Dan Lawrence is slated to open the batting for England in their upcoming three-match Test series against Sri Lanka, stepping in after Zak Crawley was sidelined with a fractured finger. Uncapped Jordan Cox has been added to the squad as an extra batter, while Olly Stone replaces Dillon Pennington, who suffered a hamstring injury during the Hundred.
Crawley fractured his right pinky finger while dropping a catch in the slips during England's ten-wicket victory over West Indies at Edgbaston last week. This injury rules him out of both the Hundred and the Sri Lanka series, though he aims to return for England's Test tour to Pakistan in October.
In the match against West Indies, Ben Stokes temporarily filled in as Ben Duckett's opening partner and scored a rapid half-century off 24 balls. However, Lawrence will open the batting against Sri Lanka. Although he has batted in various positions from No. 3 to 7 in his 11 Tests, he is not a regular opener, having done so only seven times in his first-class career, twice as a pinch-hitter. Lawrence, who has been England's reserve batter for the past year, has not played a Test since Joe Root's final series as captain against West Indies in early 2022. This decision to promote a middle-order batter instead of a specialist opener highlights England's focus on players' attributes rather than their county-level performance.
Cox, 23, joins the squad as England's backup batter. His inclusion follows an impressive season, his first with Essex after moving from Kent. He has scored three Championship hundreds for Essex, accumulating 763 runs at an average of 69.36, and has recently returned to play for Oval Invincibles after appendix surgery. Cox is also expected to be the backup wicketkeeper for the Pakistan tour.
Cox recounted how he was out for a walk in Battersea Park with his girlfriend when he missed a call from Brendon McCullum. "I got a text saying, 'Give me a call back, it's Baz,'" he told. "I quickly called back - just in case he asked someone else to join the squad… My profile picture on WhatsApp is me putting, and he basically asked, 'Did you sink that putt?'"
Cox admitted that he hadn't considered the possibility of a Test call-up, having been more focused on white-ball cricket. "I've been thinking more about the white-ball side of it," he said. "There are so many good players out there, I thought I wasn't going to be in the mix yet, if ever, so getting this call was pretty awesome."