Dale Steyn joins England Lions as bowling consultant on short-term basis

Former South Africa international Dale Steyn will work with the England Lions on a short-term basis. The youngsters are slated to travel to South Africa in November and that’s when Steyn will join the squad and work as a bowling consultant. It will be Andrew Flintoff’s first tour as England Lions head coach and he is willing to bring in experience in the coaching unit that can benefit the team in South Africa.

England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) named a 19-member squad earlier in the month, out of which, ten of them are seamers. Two international cricketers, that is Pat Brown and Josh Hull will be part of the training camp in South Africa and they will also play one four-day match against South Africa A in the Western Province. Cricketers like Dillion Pennington and John Turner, who were previously called up for England will also be a part of the squad.

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The other six fast bowlers are Zaman Akhtar, Kasey Aldridge, Henry Crocombe, Tom Lawes, Harry Moore and Mitchell Stanley. Steyn will work closely with them as England are desperate to find the future of their pace bowling unit. After Stuart Broad and James Anderson retired, they did well in home conditions but not so well away from home.

After Anderson retired particularly, England Test captain Ben Stokes called for a pace revolution and the tour in South Africa is an important project. They are trying to identify players who can be effective in the upcoming Test series against Australia and India and that’s one of the reasons they have brought in Steyn into the coaching set-up as the ace pacer is regarded as one of the greatest to play red-ball cricket.

Neil McKenzie will join the England Lions squad as well. He will oversee the batting department that features three members of the England Under-19s set-up in Freddie McCann, Ben McKinney and Hamza Sheikh. 

Notably, former cricketer Dinesh Karthik also joined the England Lions coaching staff earlier in the year on a short-term basis. He was with the squad when the team travelled to India for a three-match series.