England have no substance without spin

Eight Tests to go until the Ashes — six if you are Andrew Strauss — and Michael Vaughan thinks that there are only two small things that need to be sorted out if England are to contemplate retaining the urn. The problem is that they are a) the batting and b) the bowling.
To be precise, the former England captain fears that mental weakness among the former could cause physical problems for the latter — and God help us all if Graeme Swann picks up an injury. The spin bowler, who made his Test debut little more than a year ago, is, according to Vaughan, England’s key to beating Australia next winter.
“He is the pivotal member of the team now,” Vaughan said yesterday. “He brings a real zest to the side. My big concern is that if Swann gets an injury, we really will struggle. He has developed into a spin bowler who can take wickets on the first day. If he wasn’t around, we’d struggle with only three seamers.”
And the reason England would have only three seam bowlers is that they could not risk batting Matt Prior as high as No 6 or Stuart Broad at No 7. It has the air of that proverb about kingdoms tumbling because of a shortage of nails for horseshoes. For want of a Freddie, the Ashes were lost?
Vaughan doesn’t mention the F word, though, and he remains optimistic about the year ahead. “There are signs that the team can go down there and be successful,” he said. “The talent is there and they can become the real deal by November. But there are also signs of vulnerability, especially with the batting.”
He is worried by the difficulty that England have in scoring 400 — only four times in their past 20 innings — despite a top six that appears strong. “Sometimes the thinking between the ears is not what it should be,” Vaughan said, showing a Yorkshire bluntness that proved a hit during his commentary debut on Test Match Special over the tour to South Africa.
They will have the chance to earn easy runs on the tour to Bangladesh that starts next month, but Vaughan has seen enough to know that England will need the insurance of six batsmen in Australia next winter.
The problem is that Prior, once a fine batsman but a fallible wicketkeeper, has regressed in what used to be his strength and, says Vaughan, cannot go in at No 6. Against Australia and South Africa in the past year, he had a batting average of 28.
“He plays a lot of shots but they are not controlled enough,” Vaughan said. “Even at No 7 you have to have an element of control. You can’t just be gung-ho and try to hook every ball.”
Yet Vaughan would not have anyone else wearing the gloves. “His keeping is now excellent,” he said. “Prior is definitely the man for the Ashes and they should stick with him.”
Broad offers useful runs at No 8, but lacks consistency, and Swann — that man again — “can take the game away from the opposition at No 9”. Neither should bat higher, Vaughan feels, which means that England must play six batsmen and only four bowlers, which could prove costly in Australian conditions.
“In England you can roll teams over in 70 overs because it is swinging,” he said. “You don’t see that in Australia, particularly with the Kookaburra ball. Generally it takes 130 overs and that will mean some tired bowlers.”
The solution, he believes, is to use the part-time bowling of Paul Collingwood, Kevin Pietersen and Jonathan Trott more.
Vaughan also wants the batting order tweaked. It is past high time that Pietersen batted at No 3, he feels, and is given the chance to show he is as great as he wants to be. Trott would be more secure at No 4 and Collingwood is one of the most underrated No 5s.
“He is a better player than people give him credit for,” Vaughan said. “He is the best aligned player in the team, in terms of being in the right position when the ball is released. He only struggles when he is mentally tired.” And that is the problem.
Vaughan was a lone voice among former England captains in defending Strauss’s decision to skip the Bangladesh tour. He still supports his former team-mate and feels that other key players, especially Collingwood, should be given a break this summer. However, Vaughan would not have missed the tour himself.
“He has been very honest to say that he is drained after only a year in the job,” Vaughan said. “If he has a stormer in Australia, no one will mind. But I know that I wouldn’t have felt comfortable to watch a team walk out without me if I was fit.
Source:The Times