England’s golden generation faces the end of an era،
It’s the end of an era. England will lose their status as reigning champions in both men’s white-ball formats next Sunday, and the golden generation of players who underpinned their unprecedented limited-overs success will split. Saturday’s match against Pakistan in Kolkata will be the final match of several historic ODI careers.
David Willey has already announced his international retirement, and while there is no incentive for others to follow suit – they all have central contracts which run until September 2024 or beyond – it is widely recognized that England must rejuvenate. After all, 11 of the 15 men on their team are 30 or older.
Rob Key, their general manager, and Luke Wright, the national selector, are back in India and have spoken to captain Jos Buttler and coach Matthew Mott about selection for next month’s tour of the West Indies. England are playing three ODIs and five T20Is there and are expected to refresh both teams.
The T20I squad may look a little more familiar, with a World Cup defense looming in June 2024, but the players accept it is time for a fresh start. Moeen Ali called supporting a new generation “common sense”, while Dawid Malan said on Friday: “At the end of the day, when you get to a stage like this, you have to make decisions.”
Malan is the second oldest player in the England squad at 36, three months younger than Moeen, and is among those who believe Saturday could be his last international appearance. “I don’t know what my future holds,” he said. “Tomorrow could be the last England cricket match for me, and it could yet be the start of another journey.”
He scoffed at the idea he could compete in the 2027 World Cup: “There’s no way I’m running around at 40!” – and said he would accept England’s decision if it chose to move forward. “You’re pretty realistic when you get to a certain point…I’ve enjoyed every moment of it.”
Malan has been a regular in England’s T20I team for four years and has featured in the last two T20 World Cups, but isn’t holding his breath at the prospect of reaching next year’s West Indies and USA: ” I would love to play – I always feel like I would, but it’s not my decision,” he said. “There could be a total overhaul of both [white-ball teams]. Who knows?”
Long before this World Cup went up in smoke, England had booked the upcoming ODIs against the West Indies as an opportunity to test their depth and select young players – and they won’t play in this format again until September 2024 – when they host Australia. By then, the 50-and-over side could look very different.
Jonny Bairstow and Joe Root have both expressed a desire to play until the 2027 World Cup, but have managed 372 runs between them in this edition. Neither scored a half-century last month, and their form demonstrated the pitfalls of approaching the tournament with limited relevant practice.
Chris Woakes said earlier this year he would be “surprised” if he played another ODI after the World Cup, and appears certain to leave the format. And while Mark Wood’s three-year contract suggests he will continue to be considered, his main focus will be on Test and T20 cricket.
For players who never play again, this won’t be the ending they imagined. England flew to India six weeks ago with high hopes of defending their title, but find themselves chasing a place in the 2025 Champions Trophy. Their comfortable victory against the Netherlands Wednesday means this is almost confirmed.
“We are seventh in the standings, which is not where we would like to be at this stage of the tournament,” Malan said. “We would have hoped to come here pushing for a semi-final spot and preparing for that, but we just weren’t good enough… we’re so disappointed in the fact that we’re here, playing against Pakistan at Eden Gardens, and we are not in the race for that.”
It’s a tournament that England wants to make history as quickly as possible. They had reached the semi-finals of five consecutive ICC men’s events – three T20 World Cups, a 50-over World Cup and a Champions Trophy – and won two of them, but lost six of their eight matches in this Cup. of the world. in India.
Numerous post-mortem analyzes will be carried out over the coming days, weeks and months, identifying exactly what went wrong and who, if anything, is to blame. The explanation may be simple: it’s one tournament too many for a team that is past its peak.
But their return to Eden Gardens for a floodlit practice session on Friday – the venue where they came so close to winning the 2016 T20 World Cup – was a reminder of just how much they have achieved. Six players from that XI – Root, Buttler, Ben Stokes, Moeen, Willey and Adil Rashid – are almost ready to return to the field on Saturday afternoon, further underlining how long this team has been around and the fact that age is catching up. Most of them.
But once the dust of this World Cup settles, this England team will be remembered not for the lows of the last six weeks, but for the highs of the previous seven years.
