LAHORE: England stand-in captain Moeen Ali believed that his side must not risk its key player, Jos Buttler, with the ICC men’s T20 World Cup 2022 just around the corner.
England white-ball captain Buttler, who has been recovering from a calf injury, has not played so far in the ongoing seven-match series against Pakistan.
Speaking at a post-match press conference on Wednesday, Moeen did not rule out the possibility of Buttler taking the reigns of the England team for the remaining two T20Is of the series as he had been training in the nets and recovered well.
“Personally, I don’t think we’ll risk such a big player (Buttler) for us with World Cup just around the corner,” he said. “But he might wake up and say that I feel good. We know he has recovered well…So he might turn up tomorrow and say look I seem playing and I’m good,” he added.
Talking about England’s defeat in the fifth T20I after a nail-biting final over, Moeen gave credit to the debutant Aamir Jamal for holding his nerves and bowling really well on his debut to defend 15 runs in the last over.
“Unfortunately I manage to get one (six) but it was a very good last over and you can’t take anything away from him (Jamal),’ said England’s captain.
It is pertinent to mention here that Pakistan beat England by six runs to go 3-2 up in the historic seven-match T20I series.
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