Ravi Patel called up by England Lions
Only last week on tour with the OMTs did the subject of England's spinner come up. Although I think Moeen Ali has done a fantastic job considering he's had missed chances by Prior and been rarely used by Cook, the fact remains that England would love a specialist world class spinner. I suggested that you have to be a pretty special off-spinner not to get carted in world cricket given that there tends to be more right-handed than left-handed batsmen. So we started thinking about who could be considered for the role of a spinner who turns it away from the right-hander and someone suggested Ravi Patel. I think the suggestion came more from the fact that he is an OMT (Old Merchant Taylor) rather than really thinking he could get picked, but I definitely didn't rule it out.
It's definitely a big surprise that Ravi's been called up to the Lions today though. It will be fascinating to see how he does if he plays. It's 50 over cricket he's been selected for rather than a 4-day game, but it's still interesting that he's getting a look in given his inexperience.
Good luck fella.
4 comments:
According to today's Sunday Times he's a "promising off spinner" !
Let's try again - The thing about Ravi is that as well as giving it a real rip he has a smooth and repeatable action. Butcher made a decent point the other night about spinners having jerky, staccato actions that do stand
up under pressure. His action is a real positive in this way and he gets it above the eye-line with good revs. Do admit some bias here as he played at my club and went to my school but reckon he's got a great chance. Needs to improve other aspects of his game but he is a better bat than people think and has a lot of confidence. We shall see.
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