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Morgan ready to tackle Test tempo

Eoin Morgan admitted he was surprised to have been fast-tracked into the Test squad for Thursday's first Test against Bangladesh, as the England selectors opted to take a punt on his temperament

Eoin Morgan believes he can transfer his one-day form into the Test arena  •  AFP

Eoin Morgan believes he can transfer his one-day form into the Test arena  •  AFP

Eoin Morgan is widely regarded as being the catalyst for England's remarkable upsurge in limited-overs cricket, having produced a string of crucial performances in South Africa, Bangladesh and, of course, during the recent World Twenty20 triumph in the Caribbean. But even he admitted he was surprised to have been fast-tracked into the Test squad for Thursday's first Test against Bangladesh, as the England selectors opted to take a punt on his temperament, and test his mettle in five-day cricket ahead of the Ashes this winter.
With his extraordinary range of innovative strokeplay, Morgan has showcased an ability to find the boundary in any given situation - a trait that has proven invaluable in the shorter-form games. However, it is his cool and calculating demeanour at the crease that has persuaded the management to overlook an indifferent first-class average of 36, and Morgan is confident that he can transfer his mindset to the form of the game he grew up watching as a youngster in Dublin.
"It did surprise me, slightly, to get the phone call the other day," said Morgan. "I was over the moon too, because to get a phone call like that is every kid's dream. Test cricket is my biggest aspiration, and my biggest dream. It's where I want to be, to test myself against the best, and it's been that way since I was a kid, when one-day cricket wasn't televised in Ireland, but there was a lot of Test cricket."
When asked if he believed he was capable of batting for five or six hours at a time, Morgan joked: "I think so, certainly, though I might get about 400", before admitting that overcoming his previous tendency towards ill-discipline was the biggest challenge that awaited him in the switch from one-day to Test batting.
Morgan has not played a first-class innings since August 2009, when he completed a tricky season for Middlesex with scores of 16 and 17 against Glamorgan at Swansea. In the whole summer, he mustered 445 runs in 20 innings at 24.72, with his solitary century coming against Leicestershire at Southgate in April.
"My head wasn't in the right place," he admitted. "We had a lot of consecutive games, and I couldn't seem to get a score under my belt, but a lot's changed since then. I've a lot of runs under my belt now and feel quite confident about my game. I wouldn't say I get bored. Where my failure has been is ill-discipline - and I think I've corrected that to a certain extent. I'm far from having the perfect game; I'm always learning, always improving. But I think I'm in as good a place as any now, to play."
Morgan credits a lot of his development in the past six months to the influence of England's coach, Andy Flower, whom he said had pushed him hard to improve his game while at the same time instilling in him the confidence to express himself at the crease. "He's been on about the basics, doing the simple things," he said. "It has helped my game massively, because it allows you to get yourself in and spend time at the crease. Once you get in, it's yours."
It remains to be seen whether Morgan will unfurl his most flamboyant range of strokeplay during the Lord's Test, including his so-called "paddywhack" reverse-sweep, but he did not believe he would let his style be cramped too much by the occasion. "I think [the pace] will be a lot more spanned-out, but if the game does dictate a certain shot and the percentages are in my favour, I'll play it," he said. "There's a mind-set [for Test cricket] of going out and just batting [for a long time], but still making the bowler do what you dictate to him.
"I have a different style to everybody else," he added. "I've played the reverse-sweep millions of times. I've got out to it 10% of the time, but it's scored me 90% of the runs. It will be a case of assessing how valuable is the shot going to be to me. I might not play it for a year, but if it's going to score me a lot of runs, maybe I will. My temperament is a major part of my game, and I take confidence from that - knowing I've put my performances in under pressure."
Just as Craig Kieswetter was drafted into the Bangladesh tour to gauge his suitability for the World Twenty20 campaign, so Morgan's Test elevation has been fast-tracked with one particular contest in mind, but right at this moment, he insists that the prospect of an Ashes tour is a distant blip on the horizon.
"It would be a dream if I was involved. But that's a long way away; there's a lot of cricket to be played between now and then," he said. "This time last year I couldn't score a run for Middlesex, but between now and then, opportunities will arise - and I hope I can take them. I've had lots of support from both sides of the Irish Sea, and I'm in good enough nick now to back myself to score some runs."

Andrew Miller is UK editor of Cricinfo