England white-ball coach Brendon McCullum described his players as 'gutted' following a second straight defeat in the ongoing tri-series, conceding that the team has clear areas to address ahead of next year's ODI World Cup in South Africa.
England were unable to defend a total of 429 against Sri Lanka in Rawalpindi, and then in Lahore on Sunday they posted 241, a score McCullum himself admitted was below what was required. Pakistan were reduced to 154 for 9, yet the England bowlers could not finish the job. Shadab Khan produced an unbeaten 113 in a last-wicket stand alongside Haris Rauf to pull off a remarkable heist and hand England a second successive defeat. When asked whether England had been unlucky or simply not good enough across the two games, McCullum chose the latter without hesitation.
"Any time you lose, you obviously haven't been good enough to win. So clearly you've got some work to do. It's so different, the [two] games as well. I guess from a coach's point of view there is some stuff in there that you can look at and say these guys have been exposed to some very different types of games where the pressure is really at its highest. And you start thinking about ways where you can ensure that you give them some options. And not just in terms of how to bat, bowl or field, but also how do we remain calm, how do we keep our poise and how do we start to plot and plan and navigate our way through those pressure moments. So that will be the conversations we will have in the next few days," McCullum said after the game, as quoted by Cricbuzz.
Why does McCullum believe experience is England's biggest gap?
McCullum pointed to a lack of big-match exposure within his current group as a core concern. Of the eleven players who featured on Sunday, only four, Joe Root, Sam Curran, Gus Atkinson and captain Harry Brook, have appeared in an ODI World Cup match.
"I thought it [tonight] was another great lesson for us, if you are behind the game and you're chasing, how are you able to manufacture a way for your set batter to get as much access to the ball as possible and still remain calm, and ultimately put the opposition under pressure down the back end of the game. So there are some good lessons there. There's some good learning opportunities. And we will learn from it. Because we are desperate to get to South Africa and be a realistic chance of challenging for that World Cup," McCullum elaborated.
With the next World Cup sitting roughly 12 months away on the calendar, McCullum was candid about where England stand, stating the team needs more games under their belt.
"I think for our boys, they are inexperienced. And we know that on the calendar in 12 months’ time there's a big World Cup which for us to be serious challengers at, we've been open to admit that we need to get better. And we need to get experiences into these guys as quick as we could," he said.
McCullum acknowledged that gaining those experiences in winning matches would have been preferable, but maintained that both recent defeats carried genuine instructional value. Sri Lanka's successful chase of 429 in Rawalpindi and Pakistan's recovery from 154 for 9 in Lahore each offered a different template on how to navigate pressure situations, and he said England's players needed to absorb both.
What did McCullum take from Shadab Khan's innings and what must England do next?
McCullum drew specific attention to Shadab's unbeaten 113, which was only the third ODI century recorded by a batter coming in at number 8. He framed the knock as a lesson his younger players could study directly.
“I thought it was an incredibly poised innings that was full of cricket intelligence. And also I thought his ability to be able to manipulate his way to get enough access to the ball as he could, batting alongside the tail, was a great example for our boys who are still young and inexperienced," he said.
Having dropped all three matches in the tri-series so far, England's path to the final is no longer in their own hands. They must beat Sri Lanka on Tuesday and then rely on Pakistan to defeat the other side a few days later, with net run-rate also likely to factor into the equation if results go their way.
