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England white-ball skipper Jos Buttler, set to play his first game of competitive cricket after the T20 World Cup semifinal loss to India due to a calf injury sustained in August, has said that he is hungry to play as much as possible and help develop a new limited-overs team for England under head coach Brendon McCullum, who will take over ODI and T20I sides next year.
After missing out on months of white-ball action, Buttler is back in Barbados for the first T20I of the five-match series against West Indies. After England lost the ODI series 1-2 under the leadership of Liam Livingstone, they would be looking to gain a crucial, confidence-boosting series win over the Windies, who have dominated the Three Lions across both white-ball formats as of late. After a poor 2023 World Cup in India, England has lost both ODI series against WI on their tour to Caribbean and a T20I series as well. All three series have seen England losing in crucial moments despite giving tough competition to the Windies. Speaking about his return from injury and his future in international cricket, Buttler said "All sorts of things run through your mind. I think you try and work through everything." The England skipper also said that he enjoys being the captain of the side and it is something he believes that he can do well. McCullum, England's current Test coach, will be taking over the white-ball sides from January 2025 onwards ahead of the ICC Champions Trophy to be held from February-March in Pakistan. This development has given Buttler, under fire for poor performances in 50-over and 20-over World Cup defences, a new lease of life. The pair have been friends for a long time and McCullum aims to bring the best out of Buttler during his tenure. McCullum's experience as a white-ball captain for New Zealand in his later stages of the career have inspired Buttler to develop an environment where players can flourish and go to the "top of the mountain". "I had some chats with Baz (Brendon) about how this stage of your career can actually be the most rewarding. He spoke about his own experiences as captain in the last few years of when he was playing, it is not about you at all, it is about creating that environment and letting people flourish and how seeing them go to the top of the mountain was some of the happiest times of his career as a player. And that is exactly what I want to get out of them," said Buttler. Buttler is a man with a renewed sense of purpose, with a fresh cycle of ICC white-ball tournaments approaching. With the next year's Champions Trophy, the 2026 T20 World Cup in India and Sri Lanka and the 2027 50-over World Cup in Africa in his mind, he wants to play "as much as he can" and develop a new generation of white-ball players for England. He also opened up on how time away from the game gave him a new perspective on the game and the desperation, motivation to come back to the field. "You get a nice perspective of, when cricket has taken away from you (during time spent away from game), how great it is, how important it is and how much you enjoy it. It is all the little things that you sometimes take for granted that you really miss the most, like being around the changing room, pulling the shirt on. When you start to think about it, it gives you a lot of hunger and motivation to get back, put the work in and get playing again," said Buttler. "When you get an injury like that it makes you realise how desperately you want to get back, and the stuff that you really enjoy doing, so that is the mindset of however long I have got back." "I think throughout the three ODIs [against West Indies], Jacob Bethell scoring his maiden fifty, Dan Mousley [also] in the last game, you see those guys getting that opportunity and grabbing it which is incredibly exciting. And whatever that means in terms of squads, that is exciting for English cricket," he concluded. England Squad for the T20Is: Philip Salt(w), Jos Buttler(c), Will Jacks, Liam Livingstone, Jacob Bethell, Dan Mousley, Sam Curran, Jamie Overton, Adil Rashid, Jofra Archer, Reece Topley, Saqib Mahmood, Jordan Cox, John Turner, Rehan Ahmed, Jafer Chohan, Michael-Kyle Pepper West Indies Squad for the T20Is: Brandon King, Evin Lewis, Nicholas Pooran(w), Rovman Powell(c), Sherfane Rutherford, Roston Chase, Andre Russell, Akeal Hosein, Gudakesh Motie, Matthew Forde, Shamar Joseph, Terrance Hinds, Romario Shepherd, Shai Hope, Shimron Hetmyer. (ANI)
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