England have been knocked out of a World Cup after losing a match they were expected to win, thanks to a one-off innings which nobody saw coming. Sound familiar? That’s because it describes two events involving England which took place almost exactly a year apart: on Wednesday, their 50-over semi-final exit at the hands of South Africa; a year ago, their loss in a must-win group stage match against West Indies in the 20-over version.
In the interim, a 16-0 Ashes debacle and a post-series review which was meant to change everything. Did it? Time to delve a little more deeply into those two World Cup exits. In 2024, England fell to pieces, dropped five catches, and allowed a bish-bash-bosh innings from Qiana Joseph to win the day. On Wednesday, a player with beautiful technique and temperament – the South Africa captain, Laura Wolvaardt – showed why she is one of the world’s best batters. She offered up precisely one chance – a catch to Alice Capsey at long-on – and England held on to it. The trouble was, she had already scored 169 runs by that point.
It probably won’t bring the England head coach, Charlotte Edwards, much comfort as she flies home from her first World Cup in charge – she is a results driven coach, and a loss is a loss. But she has already made a difference. From the doldrums of dropping eight catches in a single day of Test cricket in Melbourne, six months later England held on to more chances this World Cup than any other team. That is something.
The problem was what came after Wolvaardt’s knock. Did anyone inside that England dressing room really believe they were capable of chasing down a total of more than 300? Certainly no one outside it did. England’s collapse to nought for two and one for three sparked a reaction not of horror but of weary inevitability.
“We do need to improve our batting – I don’t think it’s been consistent enough at times,” Edwards said after the match. Therein lies the concern. There have been seven totals of over 300 in this tournament: three of them were hit by Australia, two by India, and two by South Africa. This is the new normal in women’s ODI cricket: in order to compete with the world’s best, England need a batting lineup which can confidently expect to exceed that milestone. But when nobody except Nat Sciver-Brunt and Heather Knight has a track record of consistently scoring meaningful runs, well, you do the maths.
Alice Capsey’s 107-run partnership with Sciver-Brunt in the semi-final wasn’t entirely pointless – Capsey showed that she can bat sensibly, at least for 70 balls – but it was never going to be enough to win the game. Compare and contrast with South Africa, who were able to score 117 runs from their last 10 overs, exceeding the magic 300, because Wolvaardt had faith in the batters coming in below her and felt she had enough freedom to hit out. “Knowing what we still had in the sheds with the last 10 coming up, I thought I’d better have a swing,” she told Sky Sports.
When Edwards was appointed in April, her dilemma was whether to stick or twist: she chose to allow an ageing ODI side who had bombed in the Ashes one last shot at World Cup glory. She got it wrong. England return home with the worst of both worlds: empty-handed, and with no foundations on which to rebuild over the next four years. Five of their top six from the semi-final are unlikely to play in another 50-over World Cup (Amy Jones is 32, Sciver-Brunt is 33 and Tammy Beaumont, Knight and Danni Wyatt-Hodge are all 34).
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A change of approach is now imminent, as Edwards herself signalled. “This is the end of an ODI cycle,” she said. “We’ve got to look at the future now.” Better late than never: time to look seriously at the 21-year-old left-handed batter Grace Scrivens, the 20-year-old wicketkeeper Seren Smale and the 18-year-old left-arm spinner Tilly Corteen-Coleman.
The nagging worry is that it might already be too late: England’s latest round of central contracts were signed, sealed and delivered on 1 October. The England and Wales Cricket Board has not yet released a full list of contracted players, but it doesn’t take a genius to work out that the current World Cup squad are the main beneficiaries (a reminder that Knight, Jones, Sciver-Brunt and Wyatt-Hodge are all on rolling two-year contracts). Stagnation and complacency were the dual enemies on which the Ashes whitewash was built – time for Edwards to signal that she is serious about preventing their return.
