James Anderson Hits Back At Tim Paine For His "Dangerous" Comments Ahead Of Ashes

Veteran England pacer James Anderson has made an appeal to Australian cricketers to be "respectable" while engaging in verbal wars ahead of the Ashes. Australia Test skipper Tim Paine had said Ashes will go ahead even if England captain Joe Root won't be part of the tour amid ongoing uncertainty about the level of restrictions the visitors may face. Anderson termed the comments made by Paine as "dangerous" and pointed out that blocking unnecessary noise is an important aspect ahead of the Ashes. "It is dangerous to start talking like that, especially when we already have one player missing because he is looking after his mental health," Anderson told the UK's Daily Telegraph as reported by Fox Cricket.

"I get it that this is an Ashes series and we are going to have this bit of pantomime stuff away from the cricket, but let's keep it respectable.

"It is important everyone knows what to expect when we get there. There is always a lot of hype and noise around the Ashes in the build-up to it. Making everyone aware of that and having ways of blocking it out are important," he added.

The legendary fast bowler highlighted that the all pre-Ashes war of words are made to distract England and it is important that the visitors focus on cricket.

"It is designed to distract us. There are always little things that crop up. That is inevitable but it is important we try to focus as much as we can on the cricket. That is our job," said Anderson.

"Our job is not really to get involved in any off-field war of words. We have to focus on our jobs on the field and perform for our country," he added.

England squad for the Ashes: Joe Root (c), James Anderson, Jonathan Bairstow, Dom Bess, Stuart Broad, Rory Burns, Jos Buttler, Zak Crawley, Haseeb Hameed, Dan Lawrence, Jack Leach, Dawid Malan, Craig Overton, Ollie Pope, Ollie Robinson, Chris Woakes, Mark Wood.

Topics mentioned in this article

Australia Cricket Team England Cricket Team James Anderson Joe Root Tim Paine Cricket