Pick satisfied with U19 efforts

Andy Pick watches England's Group D defeat to Bangladesh

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England Under-19 coach Andy Pick offered a realistic appraisal of his side’s World Cup campaign on their return from Malaysia.

England finished fifth having been knocked out of the main competition by eventual champions India at the quarter-final stage.

They went on to beat Sri Lanka in the Super League play-off semi-final and finished above Australia on tournament run rate after their final was washed out.

Match preparation for the World Cup began in mid-January with almost a month of warm-up games in Colombo where they played Sri Lanka and holders Pakistan.

England announced their arrival in Kuala Lumpur with a second warm-up win over Pakistan but suffered a disappointing defeat in the Group D decider against Bangladesh which saw them face India.

Pick told ecb.co.uk: “I said before we went, based on the strength of squads we’d taken in the past, this was a fairly strong squad and I gauged it that we probably should have reached the semi-finals - and after that pretty much anything can happen.”

“So obviously to lose in the quarter-final was disappointing, albeit to India who went on and won it.

Alex Wakely is dismissed in the quarter-final against India

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“But the disappointing parts of the World Cup campaign for me were the games against Bangladesh and India where we didn’t do what we did for most of the tour.

“Over the tour the guys played pretty well and we had some good results. We beat Pakistan twice and we beat Sri Lanka three times. Had it not been for the rain on the last day I think we would have comfortably got home against Australia.

“Winning six matches against other Test-playing nations over the course of the tour would be relatively reasonable but ultimately it’s about playing well in the big games.”

Pick pinpointed the performances of several individuals including opening batsmen Billy Godleman and James Taylor, fast bowling duo James Harris and Steve Finn, plus spin twins Liam Dawson and Tom Westley.

Finn missed the games in Sri Lanka due to a hernia but recovered in time to form a dangerous bowling partnership with Harris.

“Different players had good periods and bad periods. It was quite a long tour and it would have been difficult for people to maintain a rich vein of form throughout the whole six weeks,” Pick added.

“Billy Godleman had a good tour to Sri Lanka and posted a couple of one-day hundreds and participated in the games against Bermuda and Ireland but was probably disappointing in the games against Bangladesh and India.

“James Harris struggled at the start - most of the seamers struggled at the start - teams adopted a fairly aggressive approach against our new ball and we were left wanting a little bit in the seam department.

James Harris enjoyed success with the ball at the World Cup in Malaysia © Getty Images

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“But Harris had a good World Cup. He came back and showed what a quality bowler he was. Finn had a good World Cup when he was fit. He came back and he recovered fitness he made the difference for us up front with Harris.

“James Taylor impressed as well and he consistently got starts and, while at times I was a bit disappointed that he did not go on and make a bit more of some of those starts, he scored runs consistently and that’s not bad thing.

“Liam Dawson and Tom Westley - the two spinners - both bowled very, very well. Certainly in the earlier part of the tour they were coming on a lot earlier than we would have liked in the power plays because the seamers got the attack taken to them so we had to bring spin on quite early.

“So they had to bowl in some testing conditions and testing times with fielding restrictions and stuff like that but they equipped themselves very, very well.”

England were without captain Alex Wakely for their last two World Cup matches after the batsman sustained a compressed fracture of his thumb against Bangladesh.

Wakely battled through the pain barrier to face India but vice captain Westley took over for the victory over Sri Lanka and the Australia clash which England dominated before rain ended proceedings.

“Tom stepped in and did well. There are not many natural leaders at this age and to a certain degree it provided us the chance to have two captains on the tour and have a look how a couple of people coped, which we wouldn’t have done had Alex not got injured,” Pick pointed out.