England skipper Jos Buttler said his team has enough “experience in the room” to bounce back from their crushing loss to New Zealand in the World Cup opener.
The defending champions went down to New Zealand by nine wickets after the Black Caps chased down their target of 283 in just 36.2 overs in Ahmedabad.
The heavy defeat has put an early dent in England’s hopes of retaining their trophy in a tournament that concludes on November 19 at Narendra Modi Stadium.
Buttler admitted the total was well under par against a New Zealand side inspired by unbeaten centuries from Devon Conway (152) and Rachin Ravindra (123).
“The first thing that springs to mind is whether you do lose by a run or a defeat like that, it is one loss at the start of a very long tournament,” a disappointed Buttler told reporters.
“So, that’s something that I’d be encouraging everyone to remember. It’s certainly a tough loss to take.
“We were outplayed but you know we’ve got a lot of experience in the room – guys who’ve been through lots of things and faced defeats like that before.”
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England, who finished on 9-282, started briskly but New Zealand kept taking regular wickets to keep the scoring rate down after electing to bowl first.
Former England captain Joe Root, who top-scored for the defending champions with 77, confessed the team was “below par in all departments”.
“We did manage to build partnerships, but as soon as we get going we kept stalling ourselves and that stopped us getting the total we wanted,” Root said.
“In the field, when you know you’ve got a below par score, you’ve then got to be above par in everything you do and we didn’t manage that. We didn’t play anywhere near the standard that we know we are capable of.”
Eoin Morgan, who led England to World Cup glory four years ago, offered a scathing assessment of his former team’s performance.
“They were so far off the mark,” Morgan said on Sky Sports.
‘With the ball, they looked undercooked. They bowled both sides of the wicket which is not ideal by any stretch of the imagination. A really disappointing day.”
The Telegraph’s Tim Wigmore declared that England were “eviscerated” in the tournament opener, pointing out the Black Caps were without three first-choice players.
“Not since 2015 have England left a game in a global event feeling as outclassed as they did during this crushing nine-wicket loss to New Zealand,” Wigmore wrote.
“So much for all the talk of bare margins when England and New Zealand meet in global events; the defending champions were eviscerated.”
The Daily Mail’s Lawrence Booth called the performance a “horror show”.
“While this result has not yet left them with a mountain to climb if they are to reach the semi-finals, it has made the path ahead rockier than planned,” Booth wrote.
“England may concede they were undercooked. But their challenge now will be to allay concerns they are no longer quite the team we thought they were.”
England were without the talismanic Ben Stokes, who missed out due to a hip injury, but Buttler said his absence wasn’t decisive.
“I think Ben’s a top player but we’ve got many top players,” said Buttler.
“I think everyone in the team got into double figures today and we didn’t have enough guys go on and make telling contributions.
“It’s not just Ben who is able to score runs in our team. We’ve got brilliant players right throughout the squad. So, we had a lot of starts. I thought we were just a bit off in our execution.”
England will next face Bangladesh at Dharamsala’s Himachal Pradesh Cricket Association Stadium, with the first ball scheduled for 4pm AEDT.
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