World Champion status may have ended up in the bin but, ahem, European bragging rights belong to England. An incendiary century from Ben Stokes helped brush aside the Netherlands for a 160-run victory in Pune that lifted Jos Buttler’s men off the bottom of the World Cup table - not that the dyke didn’t threaten to once again burst along the way.
Could England sink any lower against one of the Low Countries? It was the question being asked before this basement battle and for an hour it looked eminently possible. Batting first after winning the toss, a hideous, self-inflicted collapse turned 133 for one from 20 overs into a troubling 192 for six by the 36th, with Buttler, a captain looking increasingly bereft, among those adding to England’s hall of shame in this failed campaign.
