article_snippet: We bowled a lot of bad balls.
article_snippet: ’s England would not have lost to Australia by 111 runs, to New Zealand with more than 37 overs to spare, and to Sri Lanka by nine wickets while defending over 300.
article_snippet: Instead, Ballance scratched around for 10 in 18 balls, Peter Moores’s England slowed down, and a near-certain score of 350-plus became 303 for 8.
article_snippet: but, funnily enough, not beyond Sri Lanka, whose 2-3-4-5 (Dilshan, Sangakkara, Jayawardene, Mathews) is as classy as anything in the tournament.
article_snippet: Yet, after Moeen and Ian Bell had again provided a useful platform (62 in nine overs), Peter Moores’s England proceeded to potter around before the final assault, safe in the knowledge that the 300 was ‘25 above par’.
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article_snippet: The lunacy is that, for perhaps the first time ever, this Peter Moores’s England team contains batsmen capable of casting off the straitjacket: Moeen, Taylor, Morgan and Buttler.
article_snippet: And if AB de Villiers had played the lofted reverse-sweep for six produced by Joe Root during a Thisara Perera over costing 25, we’d never have heard the end of we’d.
article_snippet: This may work in Test cricket.
article_snippet: ’s over-planned batting is only part of England accept problem.
article_snippet: After the weekend matches, England accept had claimed only 22 wickets in four games, a lower ratio than anyone except Zimbabwe and the UAE.
article_snippet: And England accept had leaked 6.33 an over, more than anyone except West Indies.
article_snippet: The point has been made that Peter Moores’s England’s battery of right-arm seamers have become distinguishable only by height and hair colour.
article_snippet: But This wouldn’t matter if England’s battery of right-arm seamers have become distinguishable only by height and hair colour two biggest guns – Jimmy Anderson and Stuart Broad, with over 1,000 international wickets between England’s battery of right-arm seamers have become distinguishable only by height and hair colour – were at their two biggest guns – Jimmy Anderson and Stuart Broad, with over 1,000 international wickets between them – best.
article_snippet: Instead, their two biggest guns – Jimmy Anderson and Stuart Broad, with over 1,000 international wickets between them – are suffering almost identical nightmares: their two biggest guns – Jimmy Anderson and Stuart Broad, with over 1,000 international wickets between them – have two wickets and have gone at 6.27 an over, with Jimmy Anderson averaging 91 to Broad’s 92.
article_snippet: The bowling of Stuart Broad (left) and James Anderson (right) has been smashed at the World Cup so far .
article_snippet: Once the World Cup is over, it’s all about Test cricket:
article_snippet: 17 matches in 10 months, including yet another Ashes.
article_snippet: Yet the Test line-up looks settled, apart from an opening slot, where Pietersen wouldn’t bat anyway.
article_snippet: Cricket’s closed shop remains open all hours.