BUTTLER: ENGLAND STILL FULL OF CONFIDENCE ABOUT T20 WORLD CUP DEFENCE

Paarl Royals’ superstar Jos Buttler has not given up on his England team defending their ICC Men's T20 World Cup title in the US and Caribbean.

England find themselves in a precarious position with just one point after two matches.

The defending champions’ opening clash against neighbours Scotland was washed out, while arch-rivals Australia dispatched England by 36 runs last Saturday in Barbados.

England’s situation has been further exacerbated due to Scotland’s good run of form that has seen them beat Namibia and Oman in the subsequent matches to top the Group B with five points and a positive Net Run-Rate of +2.1 in comparison to England's -1.8.

England, who boast a host of Betway SA20 stars in Moeen Ali (Joburg Super Kings), Jofra Archer, Sam Curran, Liam Livingstone (all MI Cape Town), Will Jacks, Adil Rashid, Phil Salt (all Pretoria Capitals) and Reece Topley (Durban's Super Giants), now face two must win-clashes against Oman on Thursday and Namibia over the weekend.

Buttler is joined by eight other SA20 stars in the England squad: Moeen Ali (Joburg Super Kings), Jofra Archer, Sam Curran, Liam Livingstone (all MI Cape Town), Will Jacks, Adil Rashid, Phil Salt (all Pretoria Capitals) and Reece Topley (Durban's Super Giants).

Scotland face Australia in the last Group B match on Sunday.

Although qualification is no longer solely in the hands of England, Buttler is not letting all the permutations get the better of him and instead staying firmly focused on the primary goal of winning the next two matches.

"I don't think it's s**t or bust quite yet," Buttler told the media in Antigua. "I think it's quite clear what we need to do and how we need to play. First and foremost, we need to win the game against Oman to have any chance going forward into the next one. So we have to earn the right to try and win the game. And if we can get ourselves in a position to affect our net run-rate, obviously that's what we need to do.

"We've looked at a few little bits but it's going to be ever-changing throughout the game," he said. 

"I don't think we need to consume too much energy today and tomorrow saying 'we need to score 'x' amount of runs or win by this much'. I think those kinds of things will develop on the day.

"Obviously that's the situation we find ourselves in, so we have to be aware of that, but not be consumed by that. If we try and do that bit first and forget about trying to win the game and lose, then you've got no chance anyway. So I'd rather have some kind of chance going into the last game, and know exactly what we need to.”

Buttler was also philosophical about the whole scenario, particularly as England have only had limited time out on the park.

"I think there's a lot of realism that we have only had one-and-a-quarter games," he said. "It's very easy to say we're in a tough position, but we haven't played loads of cricket. We were outplayed by Australia, and had one game rained out. There's still lots of confidence in the group.”

Equally, Buttler, who led England to their second T20 World Cup triumph in Australia in 2022, is not allowing himself to be caught up in the “outside noise”.

"I care more about the team than the media and the outside noise," he added. 

"That's always there, it's part of international sport. If you get to this level, you have to be able to deal with it, the job you guys do, that's the job TV does. It's probably harder to completely ignore it in this day and age, but there's a level of acceptance. Our focus has to be on what we can do with our performance.”

Buttler is the second leading run-scorer after two seasons of SA20 with 799 runs at an average of 39.95 and strike-rate of 137.99.

This stealthy contribution has propelled the Paarl Royals to the Playoffs in both Season 1 and 2.

T20 World Cup images courtesy: ICC/Getty