Jos Buttler says his England side have the “energy and hunger” to turn their Cricket World Cup around, with the defending champions hoping desperately that Ben Stokes’s return this weekend can spark their campaign into life.
England head into tomorrow’s crucial meeting against South Africa reeling from two defeats in their first three group-stage matches, looking a shadow of their former selves when hammered by New Zealand on the opening day of the tournament and then stunned by Afghanistan last weekend.
South Africa were also on the end of a surprise result when upset by Holland on Tuesday, but prior to that had been in imperious form, and England know another defeat at this early stage could leave them needing to win every one of their subsequent five matches to sneak into the semi-finals.
“We’ve had a few days to let the [Afghanistan] defeat sink in and move on,” said Buttler, speaking in Mumbai this morning. “We’ve had some good conversations and the energy and hunger around practice last night was very high.
“We look at the opposition but there’s a lot of focus on ourselves and we’ve had some good conversations about how we want to play our cricket, how we want to commit to the style we play. That’s always more important than the result.
“We put ourselves out there, we compete, and the opposition want to win games of cricket as well, so we know we won’t always win. But if we can stick to the way we like to play and get to the best version of that, we know that’s the best chance we have of getting positive results.”
The return of Stokes is a major boost, with England’s talisman yet to feature in the tournament after suffering a hip injury while working out in the gym during the warm-up stint in Guwahati earlier this month.
“When I did it, I thought I was done,” Stokes revealed yesterday. “But thankfully it wasn’t anywhere near as bad as we initially thought. We got a programme in place straight away and it went really well and now I’m here, available for selection.”
The 32-year-old retired from 50-over cricket last summer, citing workload concerns after taking on the Test captaincy, but reversed his decision in the run-up to the World Cup and showed no signs of rustiness in the format when hammering 182 against New Zealand at The Oval last month, the highest-ever ODI score by an Englishman.
“Ben trained really well last night and it’s great to see him back,” Buttler said. “He obviously brings a lot on the field with his presence and his leadership skills as well. He’s someone who’s always good to turn to, so he adds a lot of value.”
Where Stokes slots back in remains to be seen. Harry Brook has been deputising at No4, but top-scored in the defeat by Afghanistan, and with seamers Chris Woakes and Sam Curran both struggling badly for impact, England could rejig the balance of their side to accommodate an extra batter. Of that pair, Curran appears likeliest to make way, with Buttler this morning issuing another strong defence of Woakes.
“He’s been a fantastic performer for an incredibly long time in all the formats and especially one-day cricket,” he said. “He knows he’s not performing quite how he would like to, and that’s frustrating, but there’s no judgment from our side.
"We always back all our players. We picked them for a number of reasons and one is because they’re high-class players. He’s certainly one of those.”
