England drop Anderson, Broad for West Indies Tests: Not the end of the road for pacers, says Andrew Strauss

England’ interim director Andrew Strauss on Wednesday said it’s not the end of the road for Stuart Broad and James Anderson as England cricketers after the senior pace duo was dropped from a 16-man squad for their 3-Test series in the West Indies in March.

Broad and Anderson were among the 8 members who were dropped from the squad that travelled to Australia for the Ashes. Dom Bess, Sam Billings, Rory Burns, Jos Buttler, Haseeb Hameed and Dawid Malan were the other 6 who did not find a place in their squad for the West Indies tour.

Broad and Anderson did not play all 5 Tess in the Ashes as they were rotated Down Under. Broad picked up 13 wickets in 3 matches while Anderson had 8 in 3 Tests but England lost in Australia largely due to their batting failure.

Interim director Strauss met with interim head coach Paul Collingwood and Joe Root to pick the 16-member squad for the West Indies tour. Notably, heads are rolling in England cricket as Director of Cricket Ashley Giles, former head coach Chris Silverwood and batting coach Graham Thorpe were among the ones who were fired after the Ashes horror.

“In respect of James Anderson and Stuart Broad, I want to emphasise this does not mean the end for them as England players. We feel that it is important to look at some exciting new bowling potential and give some added responsibility to other players who have featured previously,” Strauss said, as quoted by Sky Sports.

“No one doubts the quality and experience that James and Stuart bring to the England set-up. It will be up to the new managing director and permanent head coach to decide on whether they will be involved this summer and beyond.

“This selection of this squad is the start of a process and a journey to get England Test cricket back to where it needs to be, and the hard work starts now.”

In Broad and Anderson’s absence, England will tour West Indies with Mark Wood, Chris Woakes, Ollie Robinson, Ben Stokes, Saqib Mahmood in their pace-bowling unit.

England squad for Test series in West Indies

Joe Root (c), Jonny Bairstow, Zak Crawley, Matthew Fisher, Ben Foakes, Dan Lawrence, Jack Leach, Alex Lees, Saqib Mahmood, Craig Overton, Matt Parkinson, Ollie Pope, Ollie Robinson, Ben Stokes, Chris Woakes, Mark Wood.