It was a shockingly meek, limp and cowardly surrender - and that was just captain Michael Vaughan’s refusal to face the music from the media after England’s dismal effort against Sri Lanka.
There was a time when the England cricket team were so bad, so often humiliated and so often beaten, that it became the staple diet of the stand up comedian’s routine.
We thought those dark days had disappeared along with the armed conflict in Northern Ireland and the introduction of the Euro - maybe we should not have been so optimistic.
The batting surrender on Day Three in Galle, as England’s “star� players were skittled for just 81 runs, was as bad and as embarrassing as anything we saw in the Eighties and Nineties. The Ashes triumph of 2005, which supposedly marked the rebirth of English cricket and established us as credible opposition to Australia’s global dominance feels like a very long time ago.
The gulf in class looked like a chasm and England’s tourists, as they trudged back to the pavilion looking like the odd ones out from Noah’s Ark - one by one - wore the look of condemned men whose only salvation was the prospect of a few days at home for Christmas.
Well I hope they choke on their Turkey dinner because they’ve certainly choked out there haven’t they! I’m angry, can you tell?
Oh yes, Sri Lanka is a notoriously difficult place to tour, very tough, tricky conditions, very hot, but that does not excuse England’s failure to catch the ball in the field or the blatant lack of application with the bat on Thursday. These are basic skills, the rudiments of the game.
If you ask me, England’s player have played as though they do not want to be there - that is certainly how they’ve played in the Third Test - but, seriously, I don’t think they do.
Why? Because they are mentally and physically drained, because they are asked to play almost constant cricket for 12 months a year by a greedy ECB and ICC, because they are bored of being away from home and bored of cricket, because - and this is the bottom line for me - they are exhausted.
No country plays more Test cricket than England because when England, the country that gave the game to the world - or at least the bits we seized control of and painted pink on maps - are in town, big crowds are assured. Big crowds mean excitement, big crowds mean sponsors, big crowds mean money and money, as we know, greases palms.
So England, you’ll be playing a one day series here, a triangular series here, two Test series’ there, a World Cup here, another one day series there and then another Test series there. Any complaints? Yes, well this cheque should see to them eh chaps!?
Tiredness might seem like a convenient excuse for a poor team - and England do look poor in key areas at the moment, particularly with the bat - but consider this: Australia, the world’s best team, gave their international players six months off before a 2-0 Series win over Sri Lanka in November. When was the last time England’s players had anything like that sort of time to recharge? Oh yes, that’s right, before the Ashes Series against Australia in 2005. Coincidence?
So England will come back with their tails between their legs and their reputations in tatters. They’ll sit around the Christmas tree and ruin the day with their miserable faces and then they’ll make the short journey over to New Zealand for another round of one day internationals and Test matches!
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