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David Lloyd's first game as England coach was at Edgbaston three years ago, against India. England won the Test, the series, and the man from Accrington dreamt sweet dreams of the glories that lay ahead. Yesterday, he left an England dressing-room for the last time, on the same ground, after watching a far more resolute Indian team banish them from a competition he and the players had set their hearts on winning. The atmosphere, he said, was ``desolate''.

They were never good enough, and in the end they weren't lucky enough. They tried their hardest and yet they couldn't even reach the second stage. It gives no observer much pleasure to say ``told you so'', because most of us wanted to see them do well. Never mind the fact that this cricket is only the froth and bubble of the one-day game; if England had won the World Cup it would have given everybody a terrific lift.

Instead, Lloyd leaves his post two weeks earlier than he would have liked, and he will feel a lonely man this morning. He has a well-paid job to go to, at Sky Television, which he will do supremely well, but it will take a few months to get over the disappointment of the one he leaves. In years to come he may still find it hard to avoid pondering all the might-have-beens, if only he had received a kinder hand.

He will remember the Edgbaston Test of 1997, when the ground that resounded to Indian celebration yesterday was awash with English joy. That was Nasser Hussain's match. He made a superb double-hundred, Graham Thorpe contributed a fine century of his own and people had to pinch themselves as the mighty Australians took a pounding. Then Glenn McGrath bowled England out for spit at Lord's and Shane Warne turned the series round on a crucial day at Old Trafford. That was one dream up in smoke.

He will recall the way England fought back in Trinidad in January 1998, after losing a Test they should have won at their leisure on the same ground the week before. They surrendered a winnable series to a West Indies team that was then, as it is now, deeply flawed, and at the conclusion of the final match in Antigua, Lloyd was inconsolable. That was another.

England should have won that series, and he knew it. But when a bowler performs as poorly as Andrew Caddick did in Trinidad, and when batsmen make a habit of giving their wickets away, as they did yesterday, there isn't much a coach can do. It is very convenient to find victims in defeat, because that absolves people of the need to look beyond the result to find the underlying causes of decay. That doesn't mean we shouldn't try.

Lloyd makes a poor victim. He was not overtly at fault for England's poor overall performance during his period in office. He didn't pick the team, and he can't be held responsible for the manifest inadequacies of English cricket. As Micky Stewart and Keith Fletcher did before him, he went into the woods like Little Red Riding Hood, knowing that ``everything you learn there helps when you return there''.

Ask the players what they make of Lloyd and, to a person, they will tell you he is loyal, thorough, conscientious - and passionate. At times he was too passionate. He played every ball with the players, and fought their corner, even when it was unwise to throw a punch. If some people find fault with that, it is the price he put on the value of an England cap. It is a serious matter and, where cricket is concerned, he is a serious man.

That revelation will surprise many, for whom the apparently well-rehearsed Albert Modley routine (''in't it grand when you're daft?'') does service for the whole man. True, Lloyd can play the clown, but don't let that fool you. He has a sharp and curious mind, and is an engaging and generous man. Those are not qualities to despise.

In matters medical, physical and, heaven help us, psychological, England's players are better prepared now than they have ever been, and Lloyd can take credit for that. Nor is he one for harping on about the past. He recognises that the outstanding cricketers of this era would have been great at any time.

He still has a lot to offer the game. The most important work in cricket is done with young players, before the lazy habits of the professional game are too deeply ingrained to rectify. Lloyd, who was once described by a senior cricket figure as ``the finest coach of young cricketers I have seen'', should retain some involvement at that level, in addition to his media work.

Until English cricket finds that talent, and refines it, the national side can never hope to compete properly against the best teams in the world. They do it at under 19 level but Test cricket is a step beyond that. It separates the men from the bairns and, there, far too many soft cricketers have represented England in recent years, however competitive they may try to appear.

Yes, Lloyd said some daft things and he employed some peculiar methods of motivation, or ``focus'', as the horrid new buzzword has it. To play Churchill's wartime speeches in the dressing-room invites scorn. It is, after all, only cricket. Sportsmen may talk about going into the trenches but they don't mean it. At least, one hopes they don't.

Lloyd spoke with some feeling last week about people not getting worked up about the three games England had won in their group because ``we're English and that's the way we are''. Actually, it was because the games England had won were tame affairs that did not stretch them. Those who withheld their consent were the wise ones.

A lack of obvious enthusiasm, like irony, sarcasm and understatement, is an English virtue, though the outgoing coach may not see it like that right now. Another virtue - it still exists, just - is a sense of fair play. In time, the people who speak lightly of Lloyd will see him in a better light. He has done his best. No man can ask more.