Deliverance time for the double act

Second Test: Early hope engendered by Hussain and Fletcher is turning into expectation - now they need a result By Stephen Brenkley

This is a crucial juncture for the partnership which was hired to rescue English cricket. Not so long ago the appraisals were unequivocal: Nasser Hussain was certainly the best England captain since Mike Brearley and probably since Douglas Jardine. Duncan Fletcher was simply the best coach they had ever had.

These judgements may still ultimately prove to be sound, but the language during the First Test, both of spoken and body varieties, allowed room for other thoughts. There may be a point at which a captain and a coach cease to have influence, when their ideas and therefore their usefulness are spent.

"I don't know because I haven't been in the dressing room," said David Lloyd, Fletcher's immediate predecessor, last week. "But what I would say is that a coach needs five years to build a team to his satisfaction and these two together have had three so far if you count the period when Duncan had been appointed but wasn't hands on. When I went after the 1999 World Cup, I had been doing it for three years, I was looking to continue but the contract wasn't renewed."

Lloyd's point is that Hussain and Fletcher still need and deserve more time, but it cannot be concealed that they could both do with something more tangible than an impression that England are better than they were.

The couple were thrown together in July 1999, unknown to each other, in a move which might be put down as a stroke of genius by the England Management Advisory Committee, though it was probably unadulteratedly jammy. After a difficult start, England won four Test series in a row, and never mind that they were still playing catch-up at one-day cricket. Hussain and Fletcher were the saviours and weren't those committee men bright boys. Whoever devised the official strategy for England to become the best side in the world by 2007 suddenly did not seem barking mad.

Now England have gone another four series without victory and Sri Lanka look eminently capable of making it five. The policy makers are again candidates for the funny farm. Fletcher's contract expires at the end of the 2003 English season, Hussain is widely expected to give up the captaincy at the end of the World Cup early next year. But it is now that things are not going their way.

Of course, inspirational captains and intelligent coaches do not lose their touch overnight but the signs at Lord's were disturbing. For almost three days the match went Sri Lanka's way. The tourists were as brilliant as England were dismal.

England's improvement has stopped being matched by results. Indeed, if the first part of the First Test is a yardstick improvement has stopped. They were let down badly by their batsmen, their bowlers and their fielders, which is as bad as it gets for a captain and coach.

On the first morning, Hussain stood in the teapot position as his bowlers erred in length, in the afternoon he denied his main srike bowler, Andrew Caddick, the second new ball. On the second morning he was visibly enraged when the first over of the day from Matthew Hoggard contained three leg-side half-volleys, and on the last afternoon he refused to give himthe new ball at the start of Sri Lanka's second innings.

In between, he had to bat with accentuated fastidiousness while his team batted like clowns. Fletcher, sitting for most of the time on the dressing-room balcony, was more inscrutable but there were distinct signs of intermittent frowns, which by his lights is animated stuff.

The coach has invariably been more candid about his players than he is given credit for, Hussain protects them when he thinks they deserve it. On this occasion they let rip, and during press conferences they were as honest as it is advisable to be if you hope to keep the team with you.

If it would not quite be disastrous to fail to beat a side who had won nine Test matches in a row, it would be unexpected. Sri Lanka have been without Muttiah Muralitharan, they have been playing in rotten conditions (except at Lord's where the sun shone and the pitch was flat) and England picked a side with the express purpose of beating them.

Lloyd has been scrupulous in his measurement of Hussain and, especially, Fletcher, in his role as TV commentator, which must be difficult for an emotional bloke. "The one thing that Fletcher needs is time to do what he wants to do. It is crucial. You can't pass judgements at the moment. But I've always maintained that the coach is very much secondary to the captain. He can only help to put the bits in place for the captain to use.

"It's got to be the captain's team. The relationship is important. It worked for me both with Michael Atherton and Alec Stewart, and Hussain and Fletcher have their own way of operating."

But in this summer of all summers, with Australia and the World Cup to follow in the winter, they need to win and win soon, not least to justify their selection policy. And the wins, in bald statistical truth, do not stack up so wonderfully against the past. Under Lloyd's tenure with Atherton and Stewart England played 33, won nine and lost 13. Hussain and Fletcher begin their 33rd Test on Thursday: they have won 11, lost 11. But Lloyd had played the Australians twice.

Recent interviews with players have shed more light on the Hussain-Fletcher approach. It is clear – as it was always suspected – that Hussain is not afraid of shouting at his players and dressing them down. He will, in a word, call his men "tossers". Fletcher, by contrast, is a one- to-one man but if his wisdom is universally acknowledged, one or two players have lately broken ranks privately and raised eyebrows at his expectations.

Their job is not yet done. But they have it all to do now, otherwise they might be remembered only as the best coach and captain since Lloyd and Stewart.