England need big changes to get to top: Warne

Despite retaining the Ashes urn England needs to bring in huge changes to achieve their dream of becoming the best team in the world, feels Australian spin legend Shane Warne.

"It is a realistic aim because they have improved a lot over the last 12 months thanks to the management of Andy Flower. But you have to look at English cricket as a big cake," Warne wrote in The Telegraph.

"Lots of different ingredients have gone in to making it what it is now and a few have to be added to give it the extra bit of spice to make it the best in the world," he added.

Warne feels it is important to bring some changes in the format of the English county cricket to produce more quality players, which will boost their dream of becoming the world number one team.

"English cricket must not rest on its laurels. Now is the time to make big changes to ensure the England team gets to the top and stays there," he added.

"When you are winning, it is the ideal time to take tough decisions and build on what has gone before. For England, that means having a fresh look at county cricket.

"It is time to cut county cricket from its traditional base of 18 teams back to 10. It is hard but, if they want to be No1, they have to do it now.

"There has been a lot of talk about it in the past and a lot of committees formed. Now is the time to put 10 teams together, work it all out and say 'right, we are serious about being No1 in the world'," he added.