England shelve the need for speed as attack puts shoulder to the wheel

Posted by Admin September 1, 2024 Cricket

It was back in March, following a 4-1 defeat away to India that brought the 2025-26 Ashes into stark focus, that Rob Key put the word out to the pace bowlers of English cricket that speed was more valuable than wickets.

Six months on, with a four-man attack made up exclusively of right-armers – and no real tearaway among them – England turned over Sri Lanka in the second Test to seal their second series of the summer. With day five now for resting, it is likely this same quartet will line up once more at the Kia Oval on Friday. A foursome whose speeds rarely breached the mid-80s mph will be charged with preserving a 100 percent summer record for the first time in 20 years.

This being Lord’s at the back end of a comically rammed schedule, the pitch was no friend to speed. England needed 66.4 overs on Sunday to force a 190-run win, and it did not look like a whole lot of fun. They’d been given just 55.4 overs of rest after bowling Sri Lanka out for 196 in the first innings, and that was starting to show in the joints of a full-hearted attack.

You could throw a towel over England’s average speeds for this second innings. Olly Stone, drafted in as Mark Wood’s replacement – a comparison he downplayed before the match by warning that Wood’s mid-90s consistency was beyond him – clocked the highest at 83.6mph. Chris Woakes, the leader of the attack, brought up the rear with 80.1mph. Key has had the shotgun out for county bowlers operating at those numbers.

Of course, average speeds by their nature do not give the full picture. Stone’s qualities as a difference-maker were clear to see when he persuaded a 47-over-old ball to catch the glove of Dimuth Karunaratne, with the opener on 55 and looking at ease in his partnership with Angelo Mathews. A bit of extra mayo – 87mph – found what remaining life there was on a length to end a 122-ball stand that was beginning to irk the hosts.

As for Woakes, his operating speed suits his work. His manipulation of the seam and use of the crease – reflected in the fact he was the most economical quick across both teams – is all the more necessary in a post-James Anderson world. Sure, a gondola is never going to win the America’s Cup, but the canals of Venice require a precision that a speed boat does not possess.

We can apply all that and more to Gus Atkinson. His latest inscription into the honours board came across 16 overs in which he averaged just 83.3mph. Not that it showed.

“He has pace,” Dhananjaya de Silva acknowledged at the close of play. Sri Lanka’s captain was on the wrong end of Atkinson’s extra oomph as he failed to manage sharp bounce effectively – despite having a half-century to his name – and played onto his own stumps. “He is able to move the ball both ways. He has troubled us. We knew what to expect from him when we came from Colombo. We haven’t done well against him.”

Matthew Potts – just 0.2mph off Atkinson in a wicketless second innings – was a far more consistent version of himself compared to his outing in the first Test in Manchester. On Friday, his 2 for 19 from 11 overs – including a pearler that turned Mathews inside-out – spoke of a player steadily re-acclimatising to the rigours of Test cricket after a year out of the side. There is a sense he will be a truer version of himself at The Oval.

Despite their unique traits – Woakes’ craft, Atkinson’s height, Stone’s catapult-like release and Potts’ relentlessness – there is an obvious similarity of angle and, to a degree, pace, that matches each of the England attacks that has been found wanting in three winless Ashes tours since 2010-11. But even against a poor visiting batting line-up, that homogeny felt like a strength.

As a collective, they hammered the pitch just short of a good length, to the tune of 40.16 percent of their deliveries across 104.1 overs, thereby starving Sri Lanka’s batters of their favoured drives.

When it came to England’s bumper routine, all the quicks pitched in. What was particularly instructive was how and when Ollie Pope cycled through each of the four when employing the tactic. Because while it was largely predicated on the red Dukes no longer playing ball, every man entrusted to administer the ploy did so with renewed enthusiasm. The job of injecting some extra thrill into proceedings was not limited to one man, and was relished by all.

“It’s amazing when you feel like the game’s just plodding along, then you go to that plan and give them a few,” Stone said when reflecting on his role in the barrage that accounted for Karunaratne. “How the game changes, and the atmosphere, and I feel like, yeah, to get that wicket there… was massive.”

There is a level of fluidity here that did not exist in previous eras. Under Alastair Cook and Joe Root, there were times when bowlers other than Anderson and Stuart Broad were pigeonholed as bumper specialists (generally the fastest ones, like Wood, Jofra Archer and Ben Stokes) or older-ball containers (Woakes’ previous gig, which Stokes also filled).

Perhaps, then, it is no surprise that this current shift in attitude was set in motion by Stokes. When he took over at the start of the 2022 summer, he instigated a unilateral decision that all bowlers must be capable – and willing – to do every possible job. It was something he convinced Anderson and Broad to buy into, and it has become even more evident in their absence. Even Stokes’ own absence, as Ollie Pope carried that over on the field here at Lord’s.

Naturally, the likes of Wood, Archer, Stone and, perhaps down the line, Josh Hull – bowlers who fly closest to the sun – will have their own set of parameters. It would be foolish not to acknowledge scarce commodities and offer them a degree of protection from the thankless rigours of Test pitches such as this one. But even Wood this summer, and Stone in this match, have assumed many different guises.

If Key’s message before the summer was the need for speed, the message as we enter the final week of the Test season is that it needs to be underpinned by the ability and willingness to perform any task, and every role with the ball.

Vithushan Ehantharajah is an associate editor at ESPNcricinfo