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Eoin Morgan: I don’t think I will play Test cricket again

England’s limited-overs captain Eoin Morgan has suggested he will never play Test cricket again.

Eoin Morgan will be playing for Kings XI Punjab in this season of IPL © Getty Images
Eoin Morgan will be playing for Kings XI Punjab in this season of IPL © Getty Images

England’s limited-overs captain Eoin Morgan has suggested he will never play Test cricket again. Morgan, one of the many Irish-origin cricketers to have played international cricket for England, made his Test debut in 2010. He played as many as 16 Tests from making his Test debut at Lord’s in May 2010 till his last, against Pakistan at Dubai in February 2012. Morgan scored exactly 700 runs in 16 Tests with two centuries and three half-centuries, but has not been among England’s scheme of things for more than five years as far as Test cricket is concerned. However, Morgan remains one of England’s best players in shorter formats, and was even appointed their captain in the lead up to the last World Cup. 

Morgan told ESPNCricinfo, “Yes, I probably could become a white-ball specialist if that’s what I wanted. But it’s not, not at the moment. It might be down the line, but it’s certainly not now. I think Test cricket has gone for me. I don’t think I’ll ever play Test cricket again. But I think it’s important for me to strive to keep working on my game in red-ball cricket, to continue to work on the first 30 balls I face in a white-ball game. Maybe not for T20, but for the 50-over game it is.”

Morgan is set to return to India to play the IPL 2017 in May, right after England’s two-match ODI series against Ireland. He will be playing for Kings XI Punjab (KXIP) in the IPL. Morgan will play in the two-match ODI series against Ireland on May 5 and 7. He will return to India to play two more IPL matches scheduled for May 9 and 11. Later, he will be joining the training camp with England squad which commences on May 14. Hence, he will be missing two IPL matches. Morgan, thus, will be shuffling between his national duties as well as IPL, in which he will be playing for a new team this season. Morgan was with the defending IPL champions Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) till last year.

Morgan said, “I was pleasantly surprised to hear I’d been picked-up in the IPL auction. I wasn’t expecting to be picked up so it was good news. The perception of things was that I’d miss a lot of the IPL but in actual fact I will only miss four days. I’ll only miss two games out of the 14 which is not very much.”

Morgan says that he won’t be missing the Ireland ODIs for the IPL. While some England cricketers are allowed to do that, Morgan has decided not to do so. Along with the team director, Andrew Strauss, Morgan has decided to not miss any of the matches as they did not want to tinker with team’s leadership. Before going for the ICC Champions Trophy in June, Morgan wants to play with likes of Ben Duckett, after having missed three-match ODI series in Bangladesh last October.

Morgan believes that it is important for him to play with team as most of the players involved in the Ireland series are likely to feature in the Champions Trophy as well. As a captain of the England’s limited-overs teams, he feels that it is important to play and analyse the players before playing in the Champions Trophy.

In case, Morgan had not been selected in the IPL auction, he would have returned to Middlesex for the start of the County Championship season. His chances of returning to the Test matches remain bleak. Even, Morgan feels that he won’t be playing Test cricket again.

Presently, Morgan is looking at playing three County Championship games in August and his aim is to captain at the 2019 World Cup which will be organised in England. Meanwhile Morgan suggested that Alex Hales may miss the ODI series against West Indies as he is still recovering from a broken bone in his hand. But still Morgan remains keen for Hales to join up with the rest of the squad in the next few days.

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