Ahead of the Test series against India, England wicketkeeper-batsman Jos Buttler has hailed Joe Root’s game against spin bowling, saying that the latter is one of the best exponents of the sweep shot.
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Root led his team from the front with match-winning knocks of 228 and 186 in the first and second Tests as England inflicted 2-0 whitewash over Sri Lanka during the recently held series.
"Joe was in fantastic form in Sri Lanka, he has always had a brilliant game to play spin bowling. He is one of the best exponents of the sweep shot and he picks length brilliantly. It is a big strength when playing spin, he is very hard to bowl dot balls at. He scores quickly against spin and he has so many shots, he manages to rotate strike.
"He did that fantastically well in Sri Lanka, the biggest thing about him was the hunger shown by him to bat for long periods. He showed great application both mentally and tactically. He is in great form and it is a great place for him to be at just at the start of the year," ANI quoted Buttler as saying during a virtual press conference.
When asked whether speedster Jofra Archer would be the biggest X-factor for England in the Test series, Buttler replied: "Jofra Archer is certainly an X-factor player, it is fantastic to have Jofra back into the side, he would be excited to do well in this series. We have a few guys who can do quite amazing things with the ball. Stuart Broad and James Anderson are two of the best to play this game, Jofra is a huge X-factor and Ben Stokes is a pretty good X-factor player as well."
India will host England in a full-fledged bilateral series, comprising 4 Tests, 5 T20Is and 3 ODIs.
The first Test will be held in Chennai from February 5-9. The second Test will be at the same venue from February 13-17 before the action moves to Ahmedabad for the last two Tests (February 24-28 and March 4-8).
After the Test series, Ahmedabad will host five T20Is from March 12 March 20 while the three-match ODI series will be played in Pune from March 23 to March 28.
(With ANI inputs)
