Stephen Fleming Puts England Cricket Team Identity at Core of Test Rebuild
\nRestoring Team Identity and Standards in English Cricket<\/p>\n
Sept 20 (Reuters) – England’s new test coach Stephen Fleming said restoring the team’s identity and standards would be as important as improving results, after a turbulent year for English cricket that brought renewed scrutiny of player behaviour and team culture.<\/p>\n
Coaching Appointment and Team Challenges<\/p>\n
Fleming was\u00a0appointed in July following England’s slide in results and a series of off-field incidents that led to Brendon McCullum’s departure from the test role, amid accusations of a drinking culture amongst the players.<\/p>\n
Recent Off-Field Incidents<\/p>\n
The latest incident involved pace bowler Brydon Carse, who was handcuffed outside a nightclub following Durham’s County Championship title-winning victory over Derbyshire, shortly after Joe Root had lifted a team midnight curfew.<\/p>\n
Focus on Team Identity and Culture<\/p>\n
Fleming said work has already begun on shaping the team’s identity after months of questions over the culture surrounding the England\u00a0setup.<\/p>\n
Fleming\u2019s Vision for the Team<\/p>\n
“I would love to be in charge of the number one Test team in the world. That would be my aspiration,” Fleming told reporters in Manchester.<\/p>\n
“But there’s a piece of work there that’s already begun and that’s around our identity. There’s been a lot of coverage around that and I think the way that players represent England and the group is going to be really important to me.<\/p>\n
“The style of play will come with that also and that’ll be a little bit more player-directed, but I feel very strongly about finding a sense of belonging within the group.”<\/p>\n
Steps Taken to Improve Culture<\/p>\n
Fleming said steps had already been taken behind the scenes, although he did not provide further details.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe’ve done some things to start that piece of work, so that’s really important to me,” Fleming said.<\/p>\n
“So not only will we be in the best position to win cricket games but also represent the England cricket team in its best form.”<\/p>\n
Recent and Upcoming Fixtures<\/p>\n
Marcus Trescothick guided England to a 3-0 sweep of Pakistan as interim coach in August and September, before handing over to Fleming for December and January’s three-test tour of South Africa.\u00a0McCullum remains coach of England’s white-ball sides.<\/p>\n
England begin a three-match one-day international series against Sri Lanka on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
Reporting Credits<\/p>\n
(Reporting by Karan Prashant Saxena in Bengaluru; editing by Clare Fallon)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Stephen Fleming Puts England Cricket Team Identity at Core of Test Rebuild Restoring Team Identity and Standards in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":898994,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[564],"tags":[64,63,740,85],"class_list":["post-898993","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cricket","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/898993","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=898993"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/898993\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/898994"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=898993"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=898993"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=898993"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}