The Shorter Wisden 2013 (49 page)

Broad’s performances in the UAE built on his splice-jarring excellence against India the previous summer, but a calf strain cut short his tour of Sri Lanka, and after that
he shone only sporadically. Eleven wickets against West Indies at Lord’s were a reminder that he didn’t need to be at his best to cause havoc although, on the final afternoon at
Headingley against South Africa, he was genuinely hostile. But two trends were emerging: Broad’s pace dropped to the low-80s – he blamed the speedguns, while the management claimed not
to be concerned – and he mislaid the fuller length that had served him well in the second half of 2011. A bruised heel early in India hardly helped, and neither did a total of none for 157 at
Ahmedabad and Mumbai. Unimpressed, the selectors dropped him from the Test side for the first time in four years, only weeks after he had been confirmed as Cook’s vice-captain; soon, the heel
meant he was on his way home. His year as Twenty20 leader had to be judged by the surrenders to India and Sri Lanka, and he was dragged into the Pietersen affair when forced to deny involvement in
a fake Twitter account that had, it transpired, been started by one of his friends. That indignity felt of a piece with a disjointed year.

England’s patience was rewarded at Edgbaston in September, when Buttler put a Twenty20 game beyond South Africa’s reach with an awe-inspiring ten-ball unbeaten 32,
of which 30 came in a single over from Wayne Parnell. That blast meant a slow start to his international career was forgiven. And 48 undefeated runs off 28 deliveries in the pre-Christmas matches
in India, where he replaced Bairstow behind the stumps, confirmed his match-winning potential – especially when his ramp shot was in working order.

1 ODI: 0 runs at 0.00.

14 T20I: 143 runs @ 20.42, SR 133.64; 2 games as wicketkeeper, no dismissals.

A prolific season with Somerset and the retirement of Strauss paved the way for Compton’s passage to India, where he contentedly played second fiddle to Cook. His value
lay not so much in the runs he scored – in that respect he had a middling series – but in the alliance he forged with his captain. If their partnership of 123 in the follow-on at
Ahmedabad might have been England’s most important of the series, then their 165 at Kolkata was not far behind. Compton’s diligence was beyond reproach, and so too his temperament:
after two failures in the warm-ups, he forced his way into the Test side with three successive fifties. But it was unclear whether his straitjacket – he scored at 33 runs per 100 balls
– had been tailored to circumstance or cut from his natural cloth. On three occasions, he fell between 29 and 37, and a top score of 57 felt, in Indian conditions at least, like a glass
ceiling. But a player who was constantly reminded of his dazzling grandfather, and had replaced a modern English great, managed the dual burden with class and composure. Besides, he would always
have one over Denis: at Eden Gardens, the Barmy Army honoured Nick with his own song.

Cook could allow himself a matinee-idol grin when – having just led England to their first Test triumph in India since 1984-85 – it was put to him that his ascent to
the captaincy must have seemed like a mixed blessing. In fact, little fazed him, and his haul of 548 runs at Ahmedabad, Mumbai and Kolkata represented one of the feats of an already glittering
British sporting year. In Tests, he had endured a quiet time until then, including seven single-figure scores in the defeats by Pakistan and South Africa. But his resilience, refusal to panic, and
an enforced sense of responsibility now came together: by the end of the year, only Michael Clarke had scored more Test runs, while Cook – uniquely – could celebrate hundreds in each of
his first five Tests as captain (starting with a stand-in stint at Chittagong and Dhaka in 2009-10). As he had done while making the one-day captaincy his own the previous year, Cook added new
tricks, leaving the crease to launch straight sixes off India’s spinners: in 2012, he hit five in Tests, doubling his career tally. The single-mindedness which was reflected in Cook’s
desire to take Pietersen to India and pick Root at Nagpur had also been evident in England’s one-day fortunes. They won 12 out of 14 completed matches, while none of his team-mates could
match his 663 runs, three hundreds or 74 fours. His greatest feat, though, was to assume control so calmly in the post-Strauss era. Famously a non-sweater, Cook had turned a physical oddity into a
resounding metaphor.

15 Tests: 1,249 runs @ 48.03.

15 ODI: 663 runs @ 47.35, SR 79.97.

For all the experimentation, an ingredient was still missing: Dernbach could not yet be relied upon to stem the flow. He had his moments, most triumphantly when he gambled on a
slower ball from the last delivery of the Twenty20 decider against Pakistan, and deceived Misbah-ul-Haq. He was initially forgiven plenty, bowling more Twenty20 overs than any of his team-mates
while conceding more than almost all of them. He celebrated each victim with reassuring intensity, but there was too much anguish in between. And after leaking 7.34 an over in the New Year in
India, he was dropped from the one-day side for New Zealand.

Menace and promise lurked whenever Finn was handed the ball, but injuries and the seam-bowling hierarchy meant he played in only five of England’s 15 Tests – and
just once in consecutive games. Eight wickets against South Africa at Lord’s were overshadowed by defeat but, when he had finally recovered from a thigh injury in India, his post-lunch spell
on the fourth afternoon at Kolkata paved the way for a famous win. A strained disc ruled him out of Nagpur, but there was another troublesome body part: his right knee had a habit of knocking into
the stumps at the point of delivery, prompting umpires to call dead ball at the second offence, a ruling that cost him the wicket of Graeme Smith at Headingley. He promised to sort things out, but
never quite did, and missed out on another wicket at Mohali in January 2013. In the limited-overs formats, he was outstanding – fast, fiery, frugal. Series figures of
40–3–134–13 had helped demolish Pakistan 4–0, and Finn was also a lone flicker of light during the World Twenty20. Now England just needed to keep him fit.

Less than a year and a half after his England debut, and with Pietersen barely around, Hales could claim to have developed into their leading Twenty20 batsman, finishing 91 runs
clear of the pack. His 99 off 68 balls against West Indies at Trent Bridge was a reward for intelligent shot selection, and in the two end-of-year games in India he managed 98 off 68. He even
verged on the status of cause célèbre, banned by Nottinghamshire – along with Lumb and Patel – from considering IPL offers. But he knew time was on his side.

It seemed like an identity crisis. Finally demoted in the one-day order to No. 6 after 28 innings as opener had brought him an average of all but 30 and a strike-rate of 94,
Kieswetter lost more than he gained. It was slightly curious that England persisted with him at the top of the Twenty20 line-up, where a run a ball and only one score over 35 were barely adequate.
Too often, he followed the management’s strictures about the preservation of early wickets, but without rotating the strike. And after scoring four off 14 balls in the World Twenty20 against
New Zealand, he was dropped. His keeping, on the other hand, improved – not least during the 50-over series against Australia. But it wasn’t enough, and after more struggles, in India
in early 2013, he was ditched in that format too.

The final act of England’s year was Morgan’s straight six off Ashok Dinda to seal a last-ball Twenty20 win at Mumbai, but almost all his heroics until then had been
confined to the 50-over game. In 12 innings, he was not out six times – and England won the lot. It was no coincidence that he was the only player to appear in all 29 limited-overs
internationals in 2012, nor that he was entrusted with the Twenty20 captaincy in India while Broad was at home injured. But his Test career stuttered after both his technique and, more
unexpectedly, his temperament deserted him against Pakistan’s spinners. By the end of the Indian tour, he had disappeared into the pack, even if he had at least rectified the excessive crouch
which had been playing havoc with his balance. Only a return to the Test team, though, would complete the picture.

Here was what Panesar had become: an unaffordable luxury in England, but a potential match-winner in Asia, although even there he was no automatic selection. He missed one Test
on each of the three overseas tours, but his performances against Pakistan and India would call the selectors’ judgment into question. When he did play, both Strauss and Cook treated him as
their No. 1 spinner, partly because he provided more control than Swann: at Nagpur, he bowled 52 overs for 81. But he could be lethal too and – after he was bizarrely overlooked at Ahmedabad
– the Wankhede pitch in Mumbai might have been created with his pace and accuracy in mind; he had, he thought, never bowled better. And so the familiar lament: if only Panesar had an
all-round game. Two bad drops off Mahela Jayawardene arguably cost England the Galle Test, and he failed to score in five innings out of nine. Such one-dimensionality wouldn’t have been a
problem for any other team. But England had Swann.

The worry was that 2012 spelled the beginning and the end of Patel’s Test career. Miscast at No. 7 in Sri Lanka, he was given the chance a place higher against India
– but didn’t take it. And when Panesar was belatedly selected, for the Second Test, his bonus gig as back-up spinner became redundant; Root’s selection for Nagpur was the writing
on the wall. Patel’s limited-overs performances were not compelling either, save for a skilful 67 off 48 balls in the World Twenty20 against Sri Lanka, when he confirmed himself as one of
England’s more natural players of spin. But his gifts were glimpsed too rarely, and his slow left-armers too easily milked. In the field, he earned brownie points for his part in the run-out
of Virender Sehwag at Kolkata, yet it felt he was no more than a fluff away from riling the coaches.

The year ended as it began, with Pietersen getting into a tangle against spin in Asia, but in between he spray-painted English cricket with all the colours of the rainbow. You
name it, he did it – and never in half-measures. The early months were either famine (in the Pakistan Tests) or feast (in the subsequent limited-overs matches in the UAE, and during his
outrageous 151 in Colombo). Then came fiasco. Emboldened by his new IPL contract with Delhi Daredevils, Pietersen sought to retire from one-day internationals, with apparent disregard for the terms
of his central contract: he would have to quit Twenty20 internationals too. A misplaced sense of grievance was not helped by a fake Twitter account in his name. And he became an out-and-out pariah
when – a few days after his breathtaking 149 at Headingley and an equally jaw-dropping press conference (“it’s tough being me”) – it emerged he had been sending
“provocative” texts to members of the South African team. For England, enough was enough. Pietersen was dropped for the Third Test at Lord’s, then ignored for the World Twenty20
title defence, despite having unretired from the limited-overs formats in August via a YouTube interview. The next episode in the soap opera came during his “reintegration”, a
designation dreamed up by ECB chairman Giles Clarke during another bizarre press conference, stage-managed in Sri Lanka, where Pietersen was now providing TV punditry. But Cook replaced Strauss,
and wanted his best players in India. After a series of meetings with senior players and support staff, Pietersen was welcomed back, and celebrated with his third Test tour de force of the year, a
series-turning 186 at Mumbai. Half-centuries at Kolkata and Nagpur – where he knuckled down for the second-slowest score of 50-plus in his Test career – confirmed his return. The scenic
route is rarely straightforward.