Behind those shades at the second Test it is impossible to tell what the England head coach is thinking in the enforced absence of his captain. Brendon McCullum keeps his thoughts to himself on day one of the second Test against New Zealand.
Pressure Mounts
They had Toots and the Maytals on at the jerk stall round the back of the JM Finn stand on Wednesday morning; the grillman had their classic Pressure Drop pumping out of the sound system while the England fans queued in the drizzle to get through the Alec Stewart Gate. The rain clouds gave way after an hour. By 1pm you needed sunglasses. Not that McCullum ever needs a reason.
Is McCullum feeling it? It is increasingly hard to say what is going on behind those shades. The man is the Anna Wintour of the wicket. That eyewear makes it impossible to know what he is thinking. It has been nine days since Ben Stokes was caught breaking the England team curfew at a nightclub on King's Road, and still no one really knows what is going on, or exactly what has gone wrong. The Cricket Regulator is investigating, but it is slower than molasses in January. There does not seem to be a good reason why the England and Wales Cricket Board's own report is dragging on so long. The one clear point is that neither McCullum, nor his boss, Rob Key, wanted to offer Stokes their backing as captain.
Stokes' State of Mind
McCullum has also said, repeatedly, that he is worried about Stokes. Which would make more sense if Stokes seemed to be worried about himself. He is, after all, a man who is ready to talk about his own mental health, which once caused him to take a five-month break from the game. Those in the know say that he is fine, and eager to lead England at Trent Bridge next week. Certainly he has been training with Durham and is ready to play for them in the County Championship this weekend. His county coach, Ryan Campbell, says he has been in good spirits and is working hard.
In the absence of any ready explanations, there is speculation. There is talk that this situation has degenerated into a power struggle between the three of them, whispers that Stokes is angry about the way this has been handled. This is, after all, the same coaching regime that allowed Harry Brook to play the day after he was punched by a nightclub bouncer in Wellington. On Test Match Special, Michael Vaughan even went so far as to say he was worried the relationship between England's coach and captain might be irretrievably broken.
An Inexperienced XI
So what can we see out there through the binoculars? McCullum and Key have put together a very odd XI for this second Test, the most inexperienced team England have put on the field since 2009, and the first in twice as long that has included five players who each have one cap or fewer. The interim skipper, Joe Root, who says he is speaking to Stokes regularly, has played more Tests, and scored more runs, than the other 10 men put together, and taken more wickets than any of the four bowlers, who make up the rawest attack England have had in 23 years.
The Oval is just about the happiest batting pitch in the country right now. Surrey have had six draws in the last eight championship matches here, and barely a hundred wickets have gone down here in first-class cricket this season. England have come equipped with four bowlers, two rookies and a third who has not bowled anything longer than a four-over spell in the past six months. They have no spinner, and a specialist batter who was slated to come in at No 7. Of course Surrey do not play a spinner either, but they always use five bowlers, and have a sixth, Dan Lawrence, who gets through a hell of a lot of overs.
England could have picked Lawrence. He just scored 218 and 101 in one of those high-scoring draws. England could have picked Rehan Ahmed, who scored five hundreds in the championship last year. McCullum is already without all eight of England's leading wicket-takers since he took charge of the team four years ago, but only one of them, Brydon Carse, is injured. Another, Stuart Broad, has retired. Two, Stokes and Gus Atkinson, have been suspended, while the other four – Jimmy Anderson, Chris Woakes, Jack Leach and Shoaib Bashir – have all been dropped along the way. He has always liked a gamble, but given the options available to him, his decisions here feel like they are made against long odds for high stakes.
Early Signs
It is the sort of team you pick either in the first flourish of a new era, or the last gasps of an old one. So far, England are getting away with it. Sonny Baker, who runs in like he has just snagged his pants on the boundary hoarding, with a stutter then a skip and a surge as the elastic snaps, picked up two wickets, Matthew Fisher, Josh Tongue and Jofra Archer got one each, Jacob Bethell fluked another couple. The innings, and the match, are in the balance, and if the situation between McCullum, Key and Stokes really has grown so acrimonious, one or two of their England careers may be teetering on the edge right there with it.
