‘Adaptable’ With a ‘open mind,’ Sam Curran accepts a multi-purpose role at England
Sam Curran was forced out of last year’s T20 World Cup due to injury two weeks before the event began, and he is not counting on his participation in the 2022 edition in Australia.
Sam Curran was a fringe part of England’s limited-overs team when they selected their 50-over squad in 2019, and he sustained a lower-back stress fracture while playing in the IPL in the build-up to last year’s tournament in the UAE.
He is concerned that he would be mocked just over a month before their first game of the 2022 edition, against Afghanistan on October 22. When questioned about his first World Cup appearance, he laughed and stated, “I don’t actually want to speak about it too much.”
“I missed the previous one. I need to finish this series so that I can be excited about it when I return to Australia. The most important thing this summer was getting my body through it… the World Cup is now the priority.”
Curran spent the English summer focused on white-ball cricket, working closely with Surrey and England’s medical department to ease him back into the game after his injury. He played five Championship games, but due to workload constraints (he bowled only 41 overs), he decided with the ECB in August to focus on short-form cricket ahead of the World Cup.
“I didn’t bowl much for Surrey,” he said. “I bowled the most overs [24] in a game, and it felt like the most logical option. The Test squad was flying at the moment, so my sole emphasis was on the World Cup and trying to achieve a decent Hundred, keep performing, and get my body in shape.”
Curran hasn’t played Test cricket in over a year, but a solid T20I tour to Pakistan would put him in contention for the December three-match series here. “I’m still young, so I want to play as much as I can,” he explained.
“Because there is so much cricket, you’ve seen players choose to relax at various times. I want to play all formats right now because I’m coming off a six-month injury layoff.”
