Coach Duncan Fletcher's taciturn manner masks a steely determination and a fierce loyalty that have for eight years made him a firm favourite with England's cricketers.

But his resignation on Thursday after England's second-round World Cup exit suggested that like so many sports figures before him he lost his sense of timing.

Hindsight is a fine thing in any walk of life but how the quiet Zimbabwean must rue not quitting when he and England were so close to the top of the world.

Photographs: Getty Images | Text: Reuters

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