England on Monday named their 16-man squad for the impending five-match Test series in India in early 2024. The squad comprises of three uncapped players in Shoaib Bashir, the 20-year-old Somerset offspinner, left-arm spinner Tom Hartley and fast bowler Gus Atkinson, although the latter two have made their international debut in the white-ball format for England. Amid the analysis of the squad, former England captain Michael Vaughan fired a dire warning to Brendon McCullum and his boys, saying that Bazball could get "absolutely destroyed" in the much-anticipated India Test series.
England's Bazball strategy has been a revelation in Test cricket over the last 18 months, with the team having won 13 of their 18 Tests since the appointment of McCullum. However, Vaughan feels that the approach will fall short against the likes of world-class spinners in Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja. The former cricketer in fact cited the example of Nathan Lyon and his exploits in England, where conditions don't favour the spinners, in the Ashes series last year where he picked nine wickets at 29.33 before incurring a calf injury.
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“Ultimately the hardest place to play in the world is India and if you actually go back to the Ashes when Nathan Lyon was fit and bowling nicely, Australia were 2-0 up in the series,” Vaughan said to foxsports.com.au. “That was just one innings and a few overs in the first innings at Lords… Nathan came out with a lovely line the other week where he said he’s 2-nil up against Bazball.
{{/usCountry}}“Ultimately the hardest place to play in the world is India and if you actually go back to the Ashes when Nathan Lyon was fit and bowling nicely, Australia were 2-0 up in the series,” Vaughan said to foxsports.com.au. “That was just one innings and a few overs in the first innings at Lords… Nathan came out with a lovely line the other week where he said he’s 2-nil up against Bazball.
{{/usCountry}}“Now that’s just one spinner, if you look at that five-for he got at Edgbaston and the field was spread and England got out to him by playing ridiculous shots at times. If you add in Ashwin, Jadeja and Axar Patel on spinning wickets in India, they may get blown away, they may get absolutely destroyed. They will go out and play exactly the same way, we’ve already spoken about the impact they are going to try and achieve in India with the way they play. It will be great watching, but you will have to fancy three quality spinners might do a job on England when one quality spinner in Nathan Lyon did the job in English conditions. It’s going to be very tough for them to win in India.”
This will be the second time England will be up against India since the emergence of Bazball. The previous time was a one-off game, a rescheduled fifth Test from India's 2021 tour, where England won by seven wickets in Birmingham.