LAHORE — There is an argument for comparing England’s Champions Trophy opener against Australia in Lahore on Saturday to two bald men fighting over a comb such has been the two teams’ recent wretched form.
Both have lost their past four one-day internationals and while England’s capitulation in their 3-0 series defeat by India was bad, Australia’s 2-0 loss in Sri Lanka, where a team shorn of so many star names were routed for 165 and 107 in succession, wasn’t much better.
It would be no exaggeration to say that these are the two worst teams in Group B, with Afghanistan primed for Asian conditions and a well-balanced South Africa the favourites to claim the top two spots and progress to the semi-finals.
Most of Australia’s current problems, much like their compatriot Ange Postecoglou’s at Tottenham Hotspur, are down to injury and player unavailability.
The core of the team that shocked India to win the 2023 World Cup is no longer there.
Of the XI that silenced the Narendra Modi Stadium 15 months ago, six are likely to be missing for this contest – captain Pat Cummins (ankle injury), Josh Hazlewood (hip), Mitchell Starc (out for personal reasons), Mitchell Marsh (back), David Warner (retired) and Marnus Labuschagne (dropped).
Weirdly it means Australia are likely to be fielding as many ODI World Cup winners as England, whose XI contains the victorious 2019 quintet of Joe Root, Jos Buttler, Jofra Archer, Mark Wood and Adil Rashid.
There are still significant dangers for Buttler’s men to negotiate in this opening game – namely opener Travis Head, who averages 71 against England since coming back into the team in 2022, perennial Aussie nemesis Steve Smith and spinner Adam Zampa.
Yet this match offers England the perfect chance to start their tournament with a bang against an under-strength, inexperienced and out-of-form Australia.
A win is likely to be required if England are to stand any chance of reaching the last four because a team who have lost eight of their last 11 ODIs are unlikely to win back-to-back matches to get out of the group on the back of yet another loss.
This Champions Trophy feels like a tipping point for Buttler’s captaincy.
While Brendon McCullum has backed him to succeed since taking over as white-ball coach last month, there is a distinct feeling that Buttler’s grip on the team has slipped.
Indeed, to adapt a recent quote from one Labour insider about Prime Minister Keir Starmer, it could be said of Buttler: “Jos isn’t driving the train. He thinks he’s driving the train, but we’ve sat him at the front of the DLR.” The Docklands Light Railway in London of course has no driver.
And McCullum does need to take a grip on this team given their horrendous run of 16 defeats in 23 ODIs since the start of the 2023 World Cup.
Much like he did when stripping the wicketkeeping gloves from Buttler at the start of his tenure last month, the New Zealander has restored the 34-year-old to his most familiar position of No 6 after a brief run of games when he was tried up the order.
It is where Buttler has batted in 75 of his 157 ODI innings, including the 2019 World Cup final where he rescued his country’s hopes alongside Ben Stokes in a never-to-be-forgotten match against New Zealand at Lord’s.
Speaking about the switch on the eve of this Australia match, Buttler admitted batting in the middle order was his “super strength”.
He needs to channel that, too, because it won’t be McCullum carrying the can if England serve up another tournament horror show here in Pakistan.
As coach, Matthew Mott was held culpable for the respective failures at the ODI and T20 World Cups in 2023 and 2024.
Buttler, captain for both, was lucky to hang onto the job and his fortune will probably run out unless England progress to the semi-finals of the Champions Trophy.
Anything else should see him asked to step down and concentrate on doing what he does best – being England’s greatest white-ball batter.
It would probably help the team, too. Before he took on the role permanently from Eoin Morgan in 2022, Buttler averaged 41 from his first 151 ODIs with a strike rate of 121. Since, that average has dropped to 33 from as many matches and that strike rate is now 99.
Moreover, England are in a weird place where after three years in the job nobody actually knows what style a Buttler team plays because the only real constant of his tenure, certainly in ODIs, has been a string of poor results.
What we do know is that the previous sure-footed, ruthless and calculated aggression of Morgan’s World Cup winners has gone. It is up to Buttler, alongside McCullum, to prove he can mould this team into something equally effective.
Beating Australia on Saturday would be a good start.
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