Why England’s World Cup campaign has unravelled

England’s Cricket World Cup title defence has gone close to as badly as it could have done, with Jos Buttler’s side slipping to a fourth defeat in five matches on Thursday against Sri Lanka.

Sri Lanka romp to big win as England suffer fourth loss

Even captain Buttler admitted that it is hard to fathom just how poor his team’s performances have been.

“I'll walk back in the dressing room after this and look at the players sat there and think how have we found ourselves in this position with the talent and the skill that's in the room,” Buttler said after the eight-wicket thumping at the hands of Sri Lanka.

England’s bowlers were the weak link in each of their first three defeats, before the batting collapse against Sri Lanka saw the blame for the fourth loss shift.

But what exactly are the reasons for England’s tournament going so badly wrong? We take a look at some of the key contributing factors.

England had a reasonably consistent selection strategy coming into the tournament. Pick the best top five, have Liam Livingstone and Moeen Ali at six and seven to share the fifth bowler slot, and then pick three quicks plus Adil Rashid to make up the XI.

The squad they selected backed up that approach but England didn't stick to their guns, and the approach hasn’t looked stable right from the start of the tournament.

**Match 1:**They hedged their bets against New Zealand, naming the two spinning all-rounders and Curran, leaving the side with a pace-bowling attack that looked under-equipped.

For all of Curran’s excellence in T20 cricket, he has yet to establish himself as a reliable front-line bowler in ODIs and it showed.

World Cup State of Play: Sri Lanka boost semi-final chances, England all-but out

Matches 2 and 3: To redress the balance, England opted to prefer Curran to vice-captain Moeen against Bangladesh and Afghanistan, boosting the pace ranks with the excellent Topley who had been strangely omitted in the opener. While such a decision was understandable, it did mean a significant change given that Moeen had been England’s vice-captain and an important on-field leader.

**Masch 4:**The defeat to Afghanistan and return of Ben Stokes prompted a complete change of balance, with the all-rounders dropped and England picking six designated batters, four quicks and one spinner, making three out of a maximum four changes to the XI. The move was a complete departure from England’s previous blueprint.

**Match 5:**The loss to South Africa saw the selectors immediately flip their approach for the Sri Lanka game. Three more changes came, with Brook out and both Moeen and Livingstone returning, to set up a balance that was the first time they’d named an XI in line with their pre-tournament thinking. Gus Atkinson, who had been England’s best bowler against South Africa, did not make the XI.

All the different selections and team balances have their merits, and it’s certainly possible to argue either way that England would be better served with either the all-rounder balance or six-best-batter approach.

But the problem for England is that even the decision-makers don’t seem sure of the best XI, resulting in an extreme lack of selection consistency. Chopping and changing to such an extent has left the majority of the players seemingly unsettled and unconfident and the results speak for themselves.

Two of England’s defeats came after they won the toss and opted to bowl first. In both cases it was a confusing decision.

Afghanistan showed against Pakistan that they are a side capable of chasing down a decent score, but their most likely way to challenge a team like England was always going to be getting off to a flier with their talented openers, registering a competitive first-innings total, and then cranking up the pressure with their spinners. That is exactly what England allowed them to do.

England’s toss decision against South Africa was even more surprising. Having picked an XI with just five main bowling options, two of whom have a history of injury (Reece Topley and Mark Wood) and one of whom was significantly unwell (Adil Rashid), it was a huge gamble to ask those five to bowl first on the third hottest October day that Mumbai has seen in a decade. England’s attack wilted in the heat.

Not just that, but South Africa had already shown in the tournament just how destructive they are when batting first, racking up big scores against Sri Lanka and Australia first up, and showing their only signs of vulnerability when asked to chase by the Netherlands.

Coach Matthew Mott said after the South Africa defeat that the decision to bowl first was based on stats at the ground.

Side-stepping whether such use of stats is wise, his comments tally with a feeling that England are sticking overly rigidly to pre-conceived plans.

England have clearly targeted early wickets with new-ball swing, picking a squad with four such bowling options in it, and then using a combination of heavy pace and spin to control the middle overs.

That hasn’t worked, but England haven’t adjusted.

Wood has been a prime example. Largely ineffective and expensive through the middle overs, England could have gambled and given Wood the odd early over to try and catch the openers before the settle. They could even have gambled with a bit of early spin, as a few teams – most notably the Netherlands – have done. But they haven’t tried either, even when Plan A is so clearly misfiring.

Similarly, certain bowlers seem to have been locked in to take the ball at specific times in the innings. But that has meant situations such as against South Africa, where Atkinson, England’s best bowler on the night, didn’t complete his full allocation.

Sometimes flexibility is important. England haven’t shown it.

Buttler is not a captain with the soft skill of keeping his emotions hidden during a game, and he’s been visibly frustrated at times while his team are out in the field. Being a wicket-keeper, it’s also impractical for him to constantly go and talk to his bowlers in times of crisis, which have arrived with alarming regularity during the campaign.

So Buttler needed assistance. But his vice-captain, Moeen, who has typically filled in that role of communicator in the field, was left out of the team for England’s second, third and fourth matches, meaning he was in no position to have such an influence as things went wrong against Afghanistan and South Africa in particular.

With Ben Stokes – England’s Test captain and the squad’s ‘spiritual leader,’ according to Mott – also missing those matches through injury, Buttler needed support. But there was no Moeen or Stokes on the field to turn to.

The above issues have are all been contributing factors but, as a number of the players have admitted, England simply haven’t bowled, batted or fielded well enough as individuals.

Most of the squad have underperformed, but some key players have had particularly disappointing returns so far:

Chris Woakes is usually one of England’s most reliable performers, but was way off the mark in the first three matches and caused huge problems for his team with a lack of new-ball control.

Mark Wood’s pace means he is always likely to go for runs, but that is offset by his wicket-taking threat. Yet the speedster hasn’t made anything like the impact that England would have been expected, and he’s been incredibly expensive. Never before in his career had he gone for more than 10-an-over in an ODI for England, but he’s done so twice at this World Cup already.

Buttler wants to stay on as skipper

Jos Buttler averages just 19 in the tournament, with 95 runs across five innings. That’s a huge problem for his side given that he’s arguably England’s greatest white-ball batter. He doesn’t even have the excuse of limited time in the middle or arriving at the crease at the death, with multiple top-order collapses meaning Buttler has had plenty of opportunities to bed himself in.

Jonny Bairstow has been a consistently key presence at the top of the order in this England ODI era, but he hasn’t looked anything close to his best, averaging 25.40 across the tournament and with declining returns after a reasonable start.

Liam Livingstone, England’s preferred number six going into the tournament, has barely been a factor with the bat, scoring just 31 runs and averaging 7.75 across his four innings – the worst of any of England’s batters or all-rounders. Livingstone’s returns with the ball have been respectable, but not enough to make up for his lack of batting impact.

England have four more games to come and, for now at least, are not mathematically out of the running for the semi-final spots.

But the defeat to Sri Lanka left captain Buttler admitting that their chances of winning the tournament are effectively over.

It’s India up next for England on Sunday, with games against Australia, Netherlands and Pakistan to follow. Do they rip up the script and bed in the youngsters for some experience on the big stage? Or will the old guard get a chance to show their quality one last time? Time will tell.