It is almost a week now since England were euthanised out of the Cricket World Cup, and still the most remarkable part of their early exit is not that it was farcically, shockingly inept – although it was still farcically, shockingly inept – but that it was above all surprisingly boring. This is a significant achievement in its own right. It seems that in England’s hands even squawking, slavering, snot-stained failure at every level from batting and bowling, to all‑pervasive corporate claptrap, to an operetta of feuding personalities, can become brain‑manglingly dull.

This is at least something new. Throughout the glorious history of English cricket disasters there has usually been a sense of grand, curdled talents, of a team that might finally brush its head against the ceiling if it could only draw itself up to its full height. And even an affectionate, sitcom-ish kind of comedy: Goochy, Hicky, Stewie, Goughie chafing at the walls of their poky Peckham council flat, fretting around the Formica dinner table, millionaires this time next year.

And so here we are now with an England team it is almost impossible to get a genuine look at, an amorphous blob without edges, or areas of interest, so boring that even the debrief, with the same old talk of mindsets and sacking the coach, seems interminably dull.

The fact is in the end England were beaten by teams who simply had more ragged edges, more extreme qualities, more sense of waspish energy. With this in mind perhaps the best place to start is with something else that seems to have disappeared from English cricket. In the end maybe it all comes back to fast bowlers.

There was a moment during Bangladesh’s innings in Adelaide on Monday that captured precisely England’s sense of managed, toothless tedium. With Bangladesh on 251 for seven, their No7 batsman, Sabbir Rahman, pulled his first delivery from Stuart Broad off the front foot over straight midwicket for a controlled, dismissive six, without at any stage looking particularly pleased or surprised at being able to dump England’s most aggressive bowler straight into the crowd.

Three hours later Rubel Hossain was bouncing out Eoin Morgan with a series of skiddy, nose-shaving lifters, before wrapping up the game by bowling Broad and Jimmy Anderson. So four years of English planning had been kicked to pieces at the last by a 5ft 10in Bangladeshi fast bowler sending down his street-smart reverse-whizzers from a low-slung muscular action. And in the process releasing the ball at between five and 10 miles an hour quicker than any of England’s own battery of semi‑quicks, the most poignant member of which remains Steven Finn who has, after five years of ECB coaching, been reduced to sidling in to bowl like a sad mournful horse preparing to hurl itself under the wheels of a passing tractor.

It isn’t surprising Bangladesh have a quicker bowling attack than England. These days everyone has a quicker bowling attack than England, to the extent that pretty soon the ECB will have to hire quick bowlers like they bring in leg-spinners or left-armers just so the batsmen can practise properly. India have a mini-platoon of right‑arm quicks. West Indies have the throat‑ripping malevolence of Kemar Roach. New Zealand have the raw but thrilling Adam Milne and perfectly grooved but thrilling Trent Boult. Even Afghanistan are outgunning England these days, with Hamid Hassan a gorgeously moreish figure in his Frog Brothers bandanna, all coiled, skiddy menace.

Of course, England as a country has only ever produced a trickle of really fast bowlers, and with good reason, too. Most cricket at development age is played on damp or recently damp pitches, or indoors in some undersized sprung-floor gym. Hardly surprising, then, that the lessons of the early years so often seem to boil down to: 1) Run in without falling over; 2) Get it on target; 3) Repeat until you’re playing for England.

Plus there is at junior level a large coaching lobby that believes in ironing out and regularising on first contact with a young fast bowler. Run-ups are cut. Actions are trimmed and sanded down and made as physically low-impact as possible. Only last week I met an 11-year-old fast bowler who says he has found he can now bowl “much slower” since having the self-made kink ironed out of his delivery bound. There is a fair chance Hussain, for example, simply wouldn’t have been allowed to get away with bowling like that in England, what with his oblique approach, his habit of hurling every ounce of wiry strength into his delivery bound, forgoing the upright seam in favour of fizzing, round-arm reverse swing.

Injury prevention is a part of this and fast bowlers do suffer, even after they’ve been “adjusted” at some junior level by well-meaning English coaches. There is always a risk of injury with a body sacrificed to extreme speed. But then fast bowling is just one of the great sporting extremes, a captivating fast‑twitch discipline of rhythm and flex and gymnastic skill that can shrink with too much heavy-handed tinkering. It is perhaps for this reason that fast bowlers remain cricket’s own caged canaries, their presence a sign of wider good heath and of a system that still lets its cricketers breathe.

At which point: enter England. Over-coaching is a buzzword in its own right but the fact is these days short-form cricket demands more extreme, instinctive qualities, other gears, aggressive variation. Whereas English cricket appears to be bent on the systemic destruction of the unusual and the extreme in all forms. Ben Stokes, who can be ragged but is still the most talented young cricketer in England, has batted only nine times in the top six in ODIs in four years since his debut. Leg‑spinners, power-hitters, players who don’t fit the mould, are given two or three games to fail, their shortcomings gleefully hoarded. And at the end of all this England are left with a team that is not just bad or boring, but boring for the same reason it’s bad.