England captain Harry Brook downplayed any concerns regarding playing spin after a 30-run loss against the West Indies at the Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai in the ongoing T20 World Cup on Wednesday. While chasing 197 runs for the win, England, who avoided a Nepal scare in their opening game, were bowled out for 166.
The West Indies spin trio of Akeal Hosein, Gudakesh Motie, and Roston Chase collectively returned with figures of 6-94 in 12 overs they bowled. However, Brook said the batters had done a decent job while facing spin in a recent T20I series against Sri Lanka just before the T20I showpiece.
“I don’t think so (that there is an issue with playing spin),” he said. “That series against Sri Lanka showed that. I thought we played spin really well out there. They bowled well; they kept themselves in the game the whole time. Like you said, we lost quite a few wickets in clusters, which never really helps.
“We were probably a little bit careful. Chasing nearly 200 is always a big ask and like I said we didn’t think – we thought the pitch would get a little bit better and it’d slide onto the bat a bit more and that didn’t happen.”
Brook admitted the bowlers could not execute their plans to perfection and they conceded 15-20 runs more than they should have.
“We didn’t quite execute well enough with the ball and they probably got 15, 20 too many,” Brook said following the loss. “We thought it (197-run target) was chasable, definitely. We obviously planned for dew and it didn’t quite get as dewy as we thought, and it didn’t quite slide onto the bat as much as we were expecting.”
The English captain is hopeful that the team can take the confidence forward as they fought till the end.
“We can take a lot of confidence from not only the Nepal game, but the last T20 in Sri Lanka when they were both tight games. We can take a lot of confidence from them and in the depth with the batting that we have as well. We were stood up in the changing room and we still needed 50 off four overs and we still had faith. We can take a lot of confidence going forward. Obviously, it didn’t pay off today, but another day it would work.”
England will next take on Scotland at the Eden Gardens, Kolkata, on Saturday.
