Jos Buttler's England has no easy answers after World Cup fiasco

Team Englands deploarable early exit from the ongoing ICC World Cup 2023 has left the reigning champions facing several questions but with few simple answers A departure before the knockout stages was finally confirmed by Saturdays 33run loss to archrivals Australia in Ahmedabad with Englands sixth defeat in seven games at the tournament leaving them rock bottom of the 10team table Even nonTest playing Netherlands the lowestranked side have managed two wins It was their batting that let England down again as they failed to chase a target of 287 that would once have been well within the grasp of a powerful top order England have managed just one individual century in this World Cup thus far through Dawid Malan with star batsmen Jonny Bairstow out for a duck on Saturday and Joe Root failing to fireAlso ReadOne step behindBroader issues have also been involved in a dramatic fall from their 2019 World Cup triumph Early defeats by New Zealand and Afghanistan led England to abandon their policy of picking a side full of allrounders only for team management to then reverse course again as they struggled to find a winning formula A similar lack of clarity was also evident in the approach of Englands batsmen caught between the policy of allout aggression that had served the team so well under now retired World Cupwinning skipper Eoin Morgan or instead laying a foundation and then accelerating Much of the focus now will be on England whiteball captain Jos Buttler and limitedovers coach Matthew Mott But ditching Buttler as skipper and replacing experienced Australian coach Mott wont be straightforward given England have a Twenty20 World Cup title to defend in the United States and the West Indies in June That event may also delay a rebuild of Englands whiteball team with only four members of their original 15man World Cup squad under the age of 30Also ReadBavuma confident SA can put Indian bowlers under pressureAnother complicating factor is that during this tournament the England and Wales Cricket Board ECB announced a new raft of central contracts that included all their largely underperforming World Cup squad with the curious exception of hardgrafting pacman David Willey who announced his international retirement days later The ECB also introduced multiyear deals for the first time Injury prone fast bowler Mark Wood 33 whose six tournament wickets have cost an expensive 58 runs apiece has been given a threeyear contract But former England captain Michael Vaughan insisted the ECB had been completely spooked by suggestions players would quit the international game altogether in favour of lucrative franchise deals The downgrading of the domestic OneDay Cup because of the advent of The Hundred has hampered Englands development of new 50overs players So too has a reduction in the number of Englands ODIs 42 in the four years prior to this World Cup compared to 88 in the equivalent cycle before the 2019 edition Too many of those games have been lowgrade affairs with England often not fielding their strongest side in part because of the difficulty of balancing all their international commitments It all led to a complacent it will be alright on the night approach that has been found spectacularly wanting in India Promising batsman Harry Brook may now be recalled for Englands last two World Cup matches But things could yet get worse before they get better as England need to finish in the top eight to be assured of qualification for the 2025 Champions Trophy Defeats by the Netherlands and Pakistan could see England fail to be involved in a major ICC mens tournament for the first time in their history It all adds up to the biggest challenge of Rob Keys 18month reign as England managing directorwhich thanks mainly to a resurgent Test side has so far largely been a story of success In the meantime gifted batsman Buttler whose run of low scores continued when out for one against Australia was left saying Weve let ourselves down Weve let down people down at home who support us through thick and thin and we wear that on our own shouldersWith inputs from agencies