A prominent sports data expert has some advice for Ed Smith, England’s incoming national selector: James Vince should not be in England’s Test team and Eoin Morgan should be replaced in the Twenty20 side.

Dan Weston, a statistics analyst in tennis and cricket, has data to back up his assertion that professional teams make mistakes in their hiring and selection of players and that the English game is still in the “dark ages” when it comes to choosing teams. It is a view that goes to the heart of the question posed by Andrew Strauss to candidates for the national selector job: “Is selection art or science?”

Weston, initially a professional gambler, has developed a company — Sports Analytics Advantage — and meticulously researched England’s