Even though New Zealand will be treating this two-match Test series against England as a warm-up for the upcoming World Test Championship final against Team India at Southampton, England on the other hand will be thinking about the upcoming Test series against India in August.
Former England skipper Kevin Pietersen has advised the current English team to start looking for their own ‘Ravindra Jadeja’, a player who is a good left-arm spin-bowling all-rounder, a gun fielder, and can make a difference with his batting.
“It frustrates me that there still isn’t an international-standard English left-arm spin bowler who bats. someone of that ilk is priceless. They must identify and properly develop a left-arm spin all-rounder or that department will always be a weakness,” Pietersen wrote in his blog.
Pietersen not only called Jadeja an “absolute superstar”, but also urged the emerging cricketers from England to copy the 32-year-old all-rounder in order to have a long career.
Since the English team went with no spinner in the first Test match against New Zealand at Lord’s, Pietersen feels this shows their bowling options.
With England scheduled to take on India in a five-match Test series from August 4 followed by an Ashes series in Australia in December this year, the England team needs to stop continuous experiments with players and have a settled batting order instead.
The 40-year-old then recalled the team that went to Australia for Ashes during the 2010-11 season when the England side had a settled team which consisted of Alastair Cook, Andrew Strauss, Jonathan Trott, Paul Collingwood, Ian Bell, Matt Prior, and himself in the top seven.
(With News18 Inputs)
