Steven Finn urges fans to keep faith in England batsmen

Steven Finn claims the batsmen who carried England to number one in the Test rankings deserve loyalty despite their collective failure in the series whitewash by Pakistan.

The 3-0 defeat in the United Arab Emirates came largely as a consequence of England's inability to put up substantial totals, with the series averages making grim reading for most of the top order, most notably Ian Bell and Kevin Pietersen.

But rather than drop underperforming batsmen, pace bowler Finn believes England should stand by the players in possession.

Asked if the Test batting line-up needs to be changed, 22-year-old Finn told BBC Radio Five Live: "I think it's been very, very successful over the last two years with the personnel who played in this series.

"There's no doubt we have the best people available in the country playing in the team, we just didn't adapt as quick as we'd have hoped."

England are looking to regroup, with some new additions and others having departed, for a run of one-day internationals and Twenty20 matches against Pakistan.

"Hopefully this can give us momentum moving towards the Test series in Sri Lanka after that," Finn said.

"But in terms of having to change personnel, I don't think we need that kind of knee-jerk reactions at the moment."

Assessing England's objectives for the limited-overs matches, Finn suggests England should look to play an instinctive game.

He said: "This is a really good chance for us to go out and play with free abandon I suppose, go out and just enjoy ourselves.

"Alastair Cook is going to be leading the team and we're all looking forward to getting going in this one-day series."

PA