England take step in right direction

Hollioake is another youngster working hard to get the best out of his natural abilities. He was bowling from much closer to the stumps in Zimbabwe and denying the batsmen width. Ally that to his height and awkward length and he can prove a more than useful asset, even on slow pitches.

If overall the bowling didn't shine quite as much as the batting, let's not forget that we have front-line bowlers Darren Gough and Andy Caddick to come back into the side.

We've always had good one-day cricketers in England. It's just that they haven't always played good one-day cricket. Like it or not, 50-overs matches follow a regular pattern: big shots and hopefully a flying start in the first 15 overs when the field is in, a period of nudging and consolidation in the middle of the innings, then a blast at the end.

The trick is knowing how to exploit each passage of play. Do you keep playing shots if early wickets fall? Where are the most productive areas for singles? With batsmen in hand, does the final slog start in the 40th over, the 38th, or even earlier?

The top order were clearly under instructions not to hold back on their best shots. Marcus Trescothick and Nick Knight are naturally aggressive anyway but it was refreshing to see Mark Ramprakash lifting the ball over extra-cover so early in his innings.

Perhaps the most significant development, however, was the way the ball was manoeuvred around in the middle of the innings.

Graham Thorpe is a master of the push down the ground or the nurdle past square leg and some of his brilliance appeared to have rubbed off on Flintoff and Paul Collingwood.

Four or five singles an over may not be the most exciting thing to watch but it keeps the board ticking over.

England will have talked about all these things during the summer but when you are getting hammered match after match by two very good teams like Australia and Pakistan it is not so easy to believe in what you are doing.

So to do those things and see them work in Zimbabwe will have given the squad confidence - and that alone made it a useful exercise.

If our World Cup campaign is to stand a chance of success in South Africa in 2003 we not only need a game plan but also a settled squad of players who can adhere to it and instinctively be aware of the match situation at any given point.

I believe we've taken the first steps down that road.