Buttler still hopes to be a big hitter in the Ashes for England
JOS BUTTLER is planning to use the five-match one-day series against West Indies as a shop window for his Ashes ambitions — and he insists he can make a go of it in England’s Test middle order as a specialist batsman.
Buttler’s clean hitting in whiteball cricket remains one of the wonders of the modern English game, but it has come at the expense of his red-ball fortunes. And time is not on his side: the selectors will name their 16-man squad for Australia towards the end of this month.
Failure to secure a place on the plane — there are plenty who believe Surrey’s Ben Foakes should travel as Jonny Bairstow’s wicketkeeping understudy — will mean another winter of money-spinning Twenty20 franchise cricket.
Buttler already has a gig lined up in the Bangladesh Premier League in case the selectors don’t come calling, and there is the possibility of another stint in Australia’s Big Bash.
But he describes himself as a ‘child of the 2005 Ashes’. And it is to cricket’s most famous rivalry that his focus is turning as he seeks to resurrect his Test career that began to falter against Australian off-spinner Nathan Lyon two summers ago.
‘Any format of international cricket that you perform in gives you a chance to be selected in other formats,’ he said.
‘This one-day series for a lot of guys is very good timing: it’s before a huge winter in all forms of the game and good performances won’t do you any harm.
‘I was part of an Ashes series in 2015. For any English or Australian player, the Ashes is still the main thing.
‘I learned a lot in 2015. I was so desperate to do well and so desperate to improve that I spoke to lots of people and wanted to learn every single thing about the Ashes and what it was like. I spoke to so many people that in the end I just confused myself.
‘Now I’ve come to realise that I’m my own best coach and that my filter is probably a bit better. I love talking about cricket because I absolutely love the game, talking mind-sets and techniques and that sort of stuff.
‘But now I probably know what works best for me and that’s what I always come back to.
Buttler’s problem is a problem of the age, for he has long run the risk of being pigeon-holed as a whiteball specialist whose party pieces — notably the ramp over fine leg — are more likely to become internet memes than win Test matches.
Since April, he has played only six red-ball innings for Lancashire, scoring 103 runs at the forgettable average of 17. In the same time, he has played 24 Twenty20 innings for England, Lancashire and Mumbai Indians, often confirming his status as one of the most watchable batsmen in the world.
His Test recall, then, looks dependent on the selectors’ gut feel – or on a performance so breathtaking in the next few matches against West Indies that his case becomes irresistible.
And with Bairstow’s glovework improving, Buttler’s best hope of adding to his 18 Test caps is as a middle-order batsman.