around the world, and is currently powering the Win Predictor being used by Sky Sports in their coverage of the Ashes.

THIS THREAD IS CLOSED - PLEASE SEE 2026 VERSION