It will be a pretty magical Moment for Jofra Archer when it comes true on Tuesday with his friends, his family and, if the dream he sketched out a few weeks ago, maybe even with his beloved bulldogs watching. Jos Buttlers’ England are starting their T20 World Championship defence-Scotland first – and your chances of a replay have only increased with the return of the fast bowler to this tournament.
The recent heat-up matches against Pakistan in the UK were just a few boxes ticked, to be honest. Archer, a valuable asset with mesmerizing pace and skills, was advised by Rob Key not to set goals during the last 14 months of absence with a stress fracture in his elbow. But the thoughts of a first international on the island where it all started were his food; the tropical sun at the end of a particularly dark tunnel.
Cricket is burned into the ground in Barbados, with some even postulating that the porous coral rock underfoot is the reason it has produced 100 international players over the years. Not one, but two of that remarkable crop are adorned in England”s red today, Archer accompanied by his best friend and Mentor as he crossed the Atlantic at the time, Chris Jordan.
“Jofra is obviously a really cool guy, calm and easy to get along with, but I’m sure it also brings emotion,” Buttler said a day before this Group B meeting in Bridgetown. “He will desperately try to perform well. We know what he is capable of, but we just have to allow him to be a little bit and not expect too much.”
Phil Salt, Buttler’s fiery opening partner, makes it a third connection with the Island; highly regarded as a Bayan adopted by the locals, given the six years of his youth he spent here. Salt played Junior club Cricket alongside Hayley Matthews, the West Indies captain who is too good to be ignored, and also sat in the stands at Hall & Griffith at the age of 13 when Paul Collingwood’s team won the T20 in 2010.
“It was pretty special,” Salt said. “Every child in the ground thought that one day I would be me,” but you never believe it. Colly then walked past the Booth with the trophy and said, “Here you are, touch it while you can” and it still sticks in my mind when I think about this day. To be here in an England shirt now is awesome.”
Barbados can be a distracting place for cricketers, with the senses almost instinctively calming down on arrival as holidaymakers cook on the beaches and enjoy the sultry evenings. But even if some members of the team enjoyed a boat ride in the azure waters on Monday, the English spirits should be sharp and alert from the start, with a record to be set just after this eruption in India last winter.
Buttler was eager to get on with it as his players finished their final drills before the big push. “My focus is on this world cup,” he replied when asked about it. A simple question about the Caribbean-specific advice of the new English coach-consultant Keiron Pollard also received a sarcastic answer: “he said that it was windy.”Given that they seemed to need a local expert to tell them not to bowl first during a heat wave in Mumbai, I hope the Trinidadian’s message is a little more detailed in private.