Stocks: Sorry, Compton is just not up to the job
Chris Stocks says England were wrong to pick Nick Compton for the first Test with the No. 3 badly out of form
When Nick Compton sloped off following his third-ball duck on the first morning at Headingley, he looked every bit a dead man walking. Compton wasn’t the only England batsman to fail in Leeds yesterday – far from it. However, his demise was the most predictable given every indication coming into this series was that he is not good enough to be a successful Test batsman.
In terms of form, the 32-year-old has none. His highest score for Middlesex this season is 44.
Moreover, his second spell as an England cricketer has gone downhill very quickly since he scored a determined first-innings 85 against South Africa in Durban on Boxing Day. That knock rescued England from a slow start and laid the foundations for a fine victory for Alastair Cook’s team.
However, with the words of coach Trevor Bayliss – who has said on numerous occasions he wants “two dashers” in his top three to complement the more prosaic Cook – no doubt playing on his mind, Compton has gone backwards since Durban. Trying to play more expansively, his highest score over his next six innings in South Africa was 45.
Bayliss even commented that he hoped Compton “was not confused” as to his role. I don’t believe Compton was confused about his role, just confused about how to score regular runs at the highest level.
While Cook is a methodical accumulator, Compton is more desperate; he simply gets bogged down by good bowling and does not make a conscious decision to be watchful – he just isn’t good enough to score runs when the going gets tough.
Most international-class batsmen will tell you the secret to building big innings at the top level is to keep the scoreboard ticking over with ones and twos even when the going gets tough. It’s a skill Compton struggles with. It may sound harsh, but that’s exactly what one high-profile former England batsman cited during an off-the-record chat last winter. “Nick becomes bogged down and shotless under pressure,” was the damning verdict.
Another well-respected cricket mind, someone with links to the England camp, recently told me: “Even county bowlers hurry him up.”
So, why was Compton even picked for this Test match? It almost seems cruel.
Those who saw Compton at Lord’s, where he was playing for Middlesex against Nottinghamshire, on the day of England’s selection meeting last week, said he had the air of a condemned man. Even the player himself thought he was going to be dropped, it would seem.
However, England’s selectors – who were said to be only 60-40 in favour of retaining Compton at the start of their meeting – decided to stick with what they had. That decision was likely because of the lack of alternatives available to them. There has been much championing of Essex’s Tom Westley, who has 730 first-class runs already this season, including a hundred against the touring Sri Lankans.
Yet Division Two runs seem to be devalued currency when it comes to England selection, no matter how many you pile up.
Gary Ballance would surely have received a call-up had he started the season well for Yorkshire, but he didn’t and was left out despite having been England’s spare batsman in South Africa last winter.
Both Ballance and Westley would probably have come in at five anyway for England, with James Vince the natural replacement for Compton at three despite only making nine on his Test debut yesterday in the middle order.
I’d be amazed if Vince isn’t batting at first drop by the end of the summer, hopefully for the start of the Pakistan series in July at the latest.
The problem England now have is they probably have to give Compton the rest of this series after backing him at the start of it. The Durban-born batsman was harshly treated in his last incarnation as an England cricketer, when he opened with Cook in India and at home and away against New Zealand.
His final Test came after a horrible innings of seven from 45 balls against the New Zealanders at Headingley. His fall-out with then coach Andy Flower over the seriousness of a rib injury that he said prevented him from fielding also did not do him too many favours.
Compton is said not to have made too many friends in the current England dressing-room either, his intense personality not fitting the carefree approach espoused by Bayliss.
It was telling on Wednesday that Cook alluded to Compton’s intense nature when speaking about his team-mate’s challenge. “The guy’s a fighter,” said Cook. “He’s just got to relax and play.”
Steven Finn, speaking last week, said of his Middlesex team-mate: “I think Compo as a guy is a lot more level than the last time he was in the England team.”
Yet his dismissal yesterday, hard hands seeing a forward defensive carry to first slip, told of a man who was feeling the tension. Compton is a worrier and this latest failure is likely to prey on his mind.
Headingley is unlikely to be the final staging post of Compton’s second coming with England. He has been backed by the selectors and dropping him after one Test of the summer would not be a good look.
It would, though, be the right call, although the likely scenario is that he will at least get the Durham Test even if he does fail again here.
Bayliss has always said he would prefer to give a player “one Test too many, than one too few”. That one Test too many was here at Headingley.
With the tension ramped up ahead of his second innings here, Compton will have to respond to prove the many doubters – including those in his own dressing-room – that he deserves his place in the team.
But if the past has told us anything, it is that Compton seizes up when the pressure on his place is really on. That’s what he did yesterday and also in that Middlesex match against Notts at Lord’s last week, when his calling card for the selectors was a tortured three from 18 balls.
Like anyone who is out of their depth, Compton is struggling, much like a man with a stepladder being asked to paint the roof at the Sistine Chapel.
Joe Root warned this week international cricket can be “brutal”. Compton is finding that out all over again after his failed first spell. The only question now must be when the guillotine will fall on his England career. Let’s hope for Compton’s sake, and for the concept of mercy, it is sooner rather than later.
Compton is said not to have made too many friends in the current England dressing room, his intense personality not fitting the carefree approach espoused by coach Trevor Bayliss