England, in my opinion, might pulling off a 2010's West Indies or Sri Lanka. All spots given to all rounders with only no specialists in their bowling department. The sad truth is, you need to play specialist bowlers and not all rounders no matter how many people or how much they say that cricket is a batsman's game and blah blah. I would disagree, the competition between the ball and the bat is still very high in cricket and is evident from the recent Aus-Sri Lanka series, India vs any opposition in India, New Zealand vs Pakistan, and maybe even England vs Pakistan in England because even though the bowlers did not exactly dominate by a whole lot, we never saw huge scores.
Just because talented individuals like Smith and Kohli have lit up series with their phenomenal batting in Aus vs India series or Hash and AB have decimated with their batting, does not mean that cricket is entirely a batsman's game now. These players are just extremely talented individuals. We still have the Syen's, the Rabada's, the Mitchell Starc's, heck, the Ashes series which Aussies won primarily because of Johnson was only 2 years ago?!
The concept of playing all rounders is like chopping the branch which you are sitting on because it just finishes your own bowling. We saw something similar in the recent ODI's Pakistan played in England where they tried their hand at giving specialist positions to all rounders and it was evident that it may be a wrong move considering the record of most runs in an innings was broken.
Some people may argue that why play an ordinary spinner from your domestic cricketer when you can have someone who has the same talent as him whilst bowling and can also bat a bit. My only example to them is one man: Shahid Afridi. Had he played as a specialist bowler, his career would have been far, far better and I'm not even kidding, he could have been regarded as an ATG by even people on this forum and cricket analysts. Heck, had he only concentrated on his batting he would have had a more successful career. His average certainly would not have been in the 20's.
This is why cricket isn't a sport that is played on computer screens or cricinfo. A lot of things come into consideration. Any psychologist would be ready to point out that playing more than one role takes a toll on you mentally too, if not physically. You have an added responsibility. And many players may feel like that they can perform in the batting department if they're bowling doesn't work out to secure a spot in the team. This is what kill's the team because then you're dividing your time, training and commitment to two different roles in the team and not giving 100% to one role.
Just because you have the talent to do good in more than one department of the game does not mean you should. Ever heard of 'Jack of all trades, master of none', anyone? And playing more than one all rounder (two at MOST) cannot be justified by citing examples of greats like Imran Khan, Kallis and Dev. They were exceptional cricketers and a few exceptions do not make a difference. Even Shane Watson cannot be an example because we all saw how it all took a toll on his body and mentally. In the end, he was only reduced to playing in franchise t20's around the world, bowling 3-4 overs and batting 3 overs at most.
India, in this aspect, are a very interesting team because they don't play too many all rounders. In fact, they only all rounder in their team is Jadega. Instead, they try and convert their bowlers into decent lower order batsmen and that is how the game was/is supposed to be played. Ashwin, Yadav are playing the team as bowlers. Their playing role is BOWLER. If they are to do good, OK. If no, no problem. Batting is the responsibility of the batsmen.
The only problem is, sometimes, this habit of converting bowlers into decent tailenders can backfire because when someone shows some batting ability, he is quickly turned into an all rounder and batted higher up the order which takes a toll on his bowling. The perfect example of this is Irfan Pathan who was nothing short of immensly talented but had his career end only in his mid-20's because of ignorance by the Indian coaches and board. This is where the problem lies for Ashwin too, as long as he was batting at 7 down, it was okay but when he's brought to number 4, this is when India are playing a gargantuan gamble with their best bowler. No matter times they tell him that, its OK if he doesn't perform as a batsman, somewhere, deep down inside, he WILL most definitely feel like he's not doing good enough and he need's to work on his batting and then, the division of time and resources will come into play. If not that, then it will be enough of a mental battle for him to fail in his stronger department, or at least not find the success as he did in the past and may be reduced to being a bits and pieces player.
So, I think, there's a reason players have specialist positions. Even in our daily life, we have our own particular roles. We're supposed to do one job and when someone works more than they can, it starts to show. When single mothers raise children, we see what's missing. We see the toll that it takes on the mother, or the child. So, from this example from our daily lives, I think its easy to say, its best to let the professionals do their job and only play one all rounder in the team, someone like Abdul Razzaq, bits and pieces and player. If that one all rounder turns legendary, good. But don't expect for all your all rounder's to do the same and ruin the team.
Actually, its just that this is a topic I strongly feel about since we talk too much of the competition between the bat and ball being reduced to nil even though it is usually the managements fault that batsmen succeed.
