‘He’s doing all he can’: England back Buttler to end miserable run of form
England have not committed to fielding their strongest side in Friday’s do-not-necessarily-have-to-win T20 World Cup encounter with New Zealand but Jos Buttler will be given the chance to turn around his miserable run of form, with the team’s coaching staff convinced that a return to familiar lofty standards is imminent.After six games at the tournament, Buttler’s top score is 26, against Nepal in England’s opener, and in their past four matches he has contributed three, three, seven and two.It is his worst run in international T20s since he followed 13 in his first ever innings with five successive single-digit scores, between February and September 2012.“I’ve played a lot against Jos, he’s one of the most dangerous white-ball batters to play the game,” said Tim Southee, England’s bowling coach.“When you’re that good and you have a bit of a blip, I guess you feel a bit more pressure.
But he’s hitting it as well as he [ever] has in the nets.I’m sure he’s only a couple of good strikes away from another amazing innings.He’s doing his business, doing all he can to perform.”England have not yet named their team for Friday’s game, with Southee saying only that they would “look at conditions and pick what team they think is best suited to match up against New Zealand on that surface”, but he confirmed that Buttler would be selected.“He’s such a dangerous player,” Southee said.
“Any time you see his name on the team sheet it’s a concern for opposition bowlers.”On Thursday the England bowler Mark Wood told Buttler to believe in himself.Drafted in to cover for Buttler on the former white-ball captain’s podcast For the Love of Cricket, Wood said: “I’m sure he’s been through things like this before, and he can just call on those experiences.I’m sure it’ll come good.As a fan everybody wants everyone to hit a hundred every time, but cricket doesn’t work like that.
He might have had a couple of low scores but he’s that good his class will eventually come through.If I had any advice for Jos it would be to keep believing in yourself as much as we all believe in you.”Meanwhile Rob Walter, the New Zealand head coach, said they, too, were braced for a Buttler revival.“I don’t think you’d ever doubt the quality of Jos Buttler,” he said.“We know that all batters probably find a space in their career somewhere where there is a lull, and sometimes it only takes one knock for that to change.
No one will ever doubt his quality, and so we won’t.”Buttler is the only member of England’s top seven not to have scored more than 40 at least once at the World Cup, but with several batters in search of peak form there should be no lack of motivation, even with a place in the final four already secured.They may be no longer in need of points but England remain very much in pursuit of perfection, or something vaguely reminiscent of it.Meanwhile, New Zealand need a win to secure their own place in the final four and both teams know that whoever prevails will top their group and in so doing almost certainly avoid South Africa, who have established themselves as the tournament’s form side after victory over India was followed by a crushing win against West Indies on Thursday.New Zealand: Tim Seifert (WK), Finn Allen, Rachin Ravindra, Glenn Phillips, Daryl Mitchell, Mark Chapman, Mitchell Santner (c), Cole McConchie, Matt Henry, Ish Sodhi, Lockie Ferguson.
England: Phil Salt, Jos Buttler (WK), Harry Brook (c), Jacob Bethell, Tom Banton, Sam Curran, Will Jacks, Rehan Ahmed, Liam Dawson, Jofra Archer, Adil Rashid,One source of encouragement for England’s batters is New Zealand’s lack of a cutting edge in the tournament,The Kiwis have taken only 27 wickets, just over half the 51 taken by England, who have played one game more,As a result batters have a much higher average when playing New Zealand than the World Cup’s other leading teams: every other side in the Super 8s is also among the eight against whom batters at the World Cup have the lowest averages, while New Zealand are 15th in those rankings,Against England the average batter has scored 18.
11, against the Black Caps 28.62 – and at almost identical strike rates.“In some of those matches where we didn’t take a full set of 10 wickets we still won the game,” Walter said.“So we still managed to restrict them.In T20 cricket, sometimes restriction is as valuable as wickets.
From our point of view taking wickets is just the end process of executing a skill.For us it’s responding to the conditions, understanding what we need to do as a bowling unit and then collectively doing it.And whether that has a team seven down or all out or two down, if we win the game it’s irrelevant.”
Ocado failing to deliver on its potential as one of UK’s great technology hopes
Only six years ago, the boss of Ocado Group was writing the obituary for supermarkets as he predicted that a surge in online grocery shopping during the pandemic had brought forward the hi-tech future.“Not every store will disappear, but there will be a dramatic shift,” Tim Steiner said at the height of the Covid pandemic, when shopping from the sofa became the only option for many.Fast-forward to today and the prospect seems distant as the UK grocery technology group again slashes jobs as it battles heavy losses.Shares in the group slumped more than 6% to 220p on Thursday, as it revealed worse than expected annual losses and 1,000 job cuts, half of which are in research and development. At that price, shares are 22% above Ocado’s stock market float price of 180p in 2010 and a staggering 90% lower than their pandemic peak
Subsidies for Rolls-Royce might seem a bit rich, but they are inevitable | Nils Pratley
Rolls-Royce, the engine-maker and defence firm that is spitting out so much cash it can shove £7bn to £9bn towards buying back shares over the next three years, would like UK taxpayers to find a few quid – reportedly up to £200m as a first slug – to help fund one its big bets. The company would “appreciate” financial support from the government to smooth work on a new engine, says its chief executive, Tufan Erginbilgiç.Outrageous? Well, corporate welfare for Rolls is obviously absurd in the abstract. If there is a definition of a company that can afford to pay for its own research and development, this is it. One might also say Rolls owes us a favour since it was the recipient of billions of pounds worth of loan guarantees from the UK’s export finance agency when the Covid wolf was at the corporate door in 2020
Riaz Hasan obituary
My father, Riaz Hasan, who has died aged 87, was a water resources engineer with a distinguished career working across 40 countries – in the 1970s with the British firm Halcrow and, from the 80s, at the UN and the World Bank.Originally from Hyderabad, Riaz arrived in the UK in 1965 with £3 and an A–Z, invited, like many engineers in India at that time, by the government. After completing a master’s degree in water resources at Bradford University, where he developed a love of Yorkshire pudding and received his degree from Harold Wilson (which he described as a real privilege), he embarked on his career designing life-saving, long-term water and food solutions for the most vulnerable and those affected by war, famine and natural disasters.Born in the small town of Warangal, near Hyderabad, to Mohammed, an English professor, and his wife, Khadija, Riaz went to Nizam college. He did his engineering degree at Osmania University, graduating in 1960, then got his first job at the Central Water Power Commission (CWPC) in Delhi
Met police to pilot facial recognition identity checks, mayor confirms
Metropolitan police officers are to start scanning citizens’ faces using automated facial recognition technology to check their identities, in a move backed by the mayor of London but described as “alarming” by opponents.The pilot was revealed on Thursday when Sadiq Khan said 100 officers would use the roaming technology – commonly deployed on smartphones – for six months. The mayor was responding to questioning from an opposition politician amid rising concern about the rollout of AI-powered policing tools. The Met’s website still states it “does not presently use the so-called operator initiated facial recognition”.Face scanning has already been deployed by police with cameras on vans and in fixed locations including in Croydon, Manchester and South Wales
Birmingham City’s owners explore moving into rugby union and buying Prem franchise
Birmingham City’s owner, Knighthead Capital Management, is among a number of American investors exploring the purchase of potential new franchises in Prem Rugby before a radical shake-up of the sport due to be ratified by the Rugby Football Union on Friday.The RFU council will vote at Twickenham on proposals to ringfence the 10-team Prem with no promotion or relegation until 2030, when a staged expansion is planned, beginning with the addition of two more teams.While former top-flight sides such as London Irish, Wasps and Worcester Warriors as well as ambitious Champ clubs like Ealing Trailfinders will be given the opportunity to apply, Prem Rugby is also keen to secure new additions. New York-based merchant bank, The Raine Group, and Deloitte have been engaged with a brief to discuss franchise opportunities with potential new owners, as well as bringing new investment into Prem Rugby itself.Knighthead is understood to have expressed interest in acquiring a franchise as the next stage of its multisport strategy that has seen it buy a 49% share in the Birmingham Phoenix Hundred franchise, and a majority share in Netball Super League club Birmingham Panthers
Brady Tkachuk decries White House’s AI video of him insulting Canadians after US gold
US ice hockey star Brady Tkachuk has said he does not appreciate an AI video released by the White House that shows him insulting Canadians.Tkachuk played in the Americans’ victory over Canada at the Winter Olympics on Sunday, which secured the US men their first gold medal since 1980. In the wake of that win, the White House’s TikTok account published video of Tkachuk saying: “They booed our national anthem, so I had to come out and teach those maple syrup eating fuckers a lesson.”Tkachuk never said those words and the video, which has had more than 10m views, is labelled as AI-generated.“Well, it’s clearly fake, because it’s not my voice, not my lips moving,” Tkachuk said on Thursday
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