Jos Buttler has insisted England will not shy away from their attacking approach with the bat despite a top-order collapse in the first one-day international against Sri Lanka.
Buttler and Chris Woakes both made 90s before tailender Liam Plunkett’s last-ball six at Trent Bridge on Tuesday ensured the first of a five-match series was tied. Wicket-keeper/batsman Buttler and all-rounder Woakes revived England from the depths of 82 for six, chasing 287.
Today’s second match of the Sri Lanka series sees England return to Edgbaston, the ground where they launched their new approach to 50-over cricket when Buttler and Joe Root both scored centuries in a national record total of 408 for nine against New Zealand last year.
Buttler was adamant that now was not time for England’s top-order to go into their shells and abandon the aggressive style that has helped bolster the team’s one-day fortunes since their embarrassing first-round exit at last year’s World Cup in Australia and New Zealand.
“We expect the guys to come out tomorrow and play fantastically well,” said Buttler at Edgbaston yesterday. “It just goes to show there will be more pressure on us this summer than last year — having played the way we have in white-ball cricket over the last 12 months. (But) it shows we shouldn’t have to do anything different — just go and play with that aggressive mind-set and fall on the positive side of what we do and be prepared to take a risk rather than the negative option.
“If anything we should come out and play even more shots. That’s the way we want to play our cricket. We want to put teams under pressure, and there’s no reason to change.”
Buttler, reflecting on the tied series opener, added: “It was a morale-boosting finish to the game, but also a strange feeling — because you don’t want to celebrate getting a tie too often. Great credit to Liam at the end, and it again shows what talent we have all the way down the order — and character in a moment like that. It was a bit of a get-out-of-jail.
"We were confident of chasing that target down on that pitch, and we were disappointed we didn’t do that — but from the position we found ourselves in, it was nice to drag one back.”
Buttler accepted he was responsible for being run out in controversial fashion the last time England and Sri Lanka met in a one-day international at Edgbaston. The final match of the 2014 ODI series between the two countries saw England batsman Buttler run-out at the non-striker's end by bowler Sachithra Senanayake after Sri Lanka twice warned him for moving out of his ground backing up.
Sri Lanka won the match, and with it the series. Alastair Cook, then England's one-day captain, said at the time he was "pretty disappointed" but the view of many former internationals was that Buttler was at fault. Even though 'Mankading', the term coined after India's Vinoo Mankad ran out Australia non-striker Bill Brown during the 1947 Sydney Test, remains a legitimate dismissal, some regard it as against the spirit of cricket.
Nevertheless, Buttler said: "It is obviously batsman error. If you walk out of your ground and someone wants to do it, it is in the laws of the game. It is all part of the game.  "I was disappointed at the time, because it doesn't happen very often. I thought you could do that every ball if you wanted and there would be a chance to run someone out. But the bowler would say 'why don't you just stay in your crease?' So I guess I did learn something from it."
Sri Lanka captain Angelo Mathews, speaking before Tuesday's dramatically tied first ODI at Trent Bridge, insisted he had no regrets about Buttler's dismissal two years ago and would be prepared to uphold a similar appeal again.  "We will play our cricket within the rules," said Mathews. "If someone is trying to take advantage of the rules then we will probably warn him.