England have one more game to play before the start of the T20 World Cup and several questions still to be answered. The core problem Matthew Mott and Jos Buttler have to grapple with, however, is the one the coach and captain will have dreamed of when they picked their squad: which of these 15 players, all of them fit and the great majority also in good form, can possibly be left out? But also, what can possibly be gained from an eighth game against Pakistan in the space of a month?
Mott suggested on Friday that England’s final warm-up, to be played at the Gabba in Brisbane on Monday, will be approached simply as an opportunity to hone the fitness of those players who require a bit of game time and to give those who have not played much since arriving in Australia a taste of the action. He knows the team he would like to play against Afghanistan in England’s World Cup opener and this is not an occasion to play it.
