Jack Leach, left, and Rehan Ahmed [Getty Images/AFP via Getty Images]
With less than a fortnight to go before the Australians come to town, England have been dealt a blow with news of Leach's stress fracture in his back. The question now is: how do the hosts replace their reliable spinner?
Jack Leach has been ruled out of the Ashes through injury, after suffering a stress fracture in his lower back.
The news came just 11 days before the start of the series against Australia, leaving England with a selection conundrum.
So, how should Ben Stokes and Brendon McCullum replace the spinner? Our writers have a go at providing the answer...
HUW TURBERVILL
There's talk of Moeen Ali. He had a fine Test career against nearly everyone… except Australia. He took 20 wickets at 64 apiece against them, and that's when he was playing red-ball cricket. He was dismantled by them, alas, in 2017/18.
They will probably call up Surrey's Will Jacks. Rob Key rates him really highly. That will change the dynamic of the team, of course. I cannot see hm bowling long spells like the luckless Jack Leach would have done, holding up one end, so that they could rotate the three frontline seamers. Jacks will take the odd wicket – he can bowl the occasional snorter – but his bold batting is his strength.
The long-term prospects are Jack Carson, the Sussex offspinner. He wintered with the Lions in Sri Lanka, bowled a lot of overs on benign pitches. He bowls aggressively, and has a knack of taking wickets, like Joe Root's at Hove in 2021. He is also a handy bat.
Leicestershire leggie Rehan Ahmed will also appear again in due course, after his hugely premising Test debut against Pakistan at Karachi, when he took seven wickets in the match. At 18, time is on his side.
I said England should play four seamers in the first Test – James Anderson, Stuart Broad, Ollie Robinson and Mark Wood – so Leach's injury probably makes that more likely.
Will Jacks on tour in Pakistan in 2022 [AFP via Getty Images]
SAM MORSHEAD
It would not be surprising to see England approach the Ashes with a pace focus, calling in Chris Woakes or Stuart Broad and using Joe Root as the leading spinner. In this reporter's eyes, that'd be a mistake. With England's bowlers either carrying injuries, getting on in age, or best when used in short bursts, a reliable and seasoned campaigner is required to hold down an end, and extract turn when conditions allow.
There are a handful of candidates in the county network, but one stands out: Liam Dawson. Dawson is left-arm reliable, he adds depth to the batting order, he knows international cricket, and - perhaps importantly - he is in form.
There might be temptations to go for Will Jacks, who brings lower-order hitting power to ever-improving off-spin, or Rehan Ahmed, the exciting hot prospect. The experience of Dawson feels the better route than the fearlessness of youth. It does not, however, seem likely that Ben Stokes and Brendon McCullum will think the same way.
NICK FRIEND
Sunday's news has rather laid bare the importance of Jack Leach, if that hadn't already been confirmed as an ever-present of the Stokes-McCullum regime. He was no longer the cultish figure better remembered for cleaning his glasses or for a single at Headingley four years ago; instead, he was a reliable left-arm spinner who had developed – through the clarity of Stokes' leadership as much as anything – into a viable holding bowler in the first innings of games, which took on extra importance with England's desire to bowl first and chase, and a quality operator on turning surfaces.
With such a dry buildup to the Ashes, he'd perhaps have had even more of a role than even he'd have anticipated. Instead, as has happened at several junctures in Leach's international career, misfortune has taken over.
In his place, the cupboard isn't quite empty – Will Jacks and Rehan Ahmed both picked up Test five-wicket hauls over the winter – but Leach won't be easily replaceable, and it's a very different job doing what Leach does on a flat deck in England to unleashing a teenage leggie in Pakistan. Jacks might be an attractive, aggressive option, though, with his batting and the experience of bowling as a holding finger-spinner at The Oval. Sam Curran, though not a spinner, has also been mentioned in dispatches as a balancer of the side, and I don't mind that theory either.
Certainly, the pragmatic move, particularly with question marks around Stokes' fitness to bowl, would be to pick four seamers and use Root as the sole spinner. Somehow, that feels a little less likely with this regime than in the past, and it would put more burden on a pack of seamers already reduced by injuries to remain fit.
If the Josh Tongue selection – on the back of an impressive Lions tour – is the precedent, then Jack Carson ought to be in contention too, but it'd be asking plenty of a 22-year-old to walk straight into an Ashes series, even more so with the suggestions of flat decks and generous boundaries. If we've learnt one thing from the last year, however, it's that this England team don't do much by convention.
Liam Dawson in England nets action in 2018 [Getty Images]
ELIZABETH BOTCHERBY
Pick four seamers, call in a specialist spinner, beg Moeen Ali to come out of Test retirement… so many options, no clearcut solution to the Jack Leach conundrum. His injury is, first and foremost, a horrible blow for him personally but also a major spanner in the works for England. The lack of contingency planning, however, does feel like an oversight.
Despite the attraction of an all guns blazing pace attack and Edgbaston not exactly being a slow bowling paradise, the combination of a congested schedule, the importance of workload management and Joe Root's spin not setting Lord's alight against Ireland means having another spinner would probably be the sensible approach.
Candidates are not leaping out, but England could do a lot worse than Liam Dawson: he’s highly experienced (182 first-class appearances) and is unlikely to be overawed by the occasion; he can bat (8,607 first-class runs at 32.72); and he has performed with the ball when required for Hampshire. Sure, 68.4 overs in six Championship outings pales in comparison to Leach's workload but nine wickets and an economy of 3.14 isn’t to be sniffed at.
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