The heart of Bazball’s success is the daring and belief of the personnel, fused with a splash of non-conformism and left-field thinking. But for them to wield their paintbrush, they need the canvas of a shirtfront. It should not swing, seam, or spin, it should not crack or break, but remain much the same throughout the five days, so that they could brandish their thrilling brand of batting. There are times when there could be nothing yet they would lose, like in Edgbaston.
Commitment to ideology is laudable, but not if they consider themselves the best team in the world, or wannabe best, or don’t win the WTC mace. Baz and Ben cannot call themselves the finest of the era, or of all time, until they have conquered different teams, conditions and elements. The best teams win everywhere, in every condition. If they can’t win, they would at least draw. They cannot keep bullying teams on placid tracks and stroll to immortality. It’s the same as some teams relying too much on turners or green tracks. Triumphs come with caveats.
England, of course, could do what they want to. They can choose to be romantics or hipsters. But they can’t expect to be called world-beaters, or game-changers, or the new benchmark, least of all the messiahs saving Test cricket from death. Until, at least, they have subjugated India, South Africa and Australia at home. You could add Sri Lanka and Bangladesh too, given the challenges it had offered England in the past. For Bazball to be called a truly game-changing concept, they need to subdue swing, seam, spin, bounce (high, low, slow, fast, and uneven) to call themselves the most feared side in the world, or for history to remember them as greats rather than failed romantics.
IND vs ENG: Mohammed Kaif questioned the hype around England captain Ben Stokes’ leadership. (AP)
At this stage, they are not. Far from it. A chunk of their victories has come in England, 16 out of 24, exactly two thirds. Away from home, they have won and lost eight games apiece. Four of the defeats came against India, on not particularly diabolical turners. On a flat-bed in Birmingham, Akash Deep and Mohammed Siraj cut them to ribbons with the new ball in the first and old ball in the second. Peak Siraj and Akash are daunting propositions, but they are not bowlers the batsmen would lose sleep over.
Perhaps, full-throttle Bazball is a defence mechanism, a response to the shortage of great classical batsmen like Joe Root or a broken lineage of swing bowlers, or the vacuum of quality spin bowlers. Once the seam-swing sultans, James Anderson and Stuart Broad farewelled, they realised the perils of dishing out the traditional grassy, moisture-laden decks to opposition teams. Australia, South Africa, India and New Zealand possess the personnel to out-bowl England bowlers. It could, in reality, be an idea born from pragmatism, about harnessing the best of a limited and flawed group in the best possible way they could.
READ MORE: Nip-backers, ‘anushaasan’ and wiles: How Akash Deep did the star turn at Edgbaston
But the flaws are glaring. Zak Crawley cannot deal with a smidgeon of seam movement, Ben Duckett misjudges the bounce, or lives in the illusion that he can cope with any vicissitudes of bounce. Ollie Pope gets nailed in the crease far too often. Root is playing one stroke too many these days, especially forcing strokes behind the square on the off-sides when he has all the strokes in front of the wicket. None of Harry Brook’s eight hundreds were scripted against Australia, the toughest bowling side in the world. He missed the tour to India, has not batted in Sri Lanka, Australia or South Africa. His lone subcontinent exposure has been the highways of Pakistan. Judgement and praise on him could wait. As it is for Jamie Smith, whose stiff, too straight bat-swing could pose problems when the ball moves. Ben Stokes’s consistency code has deserted him.
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None of them, well, could bat out a draw on the most placid Edgbaston this century. They just needed to bat roughly three and a half sessions. But they lasted only 68 overs, two and a quarter sessions.
Flat surfaces too could backlash. Teams like India, this series, would erect sky-risers and out-bat them. The bowlers, barring Chris Woakes and Brydon Carse in patches, have been largely insipid. In four innings, they leaked 1,849 runs. The dilemma is, if they resort to green tracks, the batsmen would be found out. In short, they are a largely one-dimensional side, feeding off vibes, mood and flat tracks, without depth or deeper layers, a product that needs refinement to truly empower Test cricket.
History shows that the best teams in history had flexible approaches, people with different concepts and methods working towards the goal of making the team great. The West Indies empire was built of their quartet of pacemen (the identities changed), but they had exceptional batsmen too, those that could stonewall and buccaneer. Australia of Steve Waugh and Ricky Ponting accommodated a variety of gifted cricketers, who could straddle different roles. The finest England brigade this century had men of various personalities and approaches. Alastair Cook could lay siege for an eternity, Andrew Strauss gritted around, Kevin Pietersen injected brio, Ian Bell was a steely artist, and Matthew Prior fire-fought. One template suits all ideals can win battles but not wars.
For Baz and Ben to rule the world, they need to embed new layers to the teams. When the conditions are favourable, they could certainly unlock carnage on bowlers, but when not, they could bat time, battle elements and do it in the good old fashioned ways. They need to subdue the devils of the variegated surfaces; bounce and pace of Australia; seam, swing, and variable bounce in South Africa, the slow and enormous turn of Sri Lanka, and the quickish spin in India. There would be times when they have to dilute their gung-ho approach and grind out a draw. Or rather, they would scale greatness only if they learn to wield their paintbrushes on different canvas.
