Chris Silverwood shows faith in out-of-form Jos Buttler
England head coach Chris Silverwood believes that Jos Buttler still has the ability to become a successful Test batsman for England despite his form of late. Jos Buttler has failed to score a half-century in his last 12 innings and looked less than convincing behind the stumps in the first Test against England at Southampton.
Jos Buttler has two Tests left to save his Test career: Darren Gough
Former England pacer Darren Gough told Sky Sports Cricket that Jos Buttler was running out of time and that he had only two Tests left to somehow save his Test career. But Chris Silverwood did not want to put any extra pressure on Jos Buttler and showed complete faith in Jos Buttler's ability.
Jos Buttler scored 35 runs in the first innings of the first Test and Chris Silverwood believes that he looked good with the bat and deserved every chance to hit good form.
"I’m not going to go down that road yet of putting Jos under pressure, because I don’t think it’s going to help him. So, first and foremost, we want to give Jos the best opportunity to succeed. (Jos) looked brilliant coming into this game, in practice and everything. He looked very good in the first innings. He just needs to go and make those big scores now, doesn’t he? Which he knows as well," Chris Silverwood was quoted as saying by Cricket Australia.
While Jos Buttler has the complete backing of Chris Silverwood, Joe Denly was under a bit of pressure with even him going through a lean patch.
Former England skipper Michael Vaughan has even gone on to say that Joe Denly was not good enough to play the longest format for England.
The manner in which Joe Denly got out in both innings of the Southampton Test was a worrying sign for England. With Zak Crawley having scored an impressive 76 in the second innings and Joe Root set to return for the second Test, Chris Silverwood believes that Joe Denly is under a bit of pressure.
"We’re all desperate to see Joe do really well. We can see he’s trying hard, he’s training hard. He’s a great bloke hence why we all went to see him do well, but obviously he’s under pressure a little bit, yeah. Zak is improving constantly. He certainly showed maturity and the innings he played was very good. We have some young players in that side that seem to have good heads on their shoulders, and he’s one of them," Chris Silverwood asserted.
The second Test between England and West Indies will be played at Old Trafford from July 16.