Chris Waters: England nowhere near the finished article despite series win over South Africa

“Hate to see a lack of fight” –Michael Vaughan.

Just a couple of the comments after England’s capitulation on the final morning of the Centurion Test.

For the record, England lost 7-43 in 65 balls in a little over 60 minutes’ play.

As well as Kagiso Rabada bowled, the young South African taking four of those wickets to finish with match figures of 13-144, the second-best in his country’s history, it was a batting collapse of epic proportions as England lost by 280 runs.

Of course, the customary caveats were all in place… “England still won the series 2-1, it was a great achievement to win in South Africa, not many sides win away from home”, and so on, as pundits and former players all had their say.

But it was a performance that took the gloss off an otherwise impressive campaign and proved that England are nowhere near the finished article.

It was not so much England’s disintegration yesterday that left a sour taste hereabouts, however, as the fact that so many glaring concerns regarding the make-up of their side prior to the series remain glaring concerns.

Is Alex Hales the right man to open the batting?

Is Nick Compton the right man to bat No 3?

Is James Taylor the right man to bat No 5?

Is Moeen Ali a better spin bowling option than Adil Rashid?

And so on.

My own view – as worthless as anyone else’s – has not changed in respect of Adam Lyth for Hales, Gary Ballance for Compton or Taylor, and Rashid for Ali.

Predictably, the Test series has ended with concerns over positions two, three and five in the batting order, and with people saying that Moeen has not done enough in the role of No 1 spinner.

The respective statistics, incidentally, are as follows: Hales (136 runs in eight innings at an average of 17), Compton (245 runs in eight innings at 30), Taylor (186 runs in eight innings at 26), and Ali (10 wickets at 48 to go with 116 runs in seven innings at 29).

Some, of course, will have other concerns.

Is Jonny Bairstow the right man to keep wicket?

Is James Anderson on the way down?

Is Chris Woakes good enough for Test cricket?

Should we be concerned about Alastair Cook’s own underwhelming return of 184 runs in eight innings at 23?

And so on.

Again, my own view – as worthless as anyone else’s – is that Bairstow is the best batsman/wicketkeeper we possess and that he will improve behind the stumps.

Granted, he missed a number of chances (uncharacteristically so, I would suggest, having watched him often for Yorkshire), but some of them were far from easy and I think he is the sort of player who will learn from the experience – just as he has fought back so determinedly with the bat after many people wrote him off in the early part of his Test career.

Bairstow topped England’s batting averages with 359 runs in seven innings at 71 and, like man-of-the series Ben Stokes, is a match-winner.

Anderson had a poor series (seven wickets at 43) and is clearly no spring chicken as he nears his 34th birthday, which he celebrates on July 30.

Some fluctuation in form is, therefore, to be expected, but, in English conditions in particular, the Lancastrian remains a high-class operator who can continue to play an important role alongside Stuart Broad and, if England can only keep him fit, Steven Finn.

Woakes (two wickets in the series at 98) did not carry a huge amount of threat, in all honesty, but he could still perform a fill-in role, if needed, in English conditions.

As for Cook, it was only two months ago that the captain returned home from the United Arab Emirates having finished leading run-scorer in the three-match series against Pakistan with 450 at 90, so fears that he might slide back to the type of struggles he encountered in the early part of 2014 are premature.

Apart from Bairstow and Stokes (411 runs in seven innings at 58 to go with 12 wickets at 29 in a brilliant all-round performance), England’s other standout batsman in South Africa was Joe Root.

The Yorkshireman passed 50 in exactly half of his eight innings – going on to post 110 in the decisive third Test in Johannesburg – and averaged 55.

Broad topped the bowling averages with 18 wickets at 20, helped by that remarkable return of 6-17 at the Wanderers and is now rated the world’s No 1 bowler, while Finn’s contribution of 11 wickets at 26 was an important factor that should not be overlooked.

All in all, there were plenty of impressive individual contributions, as well as plenty of reasons for England to be positive going into the summer’s home Test series against Sri Lanka and Pakistan.

But there remains a significant question mark over selection, particularly in the batting department.

Will England acknowledge this and have the courage to change things?

Now that is the question.