(ICC Credit)
Tim Paine has criticized England captain Jos Buttler for numerous lapses in judgment during their team’s 36-run loss to Australia in the T20 World Cup match, which puts the defending champions in danger of an early elimination from the tournament.
At the Kensington Oval, Australia set a target of 201/7, and leg-spinner Adam Zampa’s impressive performance of 2-28 in four overs secured a convincing 36-run victory over a lackluster England side. Paine, the former Australian Test captain, believes Buttler made a crucial mistake by opting to bowl first.
“Everyone’s been talking about the fact these conditions are really hard to play in, they’re only going to get harder as the game goes on. To say they won the toss and bowled because there was a short boundary and the wind was blowing that way… was the boundary going to get shorter as the game went on?
“It’s a World Cup game and conditions that you know are going to get harder to play in… you have to bat first. You’ve got to bat first, I don’t care how small the boundary is, that wicket was going to get harder to bat on, that’s the first thing. Win the toss and bat first on that pitch, in my opinion,” said Paine on SEN Radio.
Paine was additionally puzzled by the choice to deploy Will Jacks to bowl the second over for Australia, a decision that backfired as the part-time off-spinner conceded 22 runs to David Warner and Travis Head. The pair consistently targeted the shorter boundary, leaving Paine questioning the strategy behind the move.After the game ended, Buttler admitted his “gut call” to bowl Jacks in the second over was a mistake.
“Secondly, if you’re going to win the toss and bowl, in a huge World Cup game against your archrival, set the tone at the start of the game. If you went through the Australia batting lineup before that game and said, ‘who do you want to face first boys’, every single one of those batters in the top seven would have said, ‘give me some spin before I have to face Jofra (Archer) and (Mark) Wood’, who both bowl 150ks.”
“They went with Moeen Ali, their front-line spinner. The second over, they went with Will Jacks, their part-timer. That is an absolute brain fade. I don’t care what the boundary is or what the wind is doing, you don’t bowl two overs of off-spin to David Warner and Travis Head.”
“You’re giving them 12 balls of a cider before you bring on your guys who bowl 150 kilometres an hour. Then Wood comes on and goes for 20 (in is first over), because Warner has had a look, his nerves have settled, he’s adjusted to the environment around him and taken Wood down. You give one of Wood or Archer the first over of the game and you set the tone straight up,” he elaborated.
To keep their hopes alive for advancing to the Super Eight stage, England must secure significant victories against Namibia and Oman in their remaining Group B matches. Additionally, they’ll need Scotland to lose to Australia to avoid an early elimination from the tournament.
