Joe Root endorses use of Kookaburra ball in County Championship 

Root has previously also batted for important tweaks in first-class cricket in England.

Joe Root | GettyIn order to become a more consistent side at the Test level, especially abroad, skipper Joe Root believes England can trial the use of Kookaburra ball in the County Championship for at least half of the season and introduce batting points. 

In first-class cricket in UK currently, the red Dukes ball, with a more prodigious seam, swings around all day, especially in the first half of the season in months of April, May; leaving spinners irrelevant to teams and doing little to promote express fast bowling, which then produces batsmen who graduate to this level with disorganised techniques, lack of tools required to be consistent at the highest level. 

Read Also: Win in South Africa has given England template for Ashes success in Australia, says Root 

The proposal to introduce Kookaburra, which has a thinner seam, in county cricket was first discussed by the England and Wales Cricket Board late last year but no decision was officially taken on the matter, with the ECB allowing things to stay the way they are for the upcoming season. 

"I would like to see a few big changes in county cricket to benefit the Test team," Root said in an interview with Daily Telegraph. "There are things we won't be able to change, like when the games are going to be played. That is going to be a struggle with the Hundred coming in and T20 Blast not moving."

"But things like using the Kookaburra ball for half a season. It is a flat seam, does not stay as hard for as long, so our bowlers get used to bowling with something that does not do as much. Batters get used to that style of cricket, which can be slow and attritional at times."

Root also bats for a tweak in the points system used domestically in England. "Incentivising batting and scoring big runs I would like to see, so perhaps doubling batting bonus points which in turn will bring spinners into the game because the matches will last longer."

"Anything to prolong games and incentivise bowlers in particular to be more skilful and encourage them to bowl fast, or really accurate, have good reverse-swing skills that can travel well in Australia and Asia, would be great for us," he said

The ambition, of course, is to try and regain the Ashes in Australia in 20 months time and Root wants England to be as well prepared as possible. 

"The thing about playing well there is because the wickets are flatter, the ball does not do as much, so performing well in Australia carries well everywhere in the world," he said. "That is why for a lot of the time they have been a successful team in Test cricket, because in Australian conditions it is so difficult to take 20 wickets, batters get used to scoring big hundreds, teams are used to scoreboard pressure when batting second and staring at 500-run leads, so over a period of time they have got used to playing that Test-style of cricket."

"If we can shape a model of how we want to play in Australia - big first-innings scores and not always picking our best players but picking the best players for certain positions. I think that is a big part of it," the captain added. 

"We have a clear plan of how we want to go about playing, which is different to before. We felt for a while it could get a bit muddled, which was down to the interpretation by individual players rather than a really clear method that everyone could fall into line with."

(Inputs from ESPNcricinfo)

 
 

By Kashish Chadha - 28 Feb, 2020

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