By Three Lions
November 22 2020

Team Buttler triumphed over Team Morgan in this warm up math ahead of England’s T20 and ODI series with South Africa.

40 overs was the chosen format for this one as batsmen and bowlers alike looked to get some much needed match practice in ahead of the competitive stuff.

Team Buttler won by 50 runs having made 255 before bowling Team Morgan out for 205.

Joe Root, who amazingly can’t get in to the T20 squad, was the pick of the batsmen scoring 77 from 77 balls. He was backed up by the inform Sam Billings who scored 52 from 44 balls.

Tom Curran and Mark Wood with 4 and 3 wickets respectively did the damage for Team Morgan with the ball.

With the bat no one really got going for Team Morgan until they got down to the ever reliable Chris Woakes who scored 55 from 41 balls before Rashid had him stumped by Buttler.

The Buttler bowlers shared out the wickets but special mentions to Lewis Gregory who claimed 3 victims and to Jofra Archer who went an economy rate of 2.75 from his 4 overs with just the 1 wicket to his name.

So what does this game tell us about possible team selection for the upcoming tour? Well the answer is absolutely nothing. It was no more than a bit of match practice with runs and wickets completely irrelevant to what the England selectors are already thinking.

It will be good to see some competitive international cricket again. It already seems a long, long time since the summer action.

A lot of the team have played the IPL in between so haven’t had much rest. Where on the other hand a lot have had their feet up for a few weeks and will be raring to go.

First up is the T20 stuff staring on Friday and for me not only will the England team selection be fascinating but the batting order will also. I think they have four players who would all like to open who are definite starters. And the two that don’t open won’t even bat three.

England’s T20 squad is probably the best in the world but I feel a world cup is harder to win in this format than in the 50 over format as anything can happen in a T20 game. It only takes a few early wickets or one bowler to get smashed in an over and you can find yourself in big trouble.

Joe Root not making the squad should alone mean England are big favourites but many teams have a lot of quality in this format including this week’s opponents South Africa.  

The form of Sam Billings would surely see him walk in to any other team in the world yet I can’t see him making the cut for this England team at the moment.

There is however undoubted pressure on the established to perform and keep their places. Before the emergence of Malan and Billings, all seemed undroppable, especially after Alex Hales was no longer considered as part of the equation.

I think it will be a close T20 series and I am predicting England to edge it 2 – 1 and at the end I feel that England will still have more questions than answers regarding their best team and indeed their batting order.

Team Morgan v Team Buttler

Discussion started by England Cricket (IP Logged), 22/11/2020 14:49

England Cricket
22/11/2020 14:49

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