England vs Australia: In-form Jos Buttler set to open for hosts in one off T20

Birmingham: Jos Buttler will be promoted to open the innings in England’s lone Twenty20 international against Australia at Edgbaston on Wednesday, team management have confirmed. Buttler was one of the stars of this season’s Twenty20 Indian Premier League after being promoted to open and scored a tournament record-equalling five successive fifties for the Rajasthan Royals. [caption id=“attachment_4590331” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Jos Buttler celebrates England’s victory over Australia on Sunday. AFP[/caption] He has opened once before for England in his 61 T20 internationals, making an unbeaten 73 off 49 balls - his highest T20 score for England — when Sri Lanka were beaten by eight wickets at Southampton in 2016. Buttler has usually been deployed as a middle-order batsman by England but, having been recalled to the Test side earlier this season, they are now determined to cash in on his recent brilliant form in white-ball cricket. The wicketkeeper-batsman was named man-of-the-series after England’s 5-0 rout of world champions Australia, with his brilliant 110 not out sealing a dramatic one-wicket win in the fifth one-day international at Old Trafford on Sunday. That century crowned a brilliant series where Buttler scored 275 runs in total, including scores of 91 not out and 54 not out, at an extraordinary average of 137.50. Paul Farbrace, deputising as head coach in place of Trevor Bayliss for this one-off match and next month’s three T20s against India, confirmed the 27-year-old Buttler’s promotion by telling reporters at Edgbaston on Tuesday: “He will open tomorrow (Wednesday). “You want to get your best strikers facing as many balls as possible. The form he’s in, the way he’s playing, it makes sense to get him at the top of the order,” Farbrace added.