- Jordan Cox broke his thumb last week and has been ruled out of England’s squad
- Jacob Bethell will hope to make his England test debut after Cox’s withdrawal
- The 21-year-old made his ODI and T20 debuts just two months ago in September
Wicketkeeper Jordan Cox has been ruled out of England’s series in New Zealand with a broken thumb, opening the door for exciting 21-year-old Jacob Bethell to make his debut in Thursday’s opening Test.
Uncapped Cox, due to play instead of Jamie Smith who is missing the series on paternity leave, hurt his right thumb in the Queenstown nets before the last day of England’s warm-up match against a New Zealand Prime Minister’s XI.
Ollie Pope will keep wicket but there will be much interest in the left-handed Bethell, who excited England’s management on the white-ball tour of the Caribbean.
It is not only his bleach blond haircut that has made him stand out during his first three months as an England cricketer. He has become a pivotal member of the one-day team overnight through force of personality.
As his team-mate Phil Salt said after the first of his two half centuries in the Twenty20 series in the West Indies: ‘He’s a 21-year-old lad, but if you didn’t know his age, you’d think he’d played 100 games.’
He finished the series with a strike rate of 173.97, the best of the six players to score 100 runs.
Bethell is a chameleon cricketer, adapting to new environments and challenges seamlessly and making the kind of impact that suggests, contrary to statistical evidence thus far, he will be successful in Test cricket too.
He is the latest Bazball bolter as a player, with a first-class average of 25 and without a professional century.
Kevin Pietersen had 21 four-day hundreds when he made his Test debut in the 2005 Ashes, but the selectors trade in different currency now, no longer relying on traditional apprenticeships on the county circuit.
‘All the attributes are there,’ said Marcus Trescothick, England’s acting white-ball head coach, after the West Indies tour. ‘If you have markers to be able to go, “Right, you need to do this, this and this”, he’d be knocking on the door for that.
‘There’s no reason why he can’t succeed in the Test team, because he’s flourished in both white-ball formats.
‘It will be exciting to see him go in there and see what he can do, because you could almost see him breaking through as being the next youngster after Harry Brook, the really exciting one coming through.’
Like Brook, Bethell has overcome technical challenges with his batting. In the early stages of 2024, his head was falling to the offside, with the result that he was playing at wide balls he did not have to and missing straight ones.
A meticulous maker of notes about all aspects of his cricket, he worked through the issue, realigning his position and scoring four half centuries in last summer’s County Championship before coming alive from the Vitality Blast onwards.
He is an instinct player with Brian Lara-like hands that whip through deliveries, piercing gaps or clearing the ropes with precision.
To observe his batting is to recognise the old and the new. He appears on a one-man crusade to make the late cut fashionable again, but is equally at home as a modern 360-degree player, deftly scooping over the wicketkeeper’s head or bludgeoning over the midwicket boundary off the front foot or back.
Already a fielder to match anyone in the country at backward point, and a developing left-arm spinner, Bethell’s ability to turn his hand to anything adds to his appeal.
In the long term he views himself as a top-order batter, having spent his schoolboy years as an opener, the position from which he crashed a 42-ball 88 for England Under 19s against South Africa at the 2022 World Cup.
He has the skill, character and ambition to succeed in the Test team now he has his chance and could make life uncomfortable for current Test incumbents Zak Crawley and Pope in the not-too-distant future.
Pope has kept wicket for England before, once in New Zealand in 2019 and for two Tests in Pakistan in 2022. He took the gloves on the second day of the warm-up game in Queenstown.
England will call up a replacement for Cox. Salt has kept for England in white-ball cricket, while Durham’s Ollie Robinson has impressed in the Championship. Somerset’s James Rew, 20, is exciting and is with England Lions in South Africa.
Olly Stone was England’s best bowler on the second and final day in Queenstown, with figures of three for 53.
Chasing 201 to win with little time left, England almost pulled off a remarkable victory. Joe Root hit 82 not out from 54 balls and Ben Stokes 59 from 39, but England were five short of their target on 196 for 9 from 22 overs at stumps.
