Cricket World Cup: Panesar Will Have to Displace a Seamer, Says Fletcher

Duncan Fletcher's perpetual problem of how to fit a one-day quart into a pint pot shows no sign of going away. In essence it is this: ignoring the side issue of which of his seam bowlers will make the starting line-up against New Zealand in a week's time, how does he manage to include Monty Panesar - Andrew Flintoff excepted, his most bankable bowler - without weakening either the lower order, of which he is so fond, or the pace attack?

How much, indeed, given the slow left-armer's rise to prominence in the past couple of months, does the England coach want to include Panesar at all costs and in any condition?

Unless the pitches in this tournament - an unknown quantity and for the most part yet to be properly tested - turn out to be verdant grasslands rather than the expected tributes to the subcontinent then Panesar, as an integral part of the options during the successful series in Australia, has to play. He probably will, too, given that Michael Vaughan has become a fan. But listening to Fletcher yesterday, his endorsement of the spinner's contribution since his debut carried the codicil, implicit but strongly so, that actually, because of the balancing act, it is Jamie Dalrymple who is first-choice spinner.

"Panesar is a key factor," the coach conceded. "When the pitches are going to turn we will always be looking to play two spinners. We did in Australia. When we went back to play in Brisbane we were going to go in with one but it was a totally different Brisbane pitch and we said we have got to go in with two."

Panesar is hardly a shoo-in on that basis, however, even though he and Dalrymple played together in nine of 10 matches in Australia, and here Fletcher damned him with faint praise. "Monty," he said, "has made a huge difference from the viewpoint of, when you need two spinners, the second should be basically an attacking spinner." And that means Panesar.

Panesar's record as a one-day bowler, limited as it might be, compares favourably with that of Dalrymple, who rarely sends down more than sufficient overs to share a fifth-bowler spot. Nine matches from the Sikh of Tweak, on the other hand, have yielded only a wicket a game but in bowling at the sharp end he concedes only 4.6 runs an over, which is commendable.

Dalrymple, not a wicket-taker, none the less has a similar economy rate, but captains have been very selective about when to use him. However, the competition for the final place in the side, which in batting terms seems sorted for the first match anyway, is not between Dalrymple and Panesar but between the latter and three seamers in Jon Lewis, Liam Plunkett and Sajid Mahmood.

"We are still looking at the permutations of our bowlers," Fletcher admitted. "There is a chance that some of the pitches might be similar to Arnos Vale, although we did not manage to learn too much from the first match against Bermuda."

Nevertheless, the evidence so far is that Mahmood has fallen behind and that unless the new ball shows signs of swinging dramatically, as it did under lights in Australia for example (none in the Caribbean, of course), it is Lewis who is not only more accurate but has the capacity to throttle back. So a guess at the attack for the opening match in St Lucia would be Jimmy Anderson, Lewis and Flintoff, and Panesar supplemented by Paul Collingwood and Dalrymple. Fletcher will hope to firm that up during the scrap against Australia today.

To offer some help to the slow bowlers, who Fletcher now feels were neglected in Australia, he has enlisted the help of the Leicestershire captain Jeremy Snape, a former England one-day spinner who has a masters degree in sports psychology from Loughborough and in 2005 founded a motivational company called Sporting Edge Solutions.

"It is nothing to do with the thought that spin will come to the fore," Fletcher explained. "I've been following his progress because of what he has been doing away from cricket with his degree in psychology . . . I'm monitoring that. And the big thing was I found out he was out here working with the Associate countries on behalf of ICC and that rang a bell with me. In Australia the spinners were left to themselves on certain occasions and it is good to have him here to work more on the mental side of bowling under pressure.

"He has done very well for Leicester at the back end of Twenty20 matches, when it can be very difficult. He is not here in a technical capacity but just to talk them through and to use his psychology degree and experience to help some of the other bowlers.

"He's played at this level, knows what is required, and it is a great opportunity to come and work for a few days."