Buttler: McCullum Can Go 'All In' on T20 World Cup

Jos Buttler thinks Brendon McCullum's removal as Test coach in July has sharpened England's chances at next year's T20 World Cup, with the New Zealander now free to focus entirely on the white-ball team.

McCullum lost his red-ball duties in the summer, with Stephen Fleming taking over as Test coach, while he stayed on as white-ball coach. Under the split arrangement England won 11 of 13 limited-overs matches over the summer, including ODI series victories over India and Sri Lanka, among them a 355-run innings against Sri Lanka that closed out at 132.

Buttler, who captained England through their group-stage exit at the 2023 ODI World Cup, said the narrower job has let McCullum commit fully to the tournament in southern Africa.

"He's only got one focus now and that is the white ball," Buttler said on his For the Love of Cricket podcast. "It's not that he couldn't do everything, because he could, but your time is more spread and you've got more to think about with the Test team as well. Now he can focus solely on white-ball cricket – T20, yes, but mainly ODI cricket with that World Cup on the horizon. It seems like Baz is naturally all in on, 'How do I win this World Cup with this team?' I think he can sort of see that World Cup is not that far away. It's a real target, now his remit has changed from four months ago being in charge of everything to, 'Right, I can really nail down on this'. He's just got more time and more focus on that. ODI cricket for England has not been consistently great for a couple of years so there's some nice g—"

England currently sit second in the ICC Men's T20 World Cup standings, level on 6 points from 4 matches with both Pakistan and Sri Lanka, their nearest recent opponent.