'Don't mean to be disrespectful at all but they're not to be feared' - Kevin Pietersen evaluates England's pace attack in Ashes opener

Former England cricketer Kevin Pietersen has shared his views on England's pace attack featuring in the ongoing Ashes Test at Edgbaston in Birmingham. Ben Stokes' brave captaincy is the one that has drawn more attention in the opening Test of the five-match series. The English skipper declared at 393/8 on Day 1, with Joe Root (118* off 152) hammering a century, his 30th in the longest format of the game.

Stokes got the big wicket of Steve Smith while Moeen Ali picked up two and England's pace trio of James Anderson, Stuart Broad, and Ollie Robinson combined for seven wickets. Despite their success with the ball, Pietersen believes the current set of English pacers should not be feared. The former all-rounder also compared them to former players Mitchell Johnson and Shoaib Akhtar, who he felt possessed greater pace. 

"There's a reason why the bowlers targeted in there (short deliveries) because we do feel, well everybody feels he (Travis Head) has an issue. And I don't mean to be disrespectful at all to the single bowling lineup but they're (England pacers) not to be feared. And I'll say that from a pace wise perspective where you've got guys bowling at 80 mile an hour, 83 mile an hour. You don't have Mitchell Johnson running in at 95 or Shoaib Akhtar, or even Woody (Mark Wood). Woody will run in and he will test you?," Pietersen told Sky Sports.

While discussing Travis Head's problems in dealing with short deliveries, Pietersen said that the star batter wants to be more aggressive. The 42-year-old went on to say that his former teammate Jonathan Trott had faced a comparable situation of Head during his playing days.

“So you need to have your wits about you when it comes to that instinctive way of playing. Whereas against (Stuart) Broad at 82-83 and (Ollie) Robinson at 80-82. I'm sorry the way that he played it wasn't as good as he should be playing it and absolutely no way. So it's a problem and when you get targeted with a short ball, it rocks your foundations as a batter.

“I remember that with Jonathan Trott, when Jonathan went through that period batting a three with us and everybody started to go short to him, it really rocked his foundations as a batter. So it's an issue for Head,” the former cricketer added.

Australia were bundled out for 386 on Day 3 of the first session. However, Australia's Pat Cummins and Scott Boland removed openers Ben Duckett and Zak Crawley on the rain-shortened third day as England finished at 28/2, leading by 35 runs.