Onions stakes claim for England recall with four wickets
Published:Graeme Onions laid down a marker in the race for England selection this summer after taking 4-65 in Durham’s County Championship Division 1 match against Somerset.
The 31-year-old, who was not selected to go on England’s disastrous Ashes tour of Australia, is determined to force his way into the England reckoning and he showed exactly what he is capable of, tormenting the Somerset batsmen with the moving ball.
Onions’ early season form will be leaving new England coach Peter Moores plenty to ponder when national selector James Whittaker, who was at the Emirates Durham, reports that the seamer is bang in form ahead of the start of the international summer.
The paceman, who can be classed as desperately unlucky not to add to his handful of international caps, made an excellent start to life as an England cricketer taking 32 wickets in nine Test matches at an average of 29.90.
Injuries stalled his international career and since 2010 he has played just one Test match, finishing with figures of 4-88 in the rain affected draw against the West Indies in 2012.
Onions was the country’s leading wicket taker last season with an impressive 66 wickets at 17.68 helping Durham to a third County Championship title.
Despite the clamour for his inclusion, his efforts were not enough to win him a place on the plane to Australia as England took tall fast-bowlers in Chris Tremlett and Boyd Rankin.
But with the seamer starting the new County season in excellent form England may not be able to ignore him and Moores, who was head coach at Lancashire before taking up a second chance as national coach, will know all about Onions’ talents.
England’s new era in Test matches gets underway against Sri Lanka at Lord’s in June and Ladbrokes offer odds of 8/13 that the new Moores regime gets underway with a victory.
The bookmaker goes 4/9 that the Alastair Cook and Moores combination starts with a Test series victory against a Sri Lankan side looking for a new head coach of their own after Paul Farbrace quit with reports suggesting he is to become England’s new assistant coach.
All Odds and Markets are correct as of the date of publishing.
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