Cricket: England show obsessive fear of Warne

It was not so long ago in these parts of Yorkshire that Headingley, and not the Halifax, was thought to be the banker, at least as far as the England cricket team were concerned. Times change, however, and although the Halifax has moved on to bigger and better things, England are desperately trying to turn the clock back by switching to a slow, grassy pitch.

Although it is a bit like turning to an old friend for a loan, such desperation is not unfounded. With the series still level at one match apiece, this is a crucial Test for both sides. Significantly, neither England nor Australia have come back to win a series after losing the fourth Test.

"It's essentially a three-match series now," Michael Atherton, the England captain, said yesterday. "So you'd want to win it just to set yourself up for the rest of the series. There are not many draws here, so I'm sure there will be a result - hopefully one in our favour."

England, however, are - as Atherton's opposite number, Mark Taylor, wryly observed after the change of pitch - clearly obsessed with Shane Warne. Mind you, who can blame them and mindful that Australia have posted huge totals at Headingley on their last two visits - ideal situations for slow capitulation to Warne's leg spin - England will want to play the game around smaller totals.

It is for this reason that the original pitch - whose bare ends have not recovered from the Texaco match here in June and were seen as licence for Warne to run amok - was rejected, and why, when the sun was blazing yesterday, the moisture was left in the pitch by keeping it hidden under covers.

Predictably, Atherton moved behind the accusations of deliberate pitch manipulation with his customary dead bat. "There is a lot of nonsense talked about pitches," he said, as if addressing a group of tiresome school children. "The groundsman prepares the pitch, not the England team. It's only when he puts those bits of wood in the ground and the game starts that the players take over control. In any case, it's the same for both sides."

In some ways he is right and pitch switching goes on all the time in county cricket, where most see it as accepted practice. In any case the surface looks much like an old Headingley pitch without the cracks and far better looking than the one Australia played on here in 1972 when those campaigning to free George Davis dug it up.

Presumably nothing quite that drastic came out in the pep talk England received from Sebastian Coe during their recent motivational get together. But if the squad are primed to bite the heads off anything Australian, England's final XI will not be selected until this morning when Dean Headley's fitness will be given one final assessment.

Headley, as Atherton pointed out yesterday after a long work-out in the nets, appeared to be "100 per cent at the moment". If he is not similarly sprightly this morning, then Mike Smith, Gloucestershire's left-arm swing bowler, will gain his first cap.

As the leading wicket-taker in the country with 55 wickets, Smith, a Yorkshireman, is the man in form. If the atmosphere is heavy and suits swing he may even play in front of Andy Caddick, who despite his 11 wickets in the series has been consistently short of an optimum length. That said, since the team's poor showing at Old Trafford, Atherton has been insistent that there would be no "panic changes", and Smith may have to wait a while longer.

More pressing than their bowling line-up, though, is the severe lack of runs coming from the top of the order. Since Edgbaston, when Nasser Hussain and Graham Thorpe batted superbly, England's batting - save two place-saving rather than match-saving knocks of 87 by Mark Butcher and 83 by John Crawley - has been a failure.

Perhaps the most glaring has been the poor scoring of Alec Stewart, who was comfortably England's best batsman last year. So far Stewart, batting at three, has scored 77 runs at an average of 15.4. They are the figures of a tail-ender and although Stewart is one of the fitter 34-year-olds around, keeping wicket and batting at first drop are clearly taking their toll and he may be better off swapping with Crawley.

Alternatively, the Australians, having seen more of Stewart than anyone else in the England side, may have worked him out. Either way England need him to fire now if the Ashes are to remain anything more than a dream.

By contrast, Australia have been swift and sure in replacing the troubled Michael Bevan with Ricky Ponting. But while the change narrows Taylor's bowling options it should, despite Ponting's lack of experience at six, strengthen the batting.

With Ponting hungry to show off his considerable talents, it is a move England could probably have done without at this stage of the series.

County reports,

Scoreboard, page 22