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Ford: New coach will benefit England

FORD FOCUS: Graham Ford
FORD FOCUS: Graham Ford

I'M CONFIDENT that, under the new coach Peter Moores and acting captain Andrew Strauss, England will hit the ground running this summer.

The freshness that Moores will bring is a good thing, obviously Duncan Fletcher enjoyed some good Test results and did a lot of good things, but there's always something up beat when a new coach takes the helm because it ignites energy in the entire set up.

There is a little bit of uneasy pressure on England in that the West Indies without Brian Lara and are seen as something of a weak option. A lot will be expected of the home side.

I thought Clive Lloyd played some clever psychological games when he said the days the West Indies dominating are gone and that he'd be happy if they compete and maybe win one Test in the series.

He was maybe trying to get England to drop their guard a little as, even though they will miss Lara, they still have some very talented cricketers.

The interesting thing for me is that their preparation for touring here has been virtually non-existent. They finished the World Cup a few weeks back and don't appear to have done much since.

They also have a stand-in coach and a new skipper and, as far as practice time is concerned, they seem a little under-cooked and in a bad place in terms of their preparation.

But cricket is such a funny game, it only takes one player to do something magical, create some forward momentum and the likelihood is the rest of their team might follow, and that is exactly what England have to beware of.

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