England's plans have been thrown awry after a 1-2 series defeat to Pakistan away. This is England's second straight Test series defeat in Asia and away from home in the ongoing World Test Championship (WTC) cycle and vice-captain Ollie Pope's place has come under scrutiny. Pope has had three 100-plus scores in 25 innings he has batted in Tests in 2024, however, there has been basically nothing outside those three centuries. Pope had scored a brilliant 196 in India but seems like a one-off as he ended his disappointing tour of Pakistan with a total of 55 runs in five innings.
With another tough tour of New Zealand remaining in the current cycle, former England captain Michael Vaughan suggested a radical change of moving captain Ben Stokes up to No 3 saying that the latter has had his own struggles against spin but if gets to face seam bowling the most during his stay in the middle, it will be beneficial to both him and the team.
“Pope is a good player and a great lad who clearly brings a lot to this environment, which places great stock in togetherness and getting on well. Making a big change like this is never easy, and England will not want to. But his returns suggest he does not have the mentality or technique to thrive against the very best bowlers," Vaughan wrote in his column for the Telegraph.
“Playing spin at the top level is hard. I’ve said before that I think Pope has a fragile mentality. He’s not alone in that, and that is fine. But when your mentality is fragile, you need your technique to fall back on. It looks after you on your bad days, which there are a lot more of than good ones in Test cricket.
“This might seem a strange time to suggest that, given he has had another poor tour against spin. But England won’t face as much spin for a while, and Stokes has an outstanding defence against seam, and clearly isn’t going to bowl too much. Stokes is the one player who could soak up pressure," Vaughan further said after Stokes finished the Pakistan tour with 53 runs in four innings.
Vaughan opined that if Pope and England are honest, even in his best knocks, he has lacked control and the time for change is nigh.
