This time next year, England will host the 2019 Cricket World Cup and will be going into the tournament as one of the favourites. England captain Eoin Morgan spoke exclusively to JOE about the team’s chances of bouncing back from a disappointing show last time around
A lot can can change in four years, and few fields demonstrate this better than sport. In 2015, England crashed out of the Cricket World Cup at the first hurdle, picking up only four points in six matches. The catastrophic campaign was a wake up call for the side, who have since climbed to the top of the world rankings – in no small part thanks to Eoin Morgan, captain of the limited overs sides.
“I’d like to think things have changed since then,” he says. “I think that the 2015 World Cup played a role in us getting to where we are now and was certainly a bit of an eye opener in a way that we recognised how far behind we were from the world’s best and the drastic need for change.”
It’s been a collective effort to climb to the top of the ODI rankings, involving everyone from the selectors through to the players and backroom staff. Creating a harmonious group has been a key factor in this transformation – with a change in selection policy to stick by players even when their form drops a key instrument in recent successes.
“We picked guys who we thought could come in and do the job that we wanted them to do,” Morgan says. “We also backed them up when they failed in certain periods, so we’ve built a level of trust with the players and when we started playing the cricket that we thought we could. I think we’ve created a level of identity in the manner in which we play.”
England showed how far they have come last winter when they beat Australia 4-1 in a One Day International Series that followed a dreadful Ashes Test campaign. “To win in Australia and New Zealand was a huge achievement because, in cricket, it’s almost unheard of to win away from home more than once,” he says.
“I think the success of our winter campaign was based around our bowlers, which hasn’t been our strongest point up until now, so it’s made us a more rounded team and, in a way, they’ve become the cornerstone of our success.”
One of the bowlers who shone in the series Down Under was Tom Curran. The Surrey man was a sensation last winter, as he was handed his international debut in the Boxing Day Test at the MCG and was subsequently called up to the limited overs side. Morgan is now optimistic that Curran will have a bright future playing for England.
“Tom has had a whirlwind eight months,” he says. “From playing in a Big Bash team to playing in an Ashes series and being selected for a One Day team against Australia and playing probably more than he’d ever imagined. He has taken to it like a duck to water.”
Curran’s performance at Perth, where he took five wickets and almost singlehandedly won England the first ODI of the series, stood out to Morgan as the moment he realised he was “built for international cricket”.
The 23-year-old bowler was one of several England players to play in the Indian Premier League this year, a tournament that Morgan believes has helped England’s form improve by allowing players to gain experience of white ball cricket in high pressure situations.
“I think the effect that that has had on the players is that it’s getting the most out of our white ball potential, because previously we weren’t exposed enough, simply due to the fact that our players weren’t good enough and I suppose in turn there wasn’t a huge demand for them,” Morgan says.
“The benefit of them playing against the best players in the world in the biggest tournaments in the world is that it’s great practice – you’re playing in high pressure situations, you’re expected to produce and perform the whole time.”
This view comes in direct conflict with figures in the game who blame England’s recent Test cricket failures on the increased amount of white ball cricket the players are involved in. “We shouldn’t take for granted that we’re going to beat every side just because we prioritise [Test cricket],” he says. “I think that’s hiding behind the performance aspect, any team needs go out there and perform in order to win a Test match. It’s not that easy.”
By that logic, there should be no reason why red ball and white ball cricket can’t coexist, despite some leading pundits believing that players globetrotting for T20 tournaments reduces their ability to perform at the highest level. His view will also come as a relief for the ECB, who in April unveiled plans for a 100-ball competition to be shoehorned into the English cricket season, in addition to the T20 Blast and the County Championship.
Although the emergence of the tournament is sounding alarm bells for some cricket enthusiasts – including even devoted fans of the white ball game – Morgan is unfazed by the proposals, preferring to see the potential positives the competition could bring.
“The important thing to emphasise with the 100 ball is that it’s just an idea at the moment. It’s not set in stone, it was something that was an easy selling point to anyone who isn’t interested in cricket,” he says.
“A lot of my friends don’t really understand cricket, but if they watch the Commonwealth Games or the Olympics, they will watch any sport as long as they can understand it. With the 100-ball factor, that’s exactly what you’re offering, and the fact that it’s going on free to air as well, is about maximising its potential of explaining the game of cricket.
“If you have a nine-year-old kid who turns on the BBC and the 100 ball comes up, he says to his mum and dad ‘I really like this, can you explain it?’, the parent then becomes a coach because they can explain it. If it’s a normal cricket match, regardless of how long it is, 20 overs, 100 overs, if the parent doesn’t know anything about cricket, they’re not going to be able to explain it to the kid.”
Morgan, of course, was cricket mad from a young age. He played football, hurling, hockey and rugby too, but had his eyes set on playing Test cricket from his early adolescence.
“As an 11-year-old, my dad and I met the head coach of Ireland at the time,” he says. “I’d come to my dad the week before, and my dad said “what do you want to do?”, and I said ‘I want to play Test cricket’. He sort of went ‘alright, great’, then he came back to me the next day and said you’re not going to be able to play Test cricket for Ireland. I said ‘of course I’m not, I’m going to play for England’.”
“He retells the story loads of times, I’d have slapped me round the face as a 12-year-old if someone said that to me.”
Morgan moved to England in his late teens and fulfilled his dream of playing Test cricket for England before then becoming limited overs captain. And although the Ireland side was recently granted Test status, it is clear he has no regrets about his decisions.
Asked if he has any temptation to play Test cricket for the country of his birth again, his reply is simple: “Absolutely none. I have spent more time in England than I ever have in Ireland, I’ve lived here for 16 years, this is my home. So, no.”
