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Follow UsOne year ago, with England staring down the barrel in the T20 World Cup, having lost to Ireland and having split points with Australia due to a washout, Jos Buttler single-handedly helped turn the side’s fortunes around.
Defeat against New Zealand in Brisbane would have meant curtains for England but with the team’s back firmly against the wall, Buttler, leading his country in an ICC event for the first time, put on a clinic against the Kiwis at the Gabba, smashing a sublime 47-ball 73. The captain’s knock got England back on track in the World Cup — the rest, as they say, is history.
A year on, a similar opportunity beckoned Buttler at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore on Thursday (October 26th).
This time around, however, the outcome couldn’t have been more different.
Six balls was all Buttler’s innings lasted as he perished nicking one to the wicket-keeper for the third time in five matches.
A 70% full Chinnaswamy crowd gave the England skipper a rousing reception when he walked out to bat in the hope that they’d witness something special but, instead, all they were handed in return was disappointment.
And as Buttler cut a dejected figure as he made his way slowly back to the pavilion, it was impossible to not feel how his own form encapsulated the struggles of the entire English side.
With the 6-ball 8 on Thursday, Buttler’s average in this World Cup has dropped to 19.00 — 23 lower than Mark Wood, who has scored only 10 fewer runs than him.
As it stands, Buttler’s average of 19 is 45th among 53 Top six batters who have batted at least 4 times in this World Cup.
It’s a puzzling drop in form for someone that looked in pretty decent touch in lead-up to the World Cup: in 10 innings in 2023 prior to the World Cup, Buttler averaged 60.88 while striking at 110.48.
"For whatever reason, we seem to have a few players out of form at the wrong time and it's hurt us dearly," head coach Matthew Mott told Sky Sports in the aftermath of the Sri Lanka defeat.
Buttler’s lack of runs have played a huge part in England being where they are currently in the table, considering he could have made a significant difference in both the Afghanistan and Sri Lanka games. His dismissal also proved to be the turning point in the curtain-raiser against New Zealand.
A tier 1 white-ball legend, Buttler’s ODI record in India leaves a lot to be desired: his average now reads 14.83 after 12 innings, with no fifty-plus scores across 10 years.
But make no mistake, the struggles of this England side — particularly their batting — extend well beyond Buttler.
The same was evident on Thursday at the Chinnaswamy as the Three Lions got bundled out for 156, the lowest ever first innings score at the venue in a one-day international.
Jonny Bairstow seems like a shadow of the world-beating, dominant opener that he was four years ago. Bairstow entered Thursday’s clash in desperate need of runs, having averaged 16.57 across his first 7 ODIs in the calendar year. But yet again he was unable to put up a meaningful score, even after a lucky reprieve on the first ball.
Dawid Malan’s form in lead-up to the World Cup forced England to overlook Jason Roy but outside the ton against Bangladesh in Dharamshala, the 36-year-old, the supposed ‘Mr. Consistent’ of the side, has scores of 14, 32, 6 & 28.
Joe Root, meanwhile, after a bright start, has three sub-fifteen scores and is finding funny ways to get out. After hitting one straight into the hands of the leg-slip fielder against the Proteas, he got himself run-out against Sri Lanka after attempting to take a single that was non-existent.
Root, like Malan, was supposed to be a priceless run-accumulator in the midst of hitters but him returning scores of 11, 2 & 3 in consecutive games has left the entire batting unit in disarray.
The top three’s inability to exert pressure and bat long have also had a direct impact on Buttler’s effectiveness.
In an ideal situation, you always want players like Buttler — a finisher by designation — to enter matches after the 25th over but for the odd extraordinary scenario. It helps maximize their potency.
So far in this World Cup, outside the Bangladesh match, Buttler has walked in prior to the 25th over 4/4 times. His entry points in the last three matches have been 13.2, 8.1 and 12.4 and in these games, he’s scored 8, 15 and 9 respectively, all three times falling to seamers against a relatively new ball.
Compare this to someone like an Henirich Klaasen, whose entry points (while batting first) in this World Cup have been 30.4, 25.2, 34.5 and 37.1.
Two things can be true at once, and in England’s case, it’s that while Buttler has failed to step up with the bat, he’s been done no favours whatsoever by the top-order.
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It’s not uncommon for sides to begin World Cup campaigns out of form, out of rhythm and down on confidence but great teams usually play their way into tournaments, especially when the competition itself is long. Australia, for instance, made as bad a start to this campaign as England but are now slowly starting to fly.
But England, bizarrely enough, have somehow managed to get worse with every game.
The unanimous feeling after the South Africa game was that ‘it couldn’t get worse’ for England — but it did, on Thursday.
Watching from the stands, what was evident was how much more Sri Lanka ‘wanted it’. Mind you, they were up against it on Thursday at a venue like the Chinnaswamy.
Sri Lanka entered the clash having the worst bowling average and economy among all sides in this World Cup and they were asked to bowl first in the heat on one of the flattest decks in the country. And this was a side actually in full-blown crisis, one that was without its skipper and its two best players.
Yet for all the pre-match English talk of ‘playing fearlessly’, it was Sri Lanka that played with belief, self-confidence and swagger. Their bowlers stuck to their plans and their fielders threw themselves at everything. The captaincy and bowling changes were proactive too; they left no stone unturned.
And if the 30 or so overs didn’t make it clear that Sri Lanka were hungrier and more determined than England, the dismissal of Adil Rashid did. Maheesh Theekshana bowled a wide as a section of the Chinnaswamy crowd started chanting ‘we want wicket’ but the people in the stands got their wish anyway.
Inexplicably, Rashid wandered out of his crease at the non-striker’s end and after spotting the same quickly, Kusal Mendis fired in a direct hit. Replays showed that Rashid was short of his crease and after seeing the big screen, the entire Chinnaswamy was in disbelief.
Where England go from here, then, is anybody’s guess. Heading into Thursday’s clash, they had a slim chance of making it to the semis but that’s now fully gone. They can mathematically still finish in the Top 4 but even their head coach Mott has conceded that it’ll be practically impossible for them to qualify from here.
There is, of course, ‘pride’ that’s always there to play for but you suspect that it’ll be brutal for the players to turn up for four more matches, knowing all there is at stake is ‘pride’.
Buttler will be hoping for things to not get even worse but considering they next play India in Lucknow, you’d be brave to claim that the worst is already behind England.
An already-long tournament has just gotten a whole lot longer for England. This is not the ‘Last Dance’ that Stokes, Buttler, Root and others were hoping for.
