Assistant coach Marcus Trescothick has given Rehan Ahmed a vote of confidence as the leg-spinner waits to find out if he will be part of England’s Ashes squad.
A selection panel led by managing director Rob Key and head coach Brendon McCullum will finalise their touring party this week, with the majority of their decisions needing little more than a rubber stamp.
One seam slot and a slow bowling back-up to Shoaib Bashir are the main areas to resolve, with Ahmed firmly in contention after an impressive season at Leicestershire.
The 21-year-old, who became the youngest Englishman to play Test cricket almost three years ago, has dramatically improved his all-round offering, scoring five centuries and averaging 50 with the bat. And while he has only taken 23 first-class wickets, those scalps have come at just 19 each with a neat economy rate of 2.66.
Dependable left-armer Liam Dawson was picked ahead of Ahmed when Bashir broke a finger against India this summer, but a solitary wicket in 62 overs represented a missed opportunity to nail down the place.
Trescothick deputised for McCullum in last week’s T20 series in Ireland and handed Ahmed some last-minute exposure with his first international caps in 10 months. He also batted at four and five, a promotion from previous outings at eight and nine, and picked up a tidy one for 24 in the decider.
“Rehan’s doing everything that we want him to do and he’s progressing nicely on his journey for someone who’s still really young,” Trescothick said after wrapping a 2-0 series win in Malahide.
“It was still nice to keep working with him, keep improving him and see how he can really push into the team on a longer basis. He’s had a great summer, in terms of five county championship hundreds and then getting wickets as well, but for a decent period of time he’s never really had the opportunity to play in a numerous amount of games and we got a little bit more into him here.
- 760 runs
- 50.66 average
- 5 centuries
- 23 wickets at 19.00
- 7/93 best figures
“Obviously we’ve given him a bit more opportunity and so we like having him around in the squads. He does cover a few bases and it’s trying to fit him into the right sort of position.”
Asked if he was a better player now than when he last played Test cricket at the end of last year, Trescothick added: “The stats would definitely show that, for sure.
“You can see a more experienced player in the style of play and the way he puts his game together.
“Before, he was very young, very inexperienced. He would go out, hit two or three shots and it’d be crash, bang and suddenly it’d be over. You can just see he’s grown as a person when you talk to him in preparations or around practice. You get slightly different responses because he’s maturing as he’s getting better.”
Ashes selection meetings have not always been as straightforward in years gone by, with England targeting this winter’s series when they remodelled the side midway through 2024.
Trescothick is confident that strategy will pay off Down Under.
“They’ve been planning ahead obviously for a long period of time for this moment to come,” he said.
“We’ve been gradually sort of manoeuvring our people into the right positions and planning ahead to the right bowling attack, the right style of players, the batters that we’ve been trying to put together for a number of years. I think it’s all sort of come together quite nicely.”
