England head coach Jon Lewis hopes the choice to drop Alice Capsey from the T20 and Check squads for the tour of South Africa will show a “line in the sand” for her worldwide profession and permit her to return again stronger.
Simply weeks after England’s disappointing group-stage exit from the Girls’s T20 World Cup in Dubai, all-rounder Capsey proved the high-profile exclusion from two of the three squads for England’s triple-format South African tour, which begins from November 24.
Capsey, who was solely included within the ODI squad, has not scored greater than 25 in any of her final 5 T20 internationals and was run out for a single in England’s dismal six-wicket loss to West Indies on October 15 that knocked them out of the World Cup.
Explaining the choice for the primary time to omit Capsey from two of the three squads, Lewis stated the 20-year-old had been “trending in the wrong direction” along with her recreation and stated he’s trying to see extra consistency from her – one thing he backed the Surrey teenager to finally obtain.
“We have talked at length with Alice,” stated Lewis.
“We now have given her some actually clear steering on the place we might like her to enhance and the way we might like her to play and, I suppose, an important factor from my standpoint in that place at quantity three is that she continues to try to influence the sport and play the way in which that we would like her to play, however we might additionally like her to be a little bit bit extra constant in that area.
“So in all probability simply when it comes to Alice specifically only a good time for her to have a little bit suppose, a little bit reset and are available again stronger.
“What I do know about Alice is that she’s incredibly strong-willed and really determined to be the best player she can be. I’m really convinced that over a period of time this will be a line in the sand for her to look back and say ‘Actually, I just need to adapt my game and play slightly more consistently when I pull on an England shirt’.
“There isn’t any doubt in my thoughts that over time she’s going to play tons and many video games for England in all codecs of the sport, however in the intervening time she is simply trending within the flawed route and we have to have a little bit reset, to be sincere.”
Lewis responds to T20 World Cup exit criticisms
Having reached at least the semi-finals at the previous six Women’s T20 World Cups, England’s early exit this time led to media scrutiny on various aspects of the team’s play, preparations and future.
Former England spinner Alex Hartley criticised the fitness of some of the squad, while there were also questions raised about Lewis’ own position in his role moving.
While Lewis said he had “hadn’t heard” any comment about his role, he strongly took issue with Hartley’s criticism of fitness levels.
“I 100 per cent do not agree with that as an announcement,” he said. “We’re trending actually in the best route round our bodily health.
“We now have made lots of progress throughout the board in several elements of health – energy, velocity, endurance.
Please use Chrome browser for a extra accessible video participant
Highlights from Dubai as England had been eradicated from the Girls’s T20 World Cup after falling to a six-wicket loss by the hands of West Indies.
“Availability is another part of it and our players are available more often than not. We have got about 95 per cent availability over the past six months of all our contracted players, and on top of that they are improving physically across the board. I’m more than happy to talk to Alex about that, I’ve said that before.”
And on his personal function transferring ahead, Lewis stated: “I feel like this is a developing team and we are a team that is really pushing forward in terms of our performances over the last year.
“We’re clearly extremely upset about that individual efficiency on the World Cup and I suppose the factor that was most disappointing about that was the truth that our bowling group did not execute their abilities in addition to they may have achieved in in all probability the primary eight or 9 overs of that recreation and we clearly dropped 5 catches and that is one other execution factor that we’ll have a look at.
Please use Chrome browser for a extra accessible video participant
Highlights from Dubai as England had been eradicated from the Girls’s T20 World Cup after falling to a six-wicket loss by the hands of West Indies.
“But over the course of that tournament, we played some good cricket, and you have to expect with a young group of bowlers, who apart from Nat Sciver-Brunt are all 25 and under, inconsistency. They are a developing group of bowlers and unfortunately that moment we didn’t deliver what we needed to deliver. That’s T20 cricket. T20 cricket can be really brutal at times and that was a good example of it.”
‘There’s some work to do round growing the subsequent group of leaders’
Lewis, who confirmed that Sciver-Brunt will stay within the vice-captaincy function to skipper Heather Knight on the tour, additionally took problem with recommendations his aspect lacked a ‘Plan B’ after the latter went off injured of their tournament-ending defeat to the West Indies.
“There was definitely a Plan B but, like I said, we didn’t execute our skills as well as we would have liked to have done in that situation,” he stated.
“Nat Sciver-Brunt is a very different leader to Heather Knight, I would say that. Heather’s obviously a really good leader of this group and to lose our captain through injury at that point of the game – she was batting particularly well at the time and it could have cost us 15-20 runs in the game and that would have made a big difference – that assuredness of leadership in that crunch game in particular is a real big blow.
“Nonetheless, I’ve full religion in Nat and her skill to guide an England cricket workforce. She has achieved it earlier than and while she will be able to develop her management abilities, and we’re working along with her on that within the final two years, at that time limit we did not get all our choices proper, however she received the vast majority of them proper and that is in all probability what you’d anticipate of a captain. No captain will get every part proper and there is a number of alternative ways to captain a cricket workforce, and I am actually assured that given that chance once more Nat would do a very good job.”
Lewis did, however, acknowledge that there was work to do on developing the leadership skills among the side’s young generation of players.
“I am not involved in whether or not or not Nat Sciver-Brunt can are available and change Heather Knight, I feel she is a greater than succesful chief,” he added.
“Behind that there’s, for me, a spot when it comes to the age vary of participant and expertise of participant. Behind that, there are a few gamers who’re 26… Sophie Ecclestone is about 25 after which behind that we’ve got received gamers who’re 24, 23 and loads youthful.
“So there is some work to do around developing the next group of leaders within this team. Within our senior playing group, most of those players are at 32, 33-plus, but there’s quite a gap I suppose from the ages of 30 down to 25, 26.”
Lewis added: “It’s something we have talked about for a period of time now and something we will be working hard to make sure that there is an over-supply of leaders when we get to that point. But I don’t think that point is too soon.”
England in South Africa fixtures – reside on Sky Sports activities Cricket
T20 collection
- Sunday November 24: South Africa vs England – Buffalo Park Cricket Stadium, East London
- Wednesday November 27: South Africa vs England – Willowmoore Park, Benoni
- Saturday November 30: South Africa vs England – SuperSport Park, Centurion
ODI collection
- Wednesday December 4: South Africa vs England – Kimberley Oval, Kimberley
- Sunday December 8: South Africa vs England – Hollywoodbets Kingsmead Stadium, Durban
- Wednesday December 11: South Africa vs England – JB Marks Oval, Potchefstroom
Check match
- December 15-18: South Africa v England – Mangaung Oval, Bloemfontein
Watch England’s three-format tour of South Africa reside on Sky Sports activities Cricket from November 24 till the run as much as Christmas. Get Sky Sports activities to look at cricket and much extra reside.
