Is Dale Steyn Coaching England Lions?, Yes the legendary South African fast bowler is about to work with England’s most promising young seamers, oh wow some exciting news. Alright, so let’s be honest, Steyn’s 439 Test wickets are not to be taken lightly. Anyway, he’ll be part of the England Lions coaching team on England Lions’ upcoming training camp in South Africa next month, November 20 to December 14.
The funny thing is that he isn’t the only big name. A head coach for the first time will be no less than Andrew Flintoff, while Neil McKenzie, another South African cricketing legend, is also going to be part of the staff. Imagine a young fast bowler learning from these guys.
Oh, wait, let me back up. That means the squad has 19 players ten of whom are seamers. Yeah, ten! So we’ve got two international players, Pat Brown and Josh Hull, and then some good ones like Dillon Pennington and John Turner who were in England’s squad this summer but didn’t play.
This squad’s focus? Seamers. Like, a lot of them. They want to take a look at the near future and the distant future of the team, across formats said ECB’s new performance director Ed Barney. You can see why England are going in this direction with their pace attack right now.
McKenzie will focus on the batters and he’s got his work cut out, and get this. Freddie McCann, Ben McKinney, Hamza Sheikh and a couple of others like Dan Mousley, James Coles, Matty Hurst and James Rew will be along with him. The camp will also see them play a four-day match against South Africa A.
FYI you also may not know that McKenzie was Flintoff’s staff with the Northern Superchargers in the Hundred earlier this year. And he’s worked in South Africa and the Desert Vipers, oh, too. That’s a story for another day but he was recently replaced at RCB by Dinesh Karthik.
Even this year, Karthik also did a bit for the Lions. It’s as if they’re bussing all these legends in to help develop that squad. Oh, and fun fact: In fact they even thought about Jacques Kallis for this tour! Crossing my legs a little tighter, I mean how many legends can one camp accommodate?
Also Read: PCB Announces Pakistan Test Squad Against England
Cricket Tamasha Team is a bunch of people, who create and share match breakdowns, blogs, player features and news from the world of cricket. Genuine fans will appreciate our determination to keep fans both informed and entertained.