Morgan may have retired but his legacy will live on

Piers Morgan has conducted probably one of the most explosive interviews of an active top-tier footballer and has been ruling the internet over the last few days. But this article is not about him. It's about the other Morgan, with whom Piers doesn't have many similarities apart from having an Irish heritage. Oh, he has started his broadcasting career as well, like Piers. 

When Eoin Morgan made his first Test hundred for England, he became the first Irishman to achieve the feat in 104 years. But his career in whites lasted less than two years. Despite that, it was evident that the former Ireland player was an unusual sort of talent. Exceptional player of the sweep and reverse sweep, powerful six-hitter - absolutely tailor-made for white-ball cricket.

So when Alastair Cook went, Morgan, the regular vice-captain of the side, was the obvious choice for the ODI captaincy. He took charge on the eve of the 2015 World Cup and led England to "one of the lowest points in English history". 

Since that embarrassing World Cup campaign, England qualified for the top four of every ICC event - the 2016 T20 World Cup, the 2017 Champions Trophy, the 2019 Cricket World Cup, the 2021 T20 World Cup and the recently-concluded 2022 T20 World Cup - and won two of them. They are now the only team in history to hold the 50-over World Cup and the 20-over World Cup simultaneously. 

But what changed? How did England become this good?

Birth of the 'England philosophy'

England's white-ball team didn't have much to show up until 2015 apart from a World T20 win in 2010. But it was really the early days of T20Is and most teams were yet to work out the way of playing this format. In ODIs, a " lack of intent" was visible. From the start of 2010 to that Adelaide defeat against Bangladesh, England's scoring rate in ODIs was behind all the big guns in international cricket - South Africa, New Zealand, India and Australia. 

At this point, entered captain Morgan and you know the rest.

For him, intent was the key. In an ODI in 2015, England were bowled out for 302 in the 46th over only to lose the match as New Zealand finished the chase with an over in hand. But Morgan was "proud of his boys" as they did "a lot of things right" in that innings. Six of their top seven batters went at a strike-rate of more than 85 and four of them actually went more than run-a-ball. It was clear what Morgan wanted from his team.

During that five-year period mentioned earlier, England couldn't cross the 350-mark in ODIs even once unlike the other four big teams. South Africa, India and Australia had even crossed the 400-mark. Then there was England, playing white-ball cricket like "purists". Eoin Morgan changed that completely. 

Since that Adelaide debacle, England have been comfortably the fastest-scoring ODI team in the world and the only team to score at more than six runs per over during that period. Seven out of 10 highest scores in ODIs during this period belong to England. They even almost crossed the 500-run mark recently against the Netherlands. 

Often in sports, captaincy and coaching are merely an extension of the playing style and attitude of individuals. Diego Simeone, during his playing days, was a combative midfielder and under him, Atletico Madrid grew into a feisty unit, often playing " rough football". Eoin Morgan is the leading six-hitter for England in ODIs and his captaincy and what he wanted from his side was the extension of how he looked at the game. And it worked. England won 69% of the ODIs post the Bangladesh game, compared to just above 50% during that five-year period mentioned above.

Embracing diversity 

There was a massive change in philosophy and in personnel as well. Under Morgan, England were not the "traditionalists" anymore. They had already moved on from players like Ian Bell, James Anderson, Stuart Broad and embraced more dynamic players and the ones who could do a bit of both instead of having only one extreme skill - like Liam Plunkett. Plunkett contemplated retirement around 2015 and he was persuaded not to do so by Morgan. By that time, Morgan identified how he could use Plunkett and it's one of the incredible success stories in modern-day cricket.

Not only Plunkett. Morgan shared a great bond with Adil Rashid, someone whom Jos Buttler calls the "outstanding player" of the team. Rashid made his England debut way back in 2009 and was discarded after only a handful of games. But when he returned to the set-up six years later under Morgan, all he wanted from him was to create chances and not to worry about anything else. It's another incredible story how he became England's go-to man under Morgan. 

But there are some other things beyond cricket that Morgan should be given credit for. Adil Rashid was from Yorkshire and by this time everyone knows their history of treating players of Asian descent badly. "Traditionally, Yorkshiremen have been wary of wrist-spinners. Add to the equation his Asian background and it becomes apparent that Rashid has already achieved much simply by becoming a regular in the Yorkshire side while still in his teens," wrote former England player and now a journalist Vic Marks in 2009. It was clear that players like Rashid and his best friend Moeen Ali needed to feel "at home".

That's where Morgan's quality of being a brilliant man manager came to the fore. He was instrumental in gelling together a cosmopolitan-looking side. Rashid was struggling with a shoulder problem during the 2019 World Cup but Morgan backed him throughout the tournament. After winning the World Cup glory, Morgan said, "I spoke to Adil [Rashid] and he said Allah was with us." 

Just a few days ago, Sky Sports conducted an interview featuring Moeen and Rashid where they spoke about their faith in detail. And there was no one better than Morgan to conduct that interview. Morgan said several times that his England side's culture was built on diversity and inclusivity. We've seen how people have been victims of racism and maltreatment in England while playing cricket and so it was hugely important for the England team to embrace the cultural diversity. And Morgan did that so well.

Acknowledging the significance of data

International cricket has started to accept the importance of data science and Eoin Morgan was one of the first few people to acknowledge it and actually use it to good effect. Nathan Leamon, England team's analyst, was seen showing letter and number combinations during a T20I against South Africa in 2020 and Morgan said the decision to be fed real-time data during a game was both legal and a way to help his decision-making. 

The move was slammed by people like former England captain and Michael Vaughan but Morgan remained unfazed. He knew what he was doing. Successful captains like MS Dhoni depended more on intuitions rather than data but Morgan was ready to become more "open-minded" and use data and match-ups to enforce results. He even took Leamon along when he was part of KKR in the IPL. 

Like England and Morgan, teams in international cricket have started to respect data analysis. Dhoni's compatriot Rahul Dravid, the current head coach of India, is a firm believer in match-ups. It won't be wrong to say that Morgan showed the way and the other teams are now following it. No wonder Leamon called Morgan an "analyst's dream captain".

MS Dhoni in 2007 took charge after a poor World Cup and made the Indian team one of the world's finest, winning World Cups of both formats and leading the team to number one in Tests. Morgan was made the captain when the white-ball side was in shambles and just like Dhoni, he transformed his side to probably the greatest limited-overs side in history. Morgan gelled a multicultural team together like Clive Lloyd and found success like Steve Waugh and Ricky Ponting.

It was Jos Buttler who, in his first ICC event as captain, led England to a silverware. But Eoin Morgan deserves as much credit as Buttler for that. Adil Rashid rushing and giving Morgan a bearhug from the back after the T20 World Cup win tells you the whole story. He was the leader of a revolution. He created a team full of players who won't statistically be called "greats" but the impact of those players, including Morgan, will be long-lasting.