Harry Brook, England’s stand-in captain, made a bizarre statement after his team received a hammering by Australia in the first ODI of the five-match series in Nottingham. Australia beat England by seven wickets in the first ODI as they chased down the target of 316 in just 44 overs.
Harry Brook, captaining England in the absence of Jos Buttler, won the toss and chose to bat first. Ben Duckett scored a brilliant 95 with 11 fours and along with Will Jacks (62) added 120 runs for the second wicket.
Harry Brook (39), Jamie Smith (23), and Jacob Bethell (35) then powered the home side to 315 runs in 49.4 overs. For Australia, Adam Zampa and Marnus Labuschagne picked three wickets each, while Travis Head took two wickets with his off-spin.
Australia in reply, hammered the England bowling attack despite losing captain Mitchell Marsh for 10 runs. Travis Head attacked the England bowlers and scored 154* in 129 balls with 20 fours and 5 massive sixes. Steve Smith made 32 and gave him support for some time.
But Head breathed relief when Marnus Labuschagne began attacking from the other end as well. Marnus made 77* in 61 balls with 7 fours and 2 sixes after Cameron Green was dismissed by Bethell for 32 runs. Australia achieved the target with 7 wickets in hand in 44 overs.
We want to entertain: Harry Brook despite England’s dominating defeat
Reflecting on his team’s loss on his captaincy debut, Brook stated that his team isn’t concerned about being caught on the boundary because the identical shot may score a six another day. The young skipper also stated that the team wants to entertain and will not mind going out in search of runs.
“We are out there to score runs. If you get caught somewhere on the boundary or in the field then who cares? On another day that could go for six so I’m not too fussed about that. Obviously, it was grabbing in the pitch but another day we hit them for six. They hit a few in the air and they landed safely so a little bit unlucky. We want to entertain like I have said a few times. Obviously, we care but if you get out trying to score runs that’s the way we want to play,” Brook was quoted as saying by BBC Sport.
The second ODI will be played on September 21 at Leeds.
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