England indicate spin intentions as James Tredwell joins tour of India

James Tredwell will act as cover for other spinners

James Tredwell (GETTY IMAGES)

After admitting one of the biggest selection cock-ups of recent years, England have sought to make further amends. James Tredwell, the Kent off-spinner, is joining the Test tour to India as vital cover.

He will meet the party in Kolkata on Saturday and be ready to play if either Graeme Swann or Monty Panesar are injured. It confirms that England intend to play two spinners in each of the two remaining Tests to try to secure a rare series victory in the sub-continent.

England omitted Panesar in the First Test at Ahmedabad and while that did not directly cause their nine wicket defeat - abject batting did that – it contributed to India’s large total. Well though Samit Patel persevered with his part-time left-arm spin he never brought the required control.

Andy Flower, the team coach, issued a reminder in the wake of the euphoria surrounding Monday’s victory that there is still a big job to be done. “Just because we have won a Test match out here in India doesn’t mean that everybody has conquered their challenges,” he said.

“There will be some fascinating cricket in the next two Tests I am sure. We don’t know how those are going to end up so I would ask the same thing again as I did after the first Test: judge the team at the end of the series.”

Flower had already conceded that it was a mistake not to play Panesar in Ahmedabad and said it was only a fleeting consideration when the team for Mumbai was discussed that England had won none of the seven Tests in which he and Swann had played together.

“The conclusion was that it wasn’t necessarily their fault,” said Flower. “One more than one occasion you could have put some responsibility on the batsmen for not thriving against opposition spinners in these sorts of conditions.”

The England Performance Programme XI played the second day of their three-day match against an Academy XI with Test squad batsman, Joe Root, scoring 166.