Flower thinks Anderson will recover in time for the Ashes
The Director of England cricket team former http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Andrew-Flower-c44362 thinks that his bowling spear head James Anderson would be fit for the first Ashes Test against Australia.
The Test starts at the Gabba in Brisbane on 25th of November and Flower is quietly confident that his swing specialist would be cent-percent for the match.
Anderson was the architect of England’s 3-1 Test series win over http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Pakistan-c755 at home and once again he would be pivotal to his team’s chances against their old enemy.
The Ashes remains the ultimate prize in Test cricket and the fans in both countries eagerly await the start of the battle in http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Australia-c746. The last series was won by England, yet off late they have been abysmal in Australia.
Their worst performance there was on their last tour Down Under when Ricky Ponting’s men blew them away on their way to a record breaking 5-0 whitewash.
Flower knows that if he has to wash away the memories of the last series then his team has to get off to a good start.
His most potent pace bowling weapon remains Anderson, and according to the former wicket-keeper batsman he is already 75% fit.
"He's already bowling at 75%, so he should be fine for the first Test," Flower said. "More than likely, he'll be okay for two of those warm-up games".
Anderson had to go through a fitness assessment at Loughborough this week. He was present there along with the rest of the England squad and on Monday was bowling in the indoor school at Old Trafford.
The signs are encouraging as he seems to have recovered partially from the rib injury he sustained during the boot camp in http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Germany-c2904.
The usually fiery English media had a field day when the nature of Anderson's injury was revealed.
They laid into the English management for arranging what they thought was an unnecessary camp termed as a "boot camp".
However, Flower thinks that the camp was a great bonding exercise for the team ahead of the rigours of the tour Down Under. The man, who is being hailed by many as the man responsible for the turnaround in English fortunes in the last
year or so, claimed that there were many advantages of the exercise and it should not be ridiculed.
"I have a problem with the term 'boot camp', because it is associated with punishment in some ways," he said. "I might do some stupid things in my time, but punishing players over five days is not one of them. The whole point of that
camp was an educational, or training, or development camp, and it was conducted in that way, Jim getting injured was not part of the plan, but these things happen. Unless he injures something else he should be fine".
Deep down Flower knows that the series in Australia followed by the ODI World Cup next year makes the coming season of cricket the toughest yet in his tenure at the helm of English cricket. Besides the Test series, Flower has to keep an eye on the preparations
for the biggest limited overs tournament that England is yet to win.
They have performed abysmally in the World Cup since 1992, failing to reach the semi-finals stage even once. However, there is real hope this time around as the founders of the game buried their ICC trophy voodoo by winning the T20 World Championship in
the http://www.senore.com/Cricket/West-Indies-c760 earlier in the year.
But for the time being the talk is all about the Ashes, as cricketing fans around the World hope for another classic between the two oldest rivals in the longest format of the game.
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