Rajasthan Royals (RR) teammates Ravichandran Ashwin and Jos Buttler may not see eye-to-eye on running out a batter on the non-striker's end but they agree that impact rule in the Indian Premier League (IPL) does not take 'something away from the all-rounders'. Buttler believes that all-rounders still have a huge role to play despite the impact player rule being used in the last two seasons.
"I know in the IPL, people think the Impact Player rule is sort of taking something away from the all-rounders, but they still play a huge part. They're crucial to balancing the side. Even before the Impact Player rule came in, there were a lot of cricketers wanting to be involved, wanting to impact the game with both bat and ball," Buttler told TOI.
"All-rounders traditionally have been crucial for cricket teams, to lengthen the batting lineup, provide balance and different bowling options. All-rounders are not a luxury but a necessity. Having multi-skilled players is a huge benefit," the wicketkeeper-batter added.
Buttler on one coach for all formats
Meanwhile, Buttler is excited to work with Brendon McCullum who is set to take over as white-ball catch in January 2025. Buttler feels that there are pros and cons of having a single head coach for red-ball and white-ball cricket.
"There are pluses and minuses to both. Having that one guy across formats can have that consistent messaging, of course. At the time Brendon took over as Test coach along with Matthew Mott (former white-ball coach), the schedule for English cricket was incredibly busy. It looked impossible for one man to do it all. We had to balance that out," Buttler said.
"Now it's obviously gone back to having that single head coach, but you'll still have to be smart with schedules. There might be times when 'Baz' needs to step out for a series and one of the assistant coaches can take charge," the T20 World Cup 2022-winning captain added.
Buttler ruled out of Australia series
Buttler is currently on the sidelines as calf injury forced him to miss the limited-overs series against Australia. In T20Is, Phil Salt captained England and in ODIs Harry Brook is set to lead the team. The ODI series commences on September 19.
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