adminSYDNEY. — England may have been utterly humiliated in their second Cricket World Cup pool match against co-hosts New Zealand but Sunday’s nine-wicket defeat to Sri Lanka was much more damaging, according to former England captain Mike Atherton.
Tim Southee claimed 7-33 and skipper Brendon McCullum blasted the fastest half-century in tournament history as the Kiwis shot out England for 123 and romped home in the 13th over in a ridiculously one-sided match in Wellington.
By comparison, Eoin Morgan and his team put up a better batting display against Sri Lanka, posting 309-6, even though it was not enough to avert a nine-wicket defeat.
“In some ways, this was a more damaging defeat than the one against New Zealand,” Atherton wrote in the Times newspaper.
“It was possible to park that match out of the mind: an aberration, a one-off calamity, and against one of the most fancied and confident teams in the tournament,” the former opener said of the earlier defeat.
“This was worse. It lasted longer and therefore England’s defects were plain to see, and against a team who most would have said are slightly past their best and unfancied.”
England, who registered their only win in four outings against lowly Scotland, can still progress to the quarterfinals of a tournament they have never won but the weaknesses are too glaring for Atherton.
“ . . . (Paceman) James Anderson looks a shadow of his potent self, unable to swing the white Kookaburra as others have done. This looks, at the moment, like a one-day tournament too far for him,” he said. — AFP.
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