Fair point about Bairstow vs spin, but I'm not convinced India are going to be preparing the kind of absurdly spin favouring tracks we might expect. Their pace attack, in terms of quality and depth, is ridiculous - Bumrah, Shami, Ishant, Siraj, Saini, Natarajan - so why wouldn't they make best use of it? Given that, Bairstow's well documented struggles against quality pace bowling could be a major factor in selectors decision making.
I imagine India will prepare the same pitches they always do - dry, hard on day one but wearing gradually as the game goes on so that day five can be a bit of a minefield - and will pick the same attack they always have of two quicks, two spinners and a fifth option to suit the conditions, because even if there is some room to manouvre for the groundsmen, it is still limited by the heat and relative lack of moisture at this time of year. They do have better resources in terms of pace bowling than they have previously enjoyed but in that area they still are no better than on par with the wealth of resources England can summon - Anderson, Broad, Woakes, Curran, Archer, Wood, Stone, Overton etc. so why rely on that when their options in terms of spinners and their batsmen's ability to play spin are so far ahead?
Though actually, I think "absurdly spin favouring tracks" is a misnomer anyway. You get those in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, yes, where balls turn sharply from the offset and the bounce can be "interesting" but Indian tracks conditions, day five apart, tend to be far more about the process of attrition and wearing a batsman down than about wonder balls - hence 1) why Jadeja, who barely turns the ball at all, and Ashwin who flicks more than rips it but both attack the stumps are successful, but leggies are not and 2) why England have only won there when they had both the supreme concentration of Cook and the ability to score at pace of Pietersen at their respective peaks.
Author
Topic: England v Sri lanka (Read 45433 times)