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England’s failure to Tongue the tail

England’s failure to Tongue the tail

England have had several great bowlers. They also have a long history of strange failures against bad batters.

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Jarrod Kimber
Jun 30, 2025
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England’s failure to Tongue the tail
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UK readers can get their copy of the book here:

The Art of Batting

“Mind the windows, Tino” is what Freddie Flintoff said to West Indian No.11 hero Tino Best at Lord’s. A few moments later, Tino would swing big again, and England had a tail wicket. That story has stuck around for years, when Freddie talked Tino into coaxing away his wicket. Weirdly, for a man so well known for dismissing a tailender with his Jedi mind tricks, he struggled with the ball.

Like most things with Flintoff, that story was more important than the facts. He was a massive character, both physically and mentally. A strong man with a sense of vulnerability about him. He looked like he could take down an entire army on his own one day, and then would go missing a week later. When he retired, he made documentaries about fish and chips, while also wrestling and racing cars.

He was always a cricketer first, but he was a personality and celebrity pretty closely behind that.

Because of all that, and his incredible ability to rise up for a huge moment, he became the sort of cricketer who was more than his stats. But Flintoff could bowl, fast, heavy, and with skill. He tried to play things off as the big dumb oaf, but there was a lot going on with his cricket. And while his batting and fielding could be good, he was at his best when bowling.

A physical force through the crease, pounding down his steps and then pounding down the ball. There was a lot of pounding, his bowling was loud.

But he ended up with a bowling average of more than 30. Which, if you watched him play, makes no sense at all. On his day, he looked as good as anyone. But he never took the wickets to back that up.

Flintoff had the same flaw as most England bowlers - even if he wasn’t a typical English seamer. The big man couldn’t get the tail out. And for more than 50 years, his team have had the same issue.

When Test cricket started, it took months for a team to arrive at their tour. Australia was not a country. South Africa was basically another English team. Batters didn’t have helmets or proper gloves. The pitches had literal crap on them. The balls, stumps, and LBW laws were all different. People still bowled underarm on occasion. The game in the 1870s could not be any different from the current sport.

Yet in that first decade from only three Tests, the average for numbers 8-11 was 15.3. And 150 years later, the tail average 0.6 runs a wicket less. The sport has completely changed, and yet the fact that the tail can’t bat has always been a constant.

So the sport has changed, but the fact that we pick the last few players to bowl (or keep once upon a time), meaning they usually can’t make many runs, stays true. There have been only four decades where the averages were lower than 14, or more than 16. Outside the glorious tail-end batting of 1920, it’s been almost the same every single decade, throughout the entire history of cricket.

The other constant thing is fans talking about how their team can’t dismiss the tail. Almost every single fan base in the world thinks their bowlers can’t get them out quickly enough. That is because in our mind the innings is over, and so any delay, even a minor one, seems huge to us. Just bowl at the stumps, just bounce them, just finish them.

But while the tail can’t bat, they’re also nowhere near as bad as we think they are. Number eights obviously do okay, averaging around 21. Nines are holding in at 15 and a half, the penultimate spot is at 11.5 and the actual last man in is 8.5.

So while fans are sitting there screaming that they should be out already, the truth is, they can stick around. And while we know that intellectually, it is extremely annoying when a bloke who cannot bat is middling every awkward defensive shot.

We all think that our team cannot bowl to the tail because of all the lived-in memories of our side doing that. But there is one fanbase who is right.

England have been poor bowling to the tail since the start of the 1980s. Some of that has been when they’ve been bad, but really, they’re consistently poor against the worst batters.

Throughout the early history of the game they had no real issue with this, and then from the 1980s onwards they’ve just not found a way to get through the worst batters. These are the decades that include Bob Willis, Ian Botham, Darren Gough, Andy Caddick, Freddie Flintoff, Steve Harmison, Jimmy Anderson and Stuart Broad. There is a lot of talent there with the ball, except when they go up against bunnies.

Since 1980, they are not the worst, that would be Zimbabwe and Afghanistan. But they are the third worst. That is pretty bad. Considering Bangladesh’s history in Tests, being behind them on this list is not ideal. England is actually right in the middle of the four newest teams. So if you looked at everyone who started Tests before 1990, they are actually the worst.

For 50 years, one thing has been very clear: England cannot bowl to the tail.

And then, in the last Test, Josh Tongue does his thing. And suddenly you wonder if England actually has a bowler who can do the one thing they have been looking for: finish the innings.

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