'He has been England's best player' - Kevin Pietersen backs Jason Roy amid lean run

Former England cricketer Kevin Pietersen has backed the struggling English opener Jason Roy, and he has urged people to refrain from writing off the talented top-order batter after a lean run with the bat in the recently concluded white-ball summer.

Jason Roy is currently featuring for the Oval Invincibles in the second season of the Hundred but had a dreadful start to his campaign after being dismissed for a golden duck in his first match against London Spirit. The opening batter then followed it up with another sluggish outing against the Welsh fire, scoring a meagre ten runs.

Pietersen, who led the national side for a brief period, came out in support of the English batter and has highlighted that the batter was given the role of an attacking opener under the tenure of Eoin Morgan and has continued to do so under the new regime. He also reckoned that Roy has been England’s best batter in white-ball cricket over the years and still has a lot to offer.

“Jason is 32 years of age, and what I’m sick and tired of in this country is writing people off at such a young age. Jason is a World Cup winner; he’s done an unbelievable job for Eoin Morgan. He was told by Eoin, like the whole team, to go and smack the ball. With smacking the ball and being a risk-taker, you are going to fail, and when you start failing, failing can happen for a long time. If Rob Key is listening, he is England’s best player, and he has been England’s best player for a number of years,” Kevin Pietersen spoke to Sky Sports.

Jason Roy’s place in the English T20I is in threat owing to his wretched run

The talented English opener has had a horrid run with the bat of late, scoring just 76 runs in 98 balls in six T20Is, leading up to the Hundred. England’s white-ball coach Matthew Mott had urged the batter to regain his form in the domestic league and is ready to make tough calls for the team’s benefit.

“I’ve always believed that, in great teams, different types of players fire, and they miss out. You can hold that for a bit, and you get some currency from having delivered on the big stage – but at certain times, hard decisions need to be made,” Mott had said.