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The selection of Will Jacks as Shoaib Bashir’s deputy for the Ashes reflects two brutal truths. First, England don’t expect the urn to be regained by their slow bowlers. Second, county cricket is as poor as ever at producing world-class spinners.
It’s worrying enough that Bashir, the first-choice Test spinner, has paid 39 for each of his 68 wickets, despite some highlights in his first couple of years at the highest level. But this season Jacks has bowled a grand total of 74.1 red-ball overs for Surrey, taking five wickets at 38. He has barely even qualified as ‘part-time’.
England had other options to play the role of Bashir’s No 2, notably the 21-year-old Leicestershire leg-spinner Rehan Ahmed, who this summer added runs to his game and has scored five first-class hundreds.
But his lack of experience as the team’s lone slow bowler counted against him, while Hampshire slow left-armer Liam Dawson played himself out of contention on his Test return against India at Old Trafford, and Somerset’s Jack Leach is now considered an Asia specialist, if that.
It’s why managing director Rob Key described Jacks as a ‘tactical decision as much as a replacement’, and here there is method to England’s apparent madness.
Because, paradoxically, if Jacks does play in any of the five Ashes Tests, it is likely to be in conditions that do not suit spin: at most, he will keep things tidy at one end while the quicks rotate at the other. And of course he will add depth to the batting in a part of the world where England’s lower order has been all too routinely blown away.
Will Jacks has bowled a grand total of 74.1 red-ball overs for Surrey this season, taking five wickets at 38
Rehan Ahmed (left) wasn't included in England's squad to tour Down Under, where there will be plenty of pressure on No 1 spinner Shoaib Bashir (right)
Somerset’s Jack Leach was once England's first-choice spinner but is now considered an Asia specialist
‘On the whole, we’re expecting the spinners to do a bit more of a holding role, potentially winning a game on the last day,’ said Key. ‘It’s going to be down to the seamers and batters to get the wickets and runs.’
England have loaded their 16-man squad with quicks, and will be able to call on reinforcements from the Lions party who will be in Australia at the same time. And if Jacks really is needed as a second spinner, it could spell trouble: that would suggest the Australians have prepared a rare turning pitch, in which case their own off-spinner Nathan Lyon, with 562 Test wickets to his name, will be licking his lips.
It’s not the first time the selectors have thought laterally. For the trip to India early last year, they plucked Lancashire slow left-armer Tom Hartley out of the county game because they felt his ability to drive the ball into the surface from a tall frame would suit the pitches.
Sure enough, he helped win the first Test at Hyderabad with second-innings figures of seven for 62, and finished the series as England’s leading wicket-taker, with 22.
Jacks, similarly, has been chosen with Australian conditions in mind. ‘Generally, you want someone there who gets over-spin, a bit of bounce,’ said Key, before cheerfully admitting: ‘Will Jacks isn’t the finished article.’
Neither, at the age of 26, has he only just begun. In the first of his two Tests, against Pakistan at Rawalpindi in December 2022, Jacks’s off-breaks claimed six for 161 to help set up a famous win.
Last summer, he hoovered up seven for 129 against Nottinghamshire on a helpful Trent Bridge surface during one of the rounds of championship matches played with the Kookaburra – the ball that will be used in Australia.
But the feeling persists that England are hedging their bets, with Jacks – who goes back a long way with Harry Brook, the new Test vice-captain – making an impression on Brendon McCullum during his new role in the one-day side as the extra batsman at No 7. And, needless to say, they like his attitude.
Jacks is an explosive batsman and 'a really handy option' according to England chief Rob Key
Jacks salutes the crowd in Rawalpindi after taking six wickets against Pakistan back in 2022
‘We think he’s someone who’s not going to be overawed by the occasion, and the extra pace and bounce you get over there,’ said Key.
‘He’s just a really handy option to have for the different things we might come up against. We’ve looked at the spinners as well and we feel for this role out there that covers a number of bases, Will Jacks is the best man for the job.’
His best chance of making an impact will be if England decide conditions favour the quicks and omit Bashir altogether, leaving what little off-spin is required in the hands of Jacks and Joe Root.
But his impact is likelier to be with bat than with ball, and he won’t be the first England spinner to say that.
