Mark Butcher, an England former international, believes that the men’s Jos Buttler-styled side is arrogant and thus everyone just loves seeing them lose. People can’t stand this England team because they just have no regard for the time and flow of 50-over cricket yet head into the ICC tournaments feeling entitled to win them.
England was eliminated from the tournament after only two group-stage matches against Australia and Afghanistan. Since the 2023 World Cup, they had played only 14 ODIs, recording only four wins, few in a bid to prepare for this tournament after failing to make it out of the group stage.
Their last outing before the tournament was a 3-0 series defeat against India. Ben Duckett, the England opener, had shared then that his team could care less if they lost the bilateral series because their focus was really in the Champions Trophy.
“All I can say is that I absolutely, wholeheartedly understand the reason why everybody always loves to see England lose,” Butcher said on a Wisden podcast. “And it’s this – and I might have said this a long time ago – the arrogance of English cricket to assume that after struggling for all that time to win a 50-over World Cup, you will next breath state of people not worth their players’ time for you to play.”
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England lost to Afghanistan by eight runs at the Gadaffi Stadium in Lahore, an arena that had a significant number of Afghan fans cheering for them even as local neutrals joined in support of the Afghans against English players.
“The arrogance is in that, and the comeuppance that has come around…it is no wonder that the vast majority of the crowd were supporting Afghanistan, regardless of whether those in support hailed from Afghanistan or Pakistan or did not.”
Butcher had flagged up the deficiency of ODI experience within this England team, making the assertion-ahead of the Champions Trophy-that most of the players were used to the uptempo of 50-over cricket.
“I think the very thought is that you’re good enough to make those decisions and think you can win major trophies,” he added. “It’s one of the reasons people hate us…You’re going to these competitions, hoping to perform your best and do yourself and your country proud: just what right do we have to think we’re good enough to win a 50-over tournament?” Butcher added.
The same point about Buttler and Company has also not been made for the first time by this English commentator. Throughout the India series, which saw Alex Hartley recently substantiate similar sentiments, Kevin Pietersen had expressed equally similar sentiments regarding them.
