England in hurry to recapture past glories

	Andrew Flintoff limbers up with some ball work on the eve of the start of the series © Getty Images

The days of England sides embarking on a Test series in the Caribbean aiming to head home with as few broken bones as possible are a fading memory. The images of Ambrose and Walsh inflicting scarring - both physical and mental - on a generation of batsmen, as the likes of Holding, Marshall and Garner did before them are now only for YouTube.

Even though England have failed to live up to their lofty billing over last three years, their current generation of players are getting used to being favourites whenever these two sides meet. For so long it was the other way round, but any sense of enjoyment they gain from being able repay some of those painful debts is tempered by the depths to which West Indies cricket has fallen.

However, there is hope that this series may just be different from the last three and provide a close-run affair. Test cricket needs as many good series as it can muster at the moment, and while a ding-dong battle like Australia and South Africa have recently managed is probably asking too much, some hard-fought cricket isn't.

In reality England should win, but they have had anything but a calm build-up. It's just 41 days since they finished their last international in the fog and chill of Mohali, but so much has happened since then that the team has entered a new era barely six months after the last rebirth was heralded. Now there is no more room for second chances, squabbles or dressing-room splits.

This, if anyone has forgotten, is an Ashes year and starting at Sabina Park tomorrow is the first of the six matches - four in West Indies and two back home - that England have to come up with a successful strategy. There are plenty of questions to answer; who should bat at No. 3? Can Andrew Flintoff be a Test No. 6 again (if only for six months)? Is Steve Harmison ever going to be a match-winner again? And who is the frontline spinner?

And that list says nothing of the man who has been centre of attention for the last month. Kevin Pietersen left India defeated, but with a clear plan of how he wanted to take England forward. That plan didn't involve Peter Moores and Pietersen's bosses at the ECB couldn't work with that. So Pietersen was hurriedly and messily returned to the ranks, to be replaced by Andrew Strauss who has now been thrust into the task of bringing the team back together.

In reality, the splits and cliques in the England dressing room have probably been over-egged ever so slightly. Yes, certain people hang around in certain groups but that happens in every walk of life from the playground to the boardroom. The key for England is that differences, if any remain, are put aside. The build-up since arriving in the Caribbean two weeks ago hasn't been stress-free for Strauss. There has been the ubiquitous Flintoff injury concern and a lack of incisiveness from the quick bowlers.

On the plus side Pietersen, it seems, is moving on at least in cricketing terms - he still holds plenty of grudges against people in suits and those in the press box - and if recent events have made him more focused than ever, then in a perverse way it will help England. One thing about Pietersen is he can sense an opportunity and this series over the next five weeks offers him the chance of a mountain of runs.

When England last toured the Caribbean they were 16 months away from an Ashes series rather than six, so the building work that went into making that successful side has to be put on fast-forward. In 2004 the middle order - Mark Butcher, Nasser Hussain and Graham Thorpe - knuckled down and eked out whatever they could on tricky pitches, but had all disappeared by the the 2005 Ashes, to be replaced by the more stylish trio of Strauss, Ian Bell and, of course, Pietersen. The facet that won back the Ashes, however, was formed and forged on these shores. Harmison, Flintoff, Matthew Hoggard and Simon Jones became England's dream team and now it is down to the class of 2009 to try and replicate that development.

What that foursome managed on the previous tour followed the work of another impressive combination during the 2000 series in England and was payback for many years of being on the receiving end. England supporters still remember with vivid reality the 46 all out in Trinidad in 1994, but revenge has been dealt out on numerous occasions in recent times. On four occasions West Indies have been skittled for less than 100, with their 47 all out at this venue five years ago topping (or should that be bottoming) the pile.

Some West Indian commentators think talk of any green-shoots of recovery (much like in the economy) are way off the mark, but there have been some causes for optimism. They earned a 1-1 draw against Sri Lanka and made Australia work for their win during the last home season, and they recently emerged with a (rain-affected) draw in New Zealand. England shouldn't scoff at a record like that. Their efforts in the last 12 months have only been sugar-coated by wins against New Zealand.

In Shivnarine Chanderpaul West Indies have one of the most prolific batsmen of the modern age, the current world No. 1 no less, and in Chris Gayle one of the most destructive. With the ball, Jerome Taylor and Fidel Edwards form a potent pair who can rattle England while Daren Powell has confidently predicted a 3-0 home win, although Powell's prophesising doesn't quite have same sting as Glenn McGrath's. If those players can fire, supported by Ramnaresh Sarwan and the gritty Brendan Nash, who has brought some Australian steel, determination and work ethic to the middle order, there's plenty reasons to expect the unexpected.

But, there's that little two-letter word 'if' - it prefaces so much about the West Indies team because it's so hard to know what team will turn up on the day. There is always a feeling that lurking around the next corner is another batting implosion, although they haven't had a double digit demise since being rumbled for 94 in Barbados on England's last visit.

The absence of Dwayne Bravo, however, is a major blow, much as Flintoff's would be for England, because he has been a shining light through some of their darkest times. He is a lesser bowler than Flintoff but his equal with the bat, however he remains sidelined by an ankle injury.

Yet, as the A-team showed during their handsome display in St Kitts last week these islands are not bereft of talent. Besides England have already come unstuck against a motivated, talented group of West Indian cricketers this winter. They may have been masquerading as the Stanford Superstars back in November, but six of them will line up in Jamaica on Wednesday. If they can show the same drive when a million dollars a man isn't on the table, this could be a fascinating series.