England wicketkeeper-batter Jos Buttler sees no reason why the white-ball skipper Eoin Morgan should stop playing. He added that Morgan has been a brilliant captain for England and is still contributing to the team as a leader and batter.
Question marks over Morgan’s future as an England captain and player have risen since they lost by five wickets to New Zealand in the first semifinal of the T20 World Cup in Abu Dhabi.
“From my point of view, I don’t see any reason why Eoin Morgan should stop playing. He has been such a brilliant captain for us. He’s a fantastic player, and still contributing so much to the team as a leader and as a batsman. So, if he is feeling fit and he’s got the hunger to do it, I don’t see any reason why he should stop next year or the year after. I see Eoin having lots more years of cricket left in him,” wrote Buttler in his column for The Daily Telegraph on Tuesday.
Buttler revealed that after the semifinal loss, Morgan had urged the players in the dressing room to use the loss as a motivation to get better in future.
“A final word about the T20. We may have fallen a bit short but in the dressing room after the New Zealand game, Eoin Morgan was encouraging us to use that as motivation to try to get better as individuals and as a team. We’re a really honest and hardworking team, with a big scope for improvement as a group. That’s always a good place to be.”
The 31-year-old pointed out that death bowling is an area that England have targeted to improve upon. Many experts had slammed England’s death bowling, saying it became an apparent weak point after Tymal Mills was ruled out of the tournament due to right thigh strain.
“How do we ensure we don’t stand still? The bowling Powerplay is one area that we’ve really targeted to improve and I think we certainly did that at the World Cup. And we’re always looking to improve our death bowling, which is such a key factor in T20 cricket.”
England’s next assignment is the 2021/22 Ashes in Australia, starting from December 8. Buttler is all geared up for the same after feeling flat post the exit in T20 World Cup.
“I spent my last few days in Dubai trying not to think about cricket very much — we came here with high hopes and expectations and fell short of where we wanted to get to, so we were quite flat. But once we get to Australia, I’ll really get geared up for the Ashes. The formats are obviously different and pose very different challenges, but I’ll try and take some of the confidence from this tournament.”