England initially planned to announce their squad for their three-match series in New Zealand immediately after the third Test in Rawalpindi, but opted to let the dust settle and will wait until early next week to do so. But Stokes and Brendon McCullum strongly suggested that there are unlikely to be any major changes to their batting line-up.
“They are the best players in England,” Stokes told Pak Gazette. “We play all over the world and traveling to New Zealand in a couple of weeks will be completely different. [to Pakistan]. But I have no doubt, nor does Brendon, that we have the six best players in England.
“You can’t close the door on everything, because then you are determined on what you want to do. But going back to the previous point, I have no doubt that we have the best-six batsmen in England. Sometimes the boys will reap the rewards of having a good performance in the middle and, unfortunately, others will miss out.
McCullum gave a clear indication that Pope will remain in the No. 3 spot despite his meager career. “It’s not an easy place to bat at No.3,” he told the BBC. “I know Popey will be disappointed with the volume of runs he got in this series, but I hope he bounces back strongly in New Zealand and we will make sure he has the support he needs to do that.
“Obviously, Popey has had a bit of a rough tour in terms of his run production… [but] We know that when Popey comes in, he scores big, and he scores big too… We have a pretty good idea of what the team composition will be for New Zealand, with the conditions we’ll have. face.”
Stokes also admitted that England’s players had been outplayed by Pakistan’s players on favorable surfaces, but said they had still done “a fantastic job”. In the second and third Tests, Sajid Khan and Noman Ali took 39 wickets between them at a combined average of 17.38, while Shoaib Bashir and Jack Leach took 17 wickets at 35.47.
“The difference between [the teams in] these two games was the understanding of how to bowl in these conditions that Pakistan’s spinners showed, but that doesn’t take anything away from how our spinners have played in this series,” Stokes said. “I think they have done a fantastic job to take the wickets they have made.
“To Shoaib in particular, I said the other day: ‘Here you are going to learn on the job. You are going to learn about yourself as a bowler through the Test match. You are going to be able to figure out how to play.’ bowling in different conditions at different phases of the game, and how exciting, how good is that?’ He absolutely loved it.”
Stokes himself returned from a hamstring tear in the second Test and did not bowl a ball in the third, but insisted he is fully fit. “I worked very, very hard to get back into that second test,” he said. “I just didn’t feel like my bowling was going to be as threatening as the [other] options we had… in terms of my fitness, as I wouldn’t bowl, that has nothing to do with it.”
The first of England’s three Tests in New Zealand begins on November 27 in Christchurch, with the team arriving in time to play a warm-up match in Queenstown on November 23-24. Their white-ball teams leave the UK on Monday ahead of three ODIs and five T20Is against the West Indies.
Matt Roller is assistant editor at Pak Gazette. @mroller98
