England dealt major injury blow as Jos Buttler is ruled out of Pakistan tour

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England’s World Cup preparations will proceed without Jos Buttler after the former captain was ruled out of the tour of Pakistan.

Buttler sustained a hamstring injury against Sri Lanka at Headingley last week, and retired hurt before returning to bat in clear discomfort.

Having missed Sunday’s Metro Bank ODI series decider at the Kia Oval, which England won by 223 runs, he is now ruled out of next month’s 50-over tri-series.

This deprives the team of arguably their finest white-ball batter as they build towards next winter’s tournament in southern Africa, with doubts remaining over his fitness for November’s tour of Australia.

“Jos won’t be in Pakistan,” limited-overs coach Brendon McCullum confirmed.

“We know he’s an incredible athlete, we know he’s supremely fit and an ultra professional, so he’ll do everything he can to get back as soon as possible but it’s hard to judge how long that will be.

“It’s disappointing not to have Jos but it will be good for us to see where we’re at. Between now and 14 months’ time lots of things will go wrong, there’ll be lots of selections you think will happen and someone will get injured or there’ll be a scheduling issue. You almost have to catastrophise these things a little to prepare yourself for that World Cup.”

In the short term, wicketkeeper-batter Jordan Cox gains an extended opportunity. Returning to the ODI setup against Sri Lanka after almost two years, he completed an impressive summer by steering England home with a fluent 76.

“I thought that was quite a Jos Buttler innings,” said McCullum.

“Cox will definitely get the opportunity in Pakistan. He’s done really well domestically for a number of years and he’s been unlucky with injuries when he’s been on the cusp previously.

“He’s deserved it. He’s very well liked in our dressing room and he seems to be one of those guys who is good at whatever he does, which can be incredibly annoying. He’s a good lad with a huge amount of runway in front of him in his career.”

England will finalise their Pakistan squad within 24 hours, with Sam Curran pushing to return after a groin injury and Adil Rashid’s bowling hand requiring assessment. Jacob Bethell continues recovering from a knee problem.

McCullum now faces a brief break after a turbulent summer. Having kept his role as all-format head coach following a poor Ashes campaign, he adapted his methods through extra staff and rigorous training.

Though later relieved of the Test job after Ben Stokes’ retirement and a series loss to New Zealand, he enters the winter leading an improving white-ball team with 11 wins from 13 matches.

His objective is for the team to become “the fittest, fastest, most dynamic and robust cricket team out there”, while also adding extra warm-up fixtures—reversing his early approach with the red-ball setup.

Reflecting on a season of change, and looking ahead to his split coaching partnership with new Test coach Stephen Fleming, he said: “It’s been eventful. I genuinely feel right now, at the end of the summer, English cricket is certainly in a really good place.

“I loved coaching all three formats, the four years I had as Test coach was one of most enjoyable periods of my time in cricket. But things move on, times change. I think Stephen will do an unbelievable job with the Test side.

“Overall, it’s no bad thing that it sits the way it sits now.”