The opening batsman of the England T20 team, Alex Hales, has said that he wants to represent England in all formats of the game. He doesn’t want to be considered as a T20 specialist.
In the first T20 match between Indian and England which was played at Pune, Hales scored a fine half century. He scored 56 runs off just 35 balls and gave England a blistering start. At one point of time, Hales was playing with a strike rate of 200, but, when Yuvraj Singh came into the attack, Hales’ strike rate came down a bit and eventually, it was Yuvraj who sent Hales to the pavilion.
Talking to the reporters in the press conference after the match, Hales said, “The ball was coming on to the bat pretty well at the start and the Indian bowlers were also bowling a bit short. So, that helped me in playing my shots.”
“In the previous three matches that I had played against India, I hadn’t managed to score too many runs. So, I am happy that I scored a few runs against the Indians tonight.”
When asked why the English batsmen struggled against Yuvraj Singh, Hales said, “Yuvraj was bowling a bit slow and he was getting a bit of turn as well. It was not easy to negotiate him. We should have tried to knock him for singles, but, we went for the aggressive shots off his bowling and lost the wickets.”
When asked about him being considered as a T20 specialist, Hales said, “I don’t like this tag. I don’t want to be considered as the specialist of a particular format of the game. I want to be successful in the longer formats of the game as well. Hopefully, I would be able to impress the selectors and would find a place in the ODI team soon.”