Lamentable, is the only apt description for this performance. England have played this game with one eye on the plane home and a lack of mental intensity throughout and even with the available technology and events bizarrely going against them at pretty well every opportunity they seem to have played this with a view to losing it since the very first ball.
I hadn't thought it possible for us to bat worse than the first innings but clearly I hadn't taken into account the attraction of a home cooked meal. If anything ten and jack made a better fist of it than the rest, apart from Colly of course.
With Morne Morkel taking three quick wickets from half trackers that nobody needed to get near to the last of those was one of the oddest I've seen. Notwithstanding the fact that Broad had nothing to gain and everything to lose by wafting everything at a ball a foot wide of leg stump and clearing it by four feet the following events show the limitations of only using half the technology and absolutely no sense at all.
The South Africans appealed and the standing umpire gave it not out. A review was called for that overturned that decision which the Sky commentary team were also baying for on the basis that there was a deflection and a noise. It seems though that the noise was ignored in favour of an assumption that the ball came off the glove which wasn't actually visible but assumed from the other events.
The problem was that the noise wasn't that of a ball hitting a glove, in fact, it might have well rung a church bell for all the similarity it had to a ball hitting a glove. Now it was close to the glove and it might have brushed it but the noise didn't support that and it was much more likely that the cause of both the deviation and the noise was an arm protector strap which the limited visual replays couldn't detect. This was just the last of a series of errors in this match.
The other odd decision was to bat first. Now I've made my views on this clear before but there are, on occasions, good reasons to do this and to my mind they existed here.
We needed to not lose this game and it was strongly and rightly predicted that the game would be significantly shortened by the weather. In these circumstances and by bowling first you cannot lose the game on the first day which we did do by batting poorly on a lively track. It also means that there is a much higher probability of making the opposition bat twice and all of this takes time out of the game. It may not have made a difference to the result but the odds are that it would have at least made the game last to the end and increased our chances of not losing it.
Now, if I can work this out I don't know why somebody in the entourage didn't spot this option. Sometimes playing the odds is the way to go.
However, even if this tactical manoeuvre had been applied it wouldn't overcome the inherent shortcomings of the England team. We do not bowl well enough or consistently enough to regularly compete at test level. Broad and Anderson are fast bowling luxuries. With career averages of over 34 and a series average for each of them no better they aren't improving and it is a problem that needs addressing before we go to Australia. Whilst they equal Steyne and Morkel with wickets taken they remain far too expensive.
The next opportunity will be in Bangladesh which in all honesty shouldn't test a county side let alone our international one so there is an opportunity to rest those who need one drop those who need to be dropped and take the opportunity to go with a balanced bowling attack and base selection more on performance than potential.
Despite that fact that the batting in this game got the headlines our real weakness is the seam attack and has been for some time.
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