By Three Lions
November 23 2020

Joe Root

Test Captain Joe Root has yet again been left out of England’s T20 squad for the tour of South Africa but are the England selectors making a mistake by not selecting him?

Root is a beautiful manipulator of the ball but his lack of power seems to be the reason behind his omission as England look to a more explosive batting line-up.

Root is a certainty in the 50 over format so is T20 that much different that someone with Root’s ability can’t be used? You wouldn’t see New Zealand dropping Williamson would you.

With the emergence of Malan you can see why England may feel they will struggle to get Root in to the team. I am not here suggesting he should be a guaranteed starter but surely you would want him in your 15 man squad as a different option if any of the batsmen aren’t firing.

Billings seems to be backup batsman at the moment and you could say rightly so given his current white ball form but does that still exclude Root given that we have allrounders so perhaps could go with one less out and out bowler in the squad.

You could also argue that at the moment in this format only, Root would be better as a second spinner than Moeen Ali and is also a safer bet with the bat. But then where would you put him in the batting order?

Could Root come in at 7 behind Roy, Bairstow, Malan, Stokes, Buttler and Morgan? Or are we going in with a batsman too many there? Two early wickets and he could perhaps be pushed up to 4 to give some stability before unleashing further fire power.

The bowlers could still then be Archer, Wood and Rashid with Tom Curran battling with Jordan for the 4^th spot and then you also have Stokes and Root to bowl as well.

I think not having Root in the squad at all when it comes to the world cup would be a mistake and a dangerous one to make.

That would be my eleven. You could even rotate a bit for games when you feel it is one batsman too many or you want another seamer or another spinner.

The rest of my squad would be Moeen, Billings, Sam Curran and the one that missed out in Jordan and Tom Curran.

You still have two fast bowlers on the bench including a left arm option, an extra spinner and an extra batsman.

I know it is only county cricket but Root showed when he went back to Yorkshire at the end of the summer just what a quality player he is in T20 cricket.

He scored loads of runs at a good strike rate and was even going at two a ball in one game before he ran Lyth out and everything went to pieces.

He showed that you don’t need to be smashing the ball for six to all sides of the ground to score at a decent rate and that you can do it by playing proper cricket shots if you have the quality.

I do however think the selectors are being stubborn on this one and will only move back to Root if one of the batsman has a bad series or two before the world cup.

Should Root Be in England’s T20 Squad?

Discussion started by England Cricket (IP Logged), 23/11/2020 14:32

England Cricket
23/11/2020 14:32

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