Eoin Morgan has poured cold water on the idea of rejigging the balance of his England one-day team to accommodate Jonny Bairstow, with the Yorkshireman’s likeliest route into the side for the Champions Trophy remaining an injury to a first‑choice player.
The decision to grant Ben Stokes, Jos Buttler and Chris Woakes an extended run in the Indian Premier League enabled England to use the two-match series with Ireland over the weekend as an opportunity for squad players to get some game time, to which Bairstow responded with an unbeaten 72 from 44 balls at Lord’s on Sunday.
These runs and a career-best 174 for Yorkshire against Durham last week merely continue a two-year purple patch with the bat for Bairstow – one during which he has scored 1,470 Test runs at 58 in 2016. However, Morgan remains set on his current batting lineup going into the summer’s eight-team global tournament.
Asked whether Bairstow’s hopes of a spot still rest on a fitness issue in the top six, the England captain replied: “It is looking like that at the moment, which is unfortunate for him.”
One possible way for England to accommodate Bairstow, given a full-strength squad, would be to leave Moeen Ali out of the side and to use Joe Root as the sixth bowler, as was the case against Ireland when his part-time off-breaks claimed five wickets across the 2-0 victory including a career-best three for 52 on Sunday.
The head coach, Trevor Bayliss, was open to this option and discussed the subject after the match – the pitches produced, he said, may mean it is considered – but, with Stokes returning to give a seam-bowling option who bats in the top six, Morgan generally sees greater value in having the spinner Moeen’s all-round abilities at No7.
He said: “To justify an out-and-out batter at seven, I’m not sure you can. The number of balls faced in that position, the spread on them is very small over the course of say 10 games. If he faces 40 balls in one game, is he going to face 40 balls that will win you a game? Or could your all-rounder going to do the same job get you up to a par score and then contribute more with the ball? It is weighing up what is more beneficial.”
When reminded of Bairstow’s brutal late assault against Ireland, in which his last nine deliveries faced were plundered for 33 runs, Morgan replied: “Yes, but you can’t guarantee that and how often would he be used?”
Morgan was speaking at the launch of NatWest’s “Cricket has no boundaries” campaign in south London on Monday morning before flying out to rejoin his IPL franchise, Kings XI Punjab, for a six-day stint. The England captain will then return for the three-day training camp in Spain that begins on 16 May, before the three-match series with South Africa that acts as a warm-up to the Champions Trophy in June.
Sam Billings, who kept wicket over the weekend in the absence of Buttler, has previously said opponents will be “petrified” of facing England during the three-week tournament. Certainly their batting has been reinvented since the last World Cup, with no team bettering either their overall run-rate of 6.27 or 19 totals in excess of 300 during this time. Morgan, however, remains keen to play down talk of being the side to beat this summer.
He said: “I think Sam is rediscovering the word ‘petrified’. That is not true at all. We are not favourites. We went to India in January and didn’t win, we lost our last series to Australia [at home in 2015]. We need to beat big sides to earn that right and the guys know that in the changing room.
“I think everybody is aware of the capabilities that we do have and I think that creates a different challenge when playing against us. Everybody enjoys bowling first now and, if you lose the toss and bat, you’re not sure what a good total is. We’re becoming one of those sides that you don’t know how good a score is because of how deep we bat.”
