After the appointment of Brendon McCullum as the head coach and Ben Stokes as the captain of the England Test team, the Three Lions have adopted a new kind of attacking approach. No matter what the score is, they only have one way to play- attack the opposition. This style has been termed as ‘Bazball’ named after the Kiwi head coach and has been quite successful. They have chased down targets in four matches in a row- three against New Zealand and one against India.
However, South Africa batsman Dean Elgar has recently criticized this Bazball approach as he questioned its longevity in Test Matches. “I’ve got absolutely no interest in the style that they’ve played. I think it can go one of two ways for them and it can go south very quickly. [Talking about it] is a waste of energy. Their own coach doesn’t even like the slogan they’ve come up with. I’d like to see them do it against our seamers,” said Elgar in an interaction with The Observer.
Now, England wicketkeeper-batsman and England Lions captain Sam Billings has hit out at Elgar’s comments after his team defeated South Africa by an innings and 56 runs in a practice match ahead of the the Proreas’ Test Series against the Three Lions.
“We’ve beaten an international team over four days by an innings in a manner of scoring 5.74 an over. You’d be pretty stupid to ignore that, if I’m honest,” Billings said in an interaction with The Guardian.
Billings also said that South Africa’s defeat in the practice game should be a wake up call for them. “If that’s not a wake-up call. because we’re not even the best XI. So, it’s up to them, really, but I think that’s laid out a pretty strong statement in the way we want the cricket to be played, but also being able to execute it and having the players to do that was really impressive,” said Billings.
