England know they have to be England, and fast

As England's players picked the bones out of the thrashing by New Zealand in their World Cup opener, Joe Root made a telling prediction. "I don't think we'll see guys getting caught mid-off or long-off check-driving anymore," Root told the BBC. "They'll be hitting it 20 rows back."

Root's 77 was England's top score and represented a welcome return to form for him after a quiet series against New Zealand last month. He was at the non-striker's end for five of his team-mates' dismissals and appeared to sense a pattern: with the exception of Harry Brook, England's batters were not dismissed while trying to hit sixes.

Take Jonny Bairstow. He fell looking to loft Mitchell Santner inside-out over extra cover, but with the ball angling straight in from around the wicket, rather than turning away, it hit the inner half of his bat and looped harmlessly towards wide long-off, where Daryl Mitchell took a good running catch to his left.

At the death, with England looking to accelerate, Liam Livingstone had faced four consecutive dot balls from Trent Boult when he shaped to work a knuckleball away into the gap between midwicket and long-on. Instead, his leading edge hung in the air, giving Matt Henry time to run in off the boundary to settle underneath it.

Brook's downfall came about in a fashion that would infuriate many, caught in the deep trying to hit a fourth consecutive boundary off Rachin Ravindra during an over of drag-downs. So did Moeen Ali's, playing across the line to Glenn Phillips. While Root himself was yorked while attempting to reverse-sweep the same bowler.

But England's uncharacteristic batting innings, scraping to 282 for 9 thanks to a 30-run last-wicket stand, was characterised by tentative shots more than full-blooded ones. According to ESPNcricinfo's ball-by-ball data, New Zealand attacked 28% of the balls they faced; England only 17%.

Even Jos Buttler fell tamely. He made a clear attempt to target New Zealand's change bowlers, hitting James Neesham and Ravindra for straight sixes. But when Henry returned, he pushed at a ball that shaped back in - "wobble-seam, trying to use the crease," Henry explained - and was caught behind. He immediately threw his head back in frustration.

England clearly tried to target New Zealand's allrounders. With Lockie Ferguson (back) and Tim Southee (thumb) unavailable, and Ish Sodhi left out, Tom Latham had to rely on 20 overs split between Neesham, Ravindra and Phillips, who returned combined figures of 3 for 149.

But perhaps England were too deferential against New Zealand's three main bowlers in Boult, Henry and Santner. Their combined figures were 6 for 133 in 30; Devon Conway and Ravindra showed no such caution against England's frontline bowlers, taking down Chris Woakes, Adil Rashid and Mark Wood.

Eoin Morgan, Buttler's predecessor, was scathing in his assessment of England's intent at the break, suggesting that they had let slip an opportunity to apply pressure after hitting Boult's first over for 12. "You'd say that England didn't throw many punches," he said on Sky Sports. "They didn't go hard enough."

After the game, he added, "They were so far off the mark. If you listened to Jos Buttler throughout the back-end of our summer, he continued to reiterate the message that you have to be more aggressive, to be brave… You have to be able to compete to say you were outplayed; for a lot of the game this evening, England didn't compete."

Root expects England to be jolted into gear by their defeat. "It reinforces what we are about as a team," he said. "We can remember how good we are, remember how intimidating we are as a batting group and double-down on it, really put sides under pressure and get those massive scores that blow teams away."

England do not need to panic. Six wins from their next eight games is almost certain to get them through to the semi-finals, and even five could be enough. "It's one loss at the start of a very long tournament," Buttler said. "We're not robots: sometimes you don't play as well as you'd like. We'll be better for the next one."

They flew to Dharamsala on Friday ahead of their next fixture against Bangladesh on Tuesday where conditions will be very different. The weather will be cooler, the ball will travel at altitude, and a 10.30am start should ensure more uniformity across 100 overs than on Thursday, when the ball came on to the bat much better under lights.

But Buttler will be frustrated that after seeming to rediscover their groove and tempo in this format last month, his batters did not exert sustained pressure on New Zealand's bowlers. If anything, New Zealand batted more like England than England did themselves.