Ljs: England's World Cup dream hinges on Kevin Pietersen gamble

A repeat of the World Twenty20 triumph is unlikely if England's new opening partnership fails or their bowlers are not fully fit

Interminable the recent one-day series in Australia may have been, and draining on a group of players most of whom had been on the road since the end of October. Yet there is another aspect, for without it England would have gone into the World Cup not having played any 50-over cricket for five months, and a lot can happen in that time.

Certainly they would not wish to have selected a squad on the basis of what happened back then. Here at least was an opportunity for Andy Flower to look at options and test the water. In this he was hamstrung only in that he was forced to declare his hand after one game only, and thus would be obliged, had injuries not intervened, to run with what he would be taking to the subcontinent.

Mainly, the series in which England were beaten heavily was not so much designed to confirm choices and positions, as act as a final eliminator of ideas. The first casualty was Steve Davies, who had there not been these games would almost certainly have kept a place.

Very early on the decision was taken to reintroduce to the mix Matt Prior, who had been playing for Victoria in the Big Bash Twenty20 competition. In the search for a power-hitter at the top of the order, he was given the opportunity and failed. One suspects that this may have been what the management thought would happen, felt they had to get it out of the way, and that on the slower, flatter pitches of the subcontinent it was always in their mind to use either Ian Bell or, as it has transpired, Kevin Pietersen to partner Andrew Strauss.

So from the mayhem in Australia has emerged something of significance, which ought to make England a more competitive side than many believe to be the case. In giving Pietersen the challenge of getting the innings off to a flyer, Flower is paying some lip service to his ego. In the absence of Eoin Morgan through injury, Pietersen, for all his desperate lack of runs in this form of the game over the past two years since he lost the captaincy and sustained an achilles tendon injury, remains one of the most potentially destructive match?winning batsmen in the game.

Lack of form is one thing but his fundamental ability has not deserted him. He thrives on the glamour of the big occasions, in front of large crowds, and loves to be the man. He will find little lateral movement with which to contend, and will have the space beyond the infield to exploit. His destruction of Dale Steyn in the World Twenty20, in which he scored 23 from the eight deliveries bowled to him by the world's leading fast bowler, shows his appetite for pace.

Unless a side has the imagination to come at him early with slow bowling (as New Zealand did to flummox their opponents in the 1992 competition) he could be long since up and running by the time the restrictions come in.

England are by no means in the sort of mess that might be indicated by the results in Australia. Providing the players prove fit for purpose, the injuries to key bowlers in Stuart Broad, Tim Bresnan and Graeme Swann, as well as Paul Collingwood's back strain, will prove a blessing in disguise, giving them rest where there would otherwise have been little.

Collingwood in particular will surely have benefited from what effectively has been a line drawn under a torrid winter for him. The ineffectiveness of Luke Wright as a credible fill-in bowler has served to emphasise Collingwood's value on slow pitches, where his cutters and change of pace can be so effective. Rarely in a career that has involved more games than any other England player has he bowled out his full complement of overs, but expect him to contribute substantially over the next few weeks.

The bowling in fact is in good order, as decent as any to be found if lacking in the sort of depth that is possessed by, say, India. It is to the batting, though, that England will have to look, for this promises to be a batsmen's tournament, with bowlers subservient. The scoring is likely to be high, particularly in India, where England play five of their six group matches.

In Nagpur, for example, where they face the Netherlands, two matches in the past 10 years have involved an average run rate of 6.1 per over. In Bangalore, where they play India and Ireland, it is dead on a run a ball over seven matches, while for six games in Chennai, where they take on South Africa and West Indies, it is 5.7. For their single group match outside India, against Bangladesh in Chittagong, the average rate drops to 4.4, although that is a reflection of the quality of the home side as much as the slowness of the surface.

Wherever they play it will be crucial that England take full advantage of the power plays, with the timing of the batting power play, a facet that England have yet to master, an aspect that may well swing games. Immediately after the ball-change at 34 overs would seem logical.

The nature of the tournament, so protective of the welfare of the marquee names after the upsets of the 2007 tournament in the Caribbean, means that England would need to play inordinately badly ? their most likely trouble coming at the hands of Tamim Iqbal and the Bangladeshi tweakers on their own pitch ? not to progress to a quarter-final in which, depending on their position in the league table of group matches, they would play in Dhaka, Colombo or Ahmedabad.

If the batsmen have fired by then, and England have gathered momentum as they did in the World Twenty20 tournament last May, then they can progress beyond that, and should not be discounted as potential winners. If the batting flops, then it will be home.

Mike Selvey

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