England’s selectors on Monday named the squads for the threematch ODI and as many T20I series against Australia. The selection of the squad shows that England has taken Australia quite seriously. But if one goes by the squad of England against Pakistan, it suggests that English selectors took the Pakistani team lightly. It can be said that England selected players against Pakistan intending to prepare a team for the future. However, this team gave Pakistan a tough time. But English selectors are quite careful in choosing players for the white ball cricket matches against Australia.
England’s selectors have rewarded Jos Buttler for his excellent performance in Test cricket by selecting him for T20 and One Day squads. Fast bowlers such as Jofra Archer and Mark Wood have succeeded in getting a place in both the teams. Curran brothers have been selected in both the teams to make the batting line-up strong. Chris Woakes, who played match-winning innings with Buttler in the Test, has also been selected in the One Day team.
At the same time, pacers like Saqib Mahmood, David Willey, and Lewis Gregory have been shown the door. This illustrates the fact that there is no dearth of talent in the England team. This is the reason why the England and Wales Cricket Board favored the idea of playing Tests and T20 at a time. It shows the abundance of talent which made England confident of winning both the matches at a time. Both the teams of England proved it also at least against Pakistan.
The greatest power of England is its batting. The reality is that this makes a lot of difference between one team and its rival in cricket. Interestingly, the strike rate of the top six batsmen of England is better than Pakistan’s Babar Azam, who is considered to be the No. 1 batsman in T20. What Pakistan should now do is stop boasting about Babar and start analysing his strike rate and match-winning attitude. If Babar continues to play like this then he can always get applause in the cricket of shortest form but he cannot script any victory.
Anyway, the point of discussion at present is England. And the teams of the world should learn from it. Pakistan is not taking risk of giving budding players a chance to play, but England, at the same time, has the confidence of winning the match relying on youngsters like David Malan and Crawley. While selecting players, England did not care for the fact that three wicketkeepers have been taken in the team.
When Jonny Bairstow is performing well, so on what ground can he be sent out? If Sam Billings is giving a good performance against Ireland then how can he be kept out of the team simply on the plea that there are so many wicketkeepers in the team? The question, therefore, arises whether Sri Lanka, Pakistan, and Bangladesh can show themselves to be professional teams by giving so many such cricketers the chances to play like this.
English selectors did not show any confusion in exiting David Willey, who was said to be a star in the making. It was said that Willey’s swing, speed, and seam movement are all different. It is a matter of luck that Joe Root is in One Day squad. If he continues to play average games as he played in some recent Tests then there is all possibility of him being dropped from the One Day team also. First, it was England versus West Indies, then it was England vs Pakistan and now from 4 September onwards it is going to be a series between England and Australia.
The earlier two series hosted by England have turned out to be spellbinding matches in the world of cricket. Now, the upcoming EnglandAustralia series is going to carve a special niche for itself in the history of cricket.