Brydon Carse has been dropped by England for the second Test against Pakistan at Lord’s, with Hampshire seamer Sonny Baker called into the squad, after the independent Cricket Regulator confirmed it will investigate the fast bowler’s conduct outside a bar in Derby on Saturday night.
Brydon Carse dropped: what the ECB said
The ECB announced the change on Monday, a day after referring the matter to the Regulator. “Brydon Carse will no longer be available for selection for the second men’s Rothesay Test match while this investigation is ongoing and the full facts are obtained,” read the statement carried by ESPNcricinfo. “Brydon will be replaced in the squad for this match by Sonny Baker.”
Carse, 31, had been released to play for Durham after missing out on the XI for the first Test at Headingley, which England won by an innings inside three days. He was then filmed in police handcuffs after his county’s Championship win over Derbyshire. Derbyshire Constabulary told ESPNcricinfo that a man in his 30s was arrested on suspicion of being drunk and disorderly in the city centre, then “de-arrested shortly afterwards having agreed to leave the area”; the Guardian reported that Carse was neither arrested nor charged.
It lands days after Joe Root scrapped the squad’s midnight curfew as reappointed Test captain, making this the first real test of his stated standards. “You always want to represent your country in the best possible light,” Root told BBC Sport. “We might have fallen short of that on a few occasions in the recent past.”
Durham team-mate Matthew Potts and Ben Stokes — retired from international cricket but still centrally contracted — also appear in the footage. Carse is the third England player this summer to miss a Test because of a disciplinary issue, according to BBC Sport.
