England skipper Eoin Morgan on Thursday (April 2) showered rich praise on teammate Jos Buttler, who has auctioned his World Cup 2019 final jersey to raise funds for the fight against COVID-19 pandemic.
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Morgan believes the impact of using the memorabilia for a noble cause outweighs it being in 'someone's drawer as a bit of a trophy'.
"It's an incredibly kind gesture. I'm not one for holding on to memorabilia. We've seen people donate during the Australian bush fires; we saw Shane Warne auction his Baggy Green cap for a million dollars or something absolutely ridiculous. The impact that can have on many lives as opposed to sitting in someone's drawer as a bit of a trophy personally it's something I don't understand,” ESPNcricinfo quoted Morgan as saying.
"People have come out and said they would never do it. Justin Langer said he could never see a situation where he would do something like that but I find that hard to believe.
"Ultimately, when we find ourselves in such a crisis, things like that have absolutely no relevance to what is going on in the outside world. His shirt will go for a lot of money and it should do. But the gesture itself, to help buy new equipment, is absolutely outstanding," he added.
On Wednesday (April 1), Buttler uploaded a video on Twitter in which he lauded doctors and healthcare staff who are on the forefront to fight the deadly Coronavirus.
He further said his shirt – which has the signatures of all England’s players who played the ODI World Cup final last year – will be auctioned to provide life-saving equipment to Royal Brompton and Harefield Hospitals charity.
As of April 2, UK has tested more than 30,000 positive cases for COVID-19 and recorded almost 2400 deaths due to the epidemic, which has claimed over 44,000 lives globally while infecting about 900,000.
Considering the rapidly increasing Coronavirus cases, the ECB last month had suspended all professional cricket in the country till May 28.
