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Former England captain Alastair Cook has admitted that the young English batting line-up will face a major challenge when they come up against Indian bowlers in the five-match series.
England put up a miserable batting show to go down against New Zealand in the recent Edgbaston Test, thus conceding the two-match series 1-0.
In the Tuffers and Vaughan podcast, Cook stated that England’s young batting line-up would find it tough against a quality Indian bowling attack.
“When the pressure comes on, this England batting unit doesn’t respond too well, they often collapse, when the game’s right on the money or when it becomes tough. It would be interesting to see how they cope with India. It will be a great challenge for them.”
Cook added that England has too many inexperienced batsmen in the top and middle-order, which has been one of the chief causes of their troubles.
“We’ve also got to look at how many games these guys have played. (Dom) Sibley 20, (Rory) Burns 25, (Zak) Crawley 14, (Ollie) Pope 19. So four out of the top five, take Joe Root out of it, have played less than 25 games. In a really seasoned Test side, you only want one player with under 20 games. You want everyone else with 50-60 Tests.
“The England side which went to Australia in 2010-11 - myself, (Andrew) Struass, (Jonathan) Trott at three, KP (Kevin Pietersen) at four, (Ian) Bell at five, (Paul) Collingwood at six - we had all played 50-60 Test matches. We had all gone through what Sibley, Burns and Crawley are going through at this particular time.”
England’s batting could get blown away: Phil Tufnell
According to former England left-arm spinner Phil Tufnell, the hosts could get blown away by India if they do not do something about their batting line-up.
“We were talking about Joe Root, in the 50-over game, being a situation player. I didn’t see any of that against New Zealand in those two Test matches. I still think there is a huge worry about the top three. Rory Burns in probably pretty much pinned in. But there are two or three spots lurking around. Ollie Pope short of runs, the likes of James Bracey came in, he was nervous. That batting order against that Indian bowling line-up will struggle, and they will need to do something about it because we could get blown away.”
The five-match India-England series will kick-off with the first Test in Nottingham from August 4.
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