Buttler says England banking on experience to fight back

AHMEDABAD (AFP): England skipper Jos Buttler on Thursday said his team has enough “experience in the room” to bounce back from their crushing loss to New Zealand in the World Cup opener.

The defending champions went down to New Zealand by nine wickets after the Black Caps chased down their target of 283 in just 36.2 overs in Ahmedabad.

The heavy defeat has put an early dent in England’s hopes of retaining their trophy in a tournament that concludes on November 19 at the same Narendra Modi Stadium.

“The first thing that springs to mind is whether you do lose by a run or a defeat like that, it is one loss at the start of a very long tournament,” a disappointed Buttler told reporters.

“So, that’s something that I’d be encouraging everyone to remember. It’s certainly a tough loss to take.

“We were outplayed but you know we’ve got a lot of experience in the room — guys who’ve been through lots of things and faced defeats like that before.”

He added: “So just as (if) we had won the game, we don’t get too high and we don’t get too low when we lose as well.”

Joe Root stood out for the champions with his 77 as all the 11 English batsmen got into double figures — a feat achieved by the team for the first time in a one-day international.

England were without the talismanic Ben Stokes, who missed out due to a hip injury, but Buttler said his absence wasn’t decisive.

“I think Ben’s a top player but we’ve got many top players,” said Buttler.

“I think everyone in the team got into double figures today and we didn’t have enough guys go on and make telling contributions.

“It’s not just Ben who is able to score runs in our team. We’ve got brilliant players right throughout the squad. So, we had a lot of starts. I thought we were just a bit off in our execution.”

England started briskly but New Zealand kept taking regular wickets to keep the scoring rate down after electing to bowl first.

England finished on 282-9 and Buttler admitted the total was well under par against a New Zealand side inspired by unbeaten centuries from Devon Conway (152) and Rachin Ravindra (123).

“I think the wicket probably did get better under the lights, but I think we were a long way short of our best with the bat and still made 280,” said Buttler.

“So, we’re probably looking at a score of 320, 330 which would have allowed us to build some kind of pressure and stuff.

“But I thought the margin for error was very small on that wicket and two batters who played exceptional innings.”