THIRD TEST Hit back from the dead Or lose your place in the Ashes, Root tells his flops
CAPTAIN TRIES TO RALLY HIS DISPIRITED TROOPS
JOE ROOT has told his underperforming and defeated cricketers their Ashes places are on the line ahead of today’s dead rubber against the West Indies.
Root is in charge of a squad and a tour in crisis as they try to manage their meagre resources.
He is using the Ashes as a carrot to try to coax a performance out of a team who could be missing Ben Stokes with a heel injury. That would mean playing both Keaton Jennings and Joe Denly, who are yet to appear against Australia.
There is likely to be a recall for speedster Mark Wood on what is said to be the quickest pitch of the three, while Jonny Bairstow will take the gloves from Ben Foakes.
“There is plenty to play for in this game, especially off the back of those two performances,” said Root.
“There is an Ashes around the corner and it is an opportunity for those guys to show how good they are and put their hand up and put in some proper performances.
“It has been frustrating.
You look at the players and individually you have to have that responsibility, find ways of exploiting the surfaces in front of you, find ways to score consistently, managing risk. The art of
Test cricket is being able to do that around the world and being consistent wherever you go. So it has been quite hard to pinpoint exactly where we’ve gone wrong.
“But on the whole we’ve played a few loose shots, especially early on in our innings, and not given ourselves the opportunity to go out and make big scores.”
The return of Jennings at the expense of Foakes looks like quite an astonishing one seeing as the former was told just one Test ago that he was not good enough and was dropped.
But in a squad that is heavy on wicketkeepers and patently a batsman light, England have few options to turn to if Stokes is unable to take his place in the side as a result of his onerous bowling demands and the suggestion he stepped on a rock while training on the beach here. “As we’ve seen in the recent past when Ben’s not been around, it can make a huge difference, so of course we want Ben fit and firing as many times as possible,” said Root.
“It’s so important to make sure that if he is right he’s going to be able to do his job properly.
“He has had a huge workload due to his ability as a seam bowler and we have to see how he pulls up on the morning of the game.”
Just like they were in Australia in 2017, England have been unsettled by the pace and hostility of the Windies attack, with Shannon Gabriel and Kemar Roach doing most of the damage.
And that lively pair could be joined by the giant Jamaican Oshane Thomas, who has been taken around the islands in this series as cover but could be Jason Holder’s replacement when the action starts today.
“He has good pace and brings some aggression,” said stand-in West Indies skipper Kraigg Brathwaite.
“He’s a tall guy and he’ll bring pace and aggression.
“In the nets he is definitely uncomfortable to face and obviously England didn’t play the pace as they should in the first two Tests. He is very aggressive.”
Root is one key batsman who will need to handle the heat better than he has done so far in the series, and despite evidence to the contrary he is confident his batsmen will be able to cope.
“We know that someone like Shannon can be quite hostile at times,” added Root. “And they’ve got a very wellbalanced attack to exploit conditions here.
“But a number of guys have had success against pace attacks in the past, especially in this current team. Managing hostile spells of bowling is part and parcel of the job and something we have done well.
“You have to get yourself in, get used to the conditions, and find ways of batting long.
“That’s a big challenge for us this week – making sure that we manage that really well and seeing improvement throughout.”
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