DUNCAN FLETCHER is about to complete seven years as England’s coach. After coming to the job with no Test experience, he now has more of it than any player in his care: the dead-rubber game against Pakistan starting on Thursday will be his 90th.

Among the other national coaches, only John Buchanan, of Australia, has lasted as long and he is stepping down after the World Cup.

In sport, old dogs need new tricks and lately Fletcher has learnt to surprise us. After spending years perfecting the art of the stony-faced dead-bat response to the mildest inquiry, he suddenly produced a ghosted book about the Ashes triumph that was both entertaining and revealing.

Then, this summer, he allowed himself to be talked out of some of his most entrenched positions. First the policy of five bowlers was abandoned, as Andrew Flintoff, now far more influential as a bowler than a batsman, was replaced by Ian Bell.

Then, when Liam Plunkett was injured, the idea that No 8 must be able to bat went out of the window, leaving England with four No 10s.

In front of them was Geraint Jones, a big Fletcher favourite who had been given 31 Tests to prove himself as wicketkeeper-batsman, in sharp contrast to the eight that his predecessor, Chris Read, was granted. Fletcher astonished everyone by accepting that Jones had turned into what Read had been — a fine wicketkeeper making too few runs — and thus reverted to Read.

The one sign of the old Fletcher came after Old Trafford when he was thoroughly grudging about Monty Panesar’s finest hour, saying we must see how he goes on a less helpful pitch, and harrumphing for the umpteenth time about his batting and fielding.

His batting was actually better than Matthew Hoggard’s, and his fielding was a lot less Charlie Chaplin than it had been. But after Panesar’s almost equally fine hour at Headingley Carnegie, even that tune changed. Fletcher now rates him the best finger spinner in the world, which must mean that he retains his place even when Ashley Giles is fit.

The defining moment of Fletcher’s career will always be 2005, but in 2006 he has offered something almost as good: a redefining moment. He has opened his mind. He has always been an ideas man, capable of coming up with anything from a simple forward movement against spinners to a system of car numberplates for his native Zimbabwe. But his ideas have tended to become idées fixes.

There is a telling passage in his book when he talks about last summer’s dilemma over who to pick for the final two Ashes batting spots — Graham Thorpe, who had played 100 Tests, Ian Bell, who had played a few, or Kevin Pietersen, who had played none. Fletcher decided that Thorpe was too restricted by a bad back to bat at four and Pietersen was too flamboyant. So Bell had to go at four, and the issue came down to a showdown between Thorpe’s canny resilience and Pietersen’s flair.

Fletcher was right to embrace Pietersen, but wrong to see Bell as the only option at four. Bell turned out to be too mousy to go in so high against the big bad Aussies. It is no coincidence that he has now flourished at six. Even a crabby Thorpe would have been a better bet to glue England’s batting together against Shane Warne.

Similarly, now, even a Darren Gough who is not as fast as he was is a better bet to bowl straight in one-day internationals than anybody else. And Fletcher has shown an open mind here, too, allowing Gough to return from the outer darkness into which he had danced over the winter.

At the risk of sounding like the old Fletcher, I don’t think we should get too excited about beating Pakistan, who have played quite bizarrely. The way they produced one of the great partnerships of all time and nothing else, the way they kept running themselves out, it all harked back to the days when the whiff of match-fixing was in the air. Their bowling has been so accommodating that it is hard to say whether Alastair Cook has really arrived at Test level yet; he certainly won’t be giving Warne sleepless nights yet. But you can only play what’s there and England sealed the series with verve.

Fletcher’s newfound flexibility has made a big difference. In 12 months England have gone from being a very good team, to a less good team, to a very good squad. They have plenty of options now for the Ashes. And you would back Fletcher to choose the right ones.

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