England embark upon their three-match Twenty20 series against Pakistan at Old Trafford on Friday evening with a side that is unlikely to bear much resemblance to the one Eoin Morgan expects to lead out in the postponed World T20, which hopefully takes place in 2021. Those who play red-ball cricket are absent from his squad and Jason Roy will also be missing from this series after picking up a side strain in training. It is hoped that Roy will be available for the matches against Australia.
The postponement of the World Cup takes some of the edge off this series – as does the absence of any spectators at the ground. But Morgan can, of course, find reasons to imbue it with significance.
Since he is understandably denied his best team at the moment Morgan points out “this is another opportunity for guys who sit outside the 15 [the number of players in a World Cup squad] to present their best case for winter tours and the World Cup next year”, adding: “One of the challenges between now and then is going to be getting our strongest team on the park as often as we can to define their roles.”
There are three fresh faces, who were not involved in the recent one-day internationals against Ireland. Two have plenty of good experiences at this level – Dawid Malan and Chris Jordan. The third, Lewis Gregory, has a curious record. In five T20 outings for England he has faced 19 deliveries and bowled 24. Morgan has a typically positive message to give the relative newcomers: “Feel as comfortable in an England shirt as you do in a county shirt – feel free enough to play the expansive game you would for your county.”
Morgan has decided how they will reshuffle in Roy’s absence but he will not announce this until the toss; the likeliest outcome is moving Tom Banton up to open, which is what he prefers, with Malan, who somehow averages more than 50 in this form of the game after 10 outings, at three. Joe Denly will compete with more obvious all-rounders for the No 6 slot.
Pakistan are led by Babar Azam, who also averages more than 50 (but after 74 matches) and he provides the obvious threat with the bat. “He’s a fantastic player,” says Morgan. “I played with him at Karachi Kings a couple of years ago. He excels by doing the simple things extremely well.”
Babar leads a squad with a remarkable age gap ranging from the 17-year-old Naseem Shah to those approaching 40 such as Mohammad Hafeez and Shoaib Malik. They have an abundance of left-arm pace bowlers with Wahab Riaz and Mohammad Amir linking up with Shaheen Afridi. And keep an eye on the 19-year-old Haider Ali, uncapped but very highly rated. Even though the World Cup is no longer imminent it should be fun.
