England coaching staff look to add to team’s overseas wins

Chennai, Feb 4 (SocialNews.XYZ) England head coach Chris Silverwood, who took charge of the England team in October 2019 by pipping the likes of World Cup-winning former India coach Gary Kirsten of South Africa, has led England to five successive away Test wins and will be gearing up for more on the upcoming tour of India.

Silverwood, a former England cricketer who played six Tests, who had earlier served as Essex head coach and was England's bowling coach prior to taking over as head coach from Trevor Bayliss, guided England to 3-1 win over South Africa away from home.

After home series wins over West Indies and Pakistan in the summer of 2020, Silverwood led England to a 2-0 Test series win in Sri Lanka last month. The only blip was at the start of his coaching career in November-December 2019, prior to SA series when his team lost Test series 0-1 to New Zealand.

Silverwood's coaching team comprises Test cricketers. Graham Thorpe, who played 100 Tests for England, is the assistant coach while Jonathan Trott, who represented England in 52 Tests, is the batting consultant. Former New Zealand off-spinner Jeetan Patel (24 Test matches) is the spin consultant, former England pace bowler Jon Lewis (one Test) is the fast-bowling coach while ex-England wicket-keeper James Foster (seven Tests) is the wicket-keeping consultant.

Their combined Test experience is 190 Tests which is over a 100 more than Indian coaching staff's experience. The combined experience of head coach Ravi Shastri (80 Tests), batting coach Vikram Rathour (6 Tests), bowling coach Bharat Arun (two Tests) and fielding coach R Sridhar (no Test) comes 88 Test matches.

Trott was appointed as batting consultant prior to the home series against Pakistan at home, taking a job that was lying vacant and filled in temporarily by Thorpe after Mark Ramprakash was sacked prior to the 2019 World Cup.

England batting consultant's job has been highly sought-after as Trott admitted on Wednesday. "There are quite a few people looking to work with England," he said.

The former England batsman was replaced by Jacques Kallis on the tour of Sri Lanka and has since returned to take charge of the side on tour of India where England's last series win came in 2012-13 with Trott as a player. The 39-year-old, who was born in South Africa but played for England in 52 Test matches, scored a hundred in the drawn game in Nagpur during the 2012-13 home Test series.

Trott spoke about his role with the team.

"I wouldn't reinvent the wheel. But it's about making sure that they're in the right space and ready to do whatever the conditions dictate, and that their all-round game is in top shape," he said.

Both Thorpe and Trott have emphasised the need to score big on Indian wickets to wrest advantage.

Patel, who took over after Saqlain Mushtaq's contract as part-time spin consultant ended in 2019, has been training the spin duo Jack Leach and Dom Bess.

A visa bungle had delayed him taking over but England had been in need of a specialist full-time coach, the lack of which saw both off-spinner Moeen Ali and leg-spinner Adil Rashid get disinterested fritter away great starts in Test cricket after good show in white-ball cricket.

Head coach: Chris Silverwood (Six Tests, 7 ODIs)
Batting consultant: Jonathan Trott (52 Tests, 68 ODIs)
Assistant coach: Graham Thorpe (100 Tests, 82 ODIs)
Fast-bowling coach: Jon Lewis (1 Test, 13 ODIs, 2 T20Is)
Spin consultant: Jeetan Patel (24 Tests, 43 ODIs, 11 T20Is)
Wicketkeeping consultant: James Foster (7 Tests, 11 ODIs, 5 T20Is)

Source: IANS