London, July 3 (IANS) Tammy Beaumont, England’s stand-in captain for the third T20I against India, said the side needs to bring out a bit of fight against India at The Oval on Thursday. England are 2-0 down in five-match series and another defeat, especially in absence of regular skipper Nat Sciver-Brunt, will mean they will suffer a series defeat after starting their rebuilding by outplaying the West Indies.

“It’s real pride and honour to have the captain’s armband tomorrow, albeit in difficult circumstances. Charlotte (Edwards, head coach) asked to meet me this morning, and straight away I said, ‘Yep, thank you very much. I’ll give it a good go’. I guess we need a bit of fight to come out in this series, and I’m probably someone who likes to get in a battle, so can understand why,” said Tammy in the pre-match press conference.

England suffered a 97-run thrashing at the hands of India at Trent Bridge, before suffering a 24-run defeat in Bristol, where designated vice-captain Sophia Dunkley took charge. One of the standout factors in both defeats has been England unable to keep India’s batters in check on both occasions.

“The worst thing we could do right now is panic. Obviously, it’s not the circumstances we wanted to be in. We didn’t want to be 2-0 down, and we didn’t want our captain and best batter to be out of the team. But we’re here where we are, and that’s what we’ve got to do.”

“We’ve got to try and bring some calm to it, and some rationale, some logic. We certainly believe we can come back and win this. Full credit to India. They’ve challenged us. They’ve pushed us so far, but I hope that we can respond, and I’m certainly intending on getting the girls to try and respond to what’s happened so far,” added Tammy.

The right-handed batter signed off by saying facing India right now could turn out to be a blessing in disguise for England. “That’s what we keep talking about. We’ve wanted more challenge (on home soil) for a long time. We’re well aware that our results in world tournaments and big series haven’t been what we’ve wanted them to be for a number of years now.”

“It’s only going to happen by being pushed more in bilateral series and feeling that pressure, and experiencing that, and taking learnings from it, and getting better each time. It’s happened quite early on, and it may come as a bit of a shock, but we are doing the hard work behind the scenes.”

“We had another really good meeting this morning, with some really honest reflections from a lot of players. A lot of players were being vulnerable, and that’s the only way that you can learn. Unfortunately, at the moment, we’re going through a tough time, but I’m a firm believer that tough times don’t last, but tough people do. We’re trying to become really tough people in this team and keep moving forward,” she concluded.

–IANS

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