Paul Farbrace Backs Jos Buttler as the Opener in T20Is

England stand-in coach for the Twenty20 International matches against Australia and India respective, Paul Farbrace has backed in-form batsman Jos Buttler to open the innings for the Three Lions.

English coach believes the team’s best player should bat in the top order in the shortest format.

Eventually, it makes all the sense to give the maximum deliveries to team’s best batsmen. As the top order batsman can make most of the powerplay overs, it is imperative to take the right first steps in the T20 game.

In fact, preserving the best players for the fag end of the innings doesn’t make much sense as only 20 overs are there in the shortest version of the gentleman’s game.

Therefore, Farbrace believes there is no point in holding back the best batsmen in the shortest format.

Get the best batsmen in the top order:

However, it is also crucial to play according to the conditions. In fact, it is better to keep some experienced batsman in the lower middle-order who can provide the finishing touches to his team.

“You need to get your best players in,” Farbrace said, as he explained the decision to open with Buttler. “With 120 balls, you need your best players facing as many balls as possible. If you get 60 or 70 in the first six overs you give yourself a great chance of winning any T20.

In fact, Buttler achieved greater success when he was asked to open the innings for the Rajasthan Royals (RR) in the recently held Indian Premier League (IPL).

Farbrace added the lower-order batsman doesn’t get to face many deliveries in the shortest format of the game.

England is in the fine limited-overs form:

“This idea of people being finishers I don’t necessarily agree with. The stat – and I don’t know if it still holds true – is that in international T20 cricket, the No. 7 faces on average seven deliveries. The chances are the No. 6 won’t face too many, either. There is a danger when you have six quality batters in your top six you are almost wasting a batter,” he stated.

Paul Farbrace also went on to add they had pondered on the same decision before the T20I World Cup of 2016. However, they veered off the track. Thus, England is looking to learn from its mistakes.

“We actually talked about him opening before the World T20 in India and then went away from it as we didn’t want to make a change before the tournament – we’ve learned that mistake – so it’s something that’s been talked about for a while. And there are one or two others in our top six who wouldn’t mind having a go at the top of the order as well,” he added.

England is playing some top class limited-overs game and would once again start as favorites in the One-off T20I against Australia.

Eoin Morgan-led team had thrashed their arch-rivals in the five-match One-day International series and would like to carry on the impetus in the solitary T20I against the Aussies.