NEWS
Follow UsOn September 1 (Sunday) at Lord’s, England completed a comprehensive 190-run victory to seal the series against Sri Lanka and move up to fourth on the World Test Championship (WTC) points table. It was a maiden series win for Ollie Pope, who filled in as skipper last minute after the unfortunate hamstring injury to incumbent captain Ben Stokes.
But while things have been smooth result-wise for Pope, what’s not been great is his batting. After scores of 6 & 6 at Old Trafford, Pope needed to go big at Lord’s to regain some confidence, but he endured twin failures once again, departing for 1 in the first innings while managing just 17 in the second.
The stand-in England skipper had an outstanding West Indies series - 239 runs @ 59.75 - but he’s come under scrutiny on the back of his horror show across the first two Sri Lanka Tests, with his overall Test average now reading 34.00 after 48 Tests.
England might have registered a clinical win but Pope, in the aftermath of the Lord’s win, admitted that his form with the bat has been far from ideal.
"I'm not going to put down my average shot to the fact that I was captain," Pope said at the press conference after the game.
"I'll learn from it and move on, but I think I've managed my own game better throughout this match… The second innings was slightly different because we were really trying to push the game forward, but I was very disappointed with the shot I played in the first innings so early on.
"I'm not going to hide behind the fact that I've had two poor games with the bat. That's the way cricket is sometimes and form comes and goes. But I think the best players are the ones who can draw a line under it and have a fresh start next week. Hopefully, I can put a score together."
Four failures in a row is tough to digest for any batter, let alone an England captain, but Pope asserted that these two games have already been a ‘big learning’ for him.
"The last two games I've had, they're learning games for me," he said.
"It definitely is something that I'm still trying to improve in my game, and obviously, the way that I start my innings especially is something that I want to keep on improving - and then when I do get in, it's trying to cash in as well."
Pope’s form has attracted a lot of criticism, and the stand-in England skipper has received a lot of flack from the media in the last couple of weeks, especially from former England cricketers.
But the 26-year-old insisted that it’ll be imperative for him to pay no heed to outside noise. The right-hander further vowed to bounce back in the third Test, which will be played in his home ground, The Oval.
“To be honest, it is just important to block it out and keep staying close with the people around you. There's a lot of voices, a lot of guys who want to have their say - some past cricketers as well - and that's completely fine,” he said.
"Everyone's entitled to their opinion, but it's important for us as a team and me to stay and keep trusting the people in the four walls, because that's not going to help me get back into my best form. Sometimes, when you have two bad games, it can feel a lot worse than it is because of the noise that's surrounding it.
"For me, it's just trying to stay as level as I can and keep on trusting the people around me, putting my work in, and not really overthinking it, to be honest. When I went and made good runs in that West Indies series, that's exactly what I was playing like, so there's no real need for me to get too involved in what people are saying."
The third and final Test of the series will be played at The Oval from September 6 onwards.
