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Former captain Michael Vaughan has warned England about their ‘Bazball’ approach ahead of the five-Test series in India. He said that this approach may get "absolutely destroyed" against the formidable spin attack of the Indian hosts.
England's aggressive strategy, known as ‘Bazball’ and named after head coach Brendon McCullum, have garnered attention in the cricketing world in the last one and a half years with 13 victories in their last 18 red-ball games.
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"Ultimately the hardest place to play in the world is India and if you actually go back to the Ashes when Nathan Lyon was fit and bowling nicely, Australia were 2-0 up in the series," Vaughan told foxsports.com.au.
"That was just one innings and a few overs in the first innings at Lords. Nathan came out with a lovely line the other week where he said he’s 2-nil up against Bazball.”
"Now that’s just one spinner, if you look at that five-for he got at Edgbaston and the field was spread and England got out to him by playing ridiculous shots at times."
England are set to play five Tests in India as part of their ICC World Test Championships cycle beginning on January 25 in Hyderabad.
The 49-year-old said that England will stick to their aggressive approach, famously known as ‘Bazball’, but warned that it might struggle against the spin trio of R Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, and Axar Patel.
“If you add in Ashwin, Jadeja and Axar Patel on spinning wickets in India, they may get blown away, they may get absolutely destroyed”, the former captain said,
“It will be great watching, but you will have to fancy three quality spinners might do a job on England when one quality spinner in Nathan Lyon did the job in English conditions. It’s going to be very tough for them to win in India.”
England announced a 16-member squad on December 11 for the Test series in India, including four specialist spinners: Jack Leach, teenage leg-spinner Rehan Ahmed, and the uncapped duo of Tom Hartley and Shoaib Bashir.
After the match in Hyderabad, England are scheduled to play the remaining four Tests in Visakhapatnam, Rajkot, Ranchi, and Dharamsala respectively.
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