{"id":558786,"date":"2026-04-30T13:59:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-30T13:59:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/558786\/"},"modified":"2026-04-30T13:59:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-30T13:59:08","slug":"sonny-baker-england-bowler-hoping-for-test-debut-this-summer-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/558786\/","title":{"rendered":"Sonny Baker: England bowler hoping for Test debut this summer"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sonny Baker has just started to tell a story about a bike he bought from someone on Facebook Marketplace and a tomahawk steak when the video call goes dead.<\/p>\n

And that is a great shame, because watching the energy and enthusiasm Baker puts into his stories is a feature of a conversation with the Hampshire pace bowler. Baker talks like he bowls – fast, and with a smile on his face.<\/p>\n

A broken link is also symbolically apt for what Baker has learned in a short England career to date.<\/p>\n

In his only one-day international, Baker shipped 0-76 against South Africa<\/a> – the most expensive figures by an England man on debut.<\/p>\n

The 23-year-old is sanguine about that day at Headingley, rightly pointing out he was targeted in a game England were never going to win after they were bowled out for 131. What rankles more is his only international T20 appearance three weeks later, when Ireland plundered 52 from his four overs.<\/a><\/p>\n

Just as the failed call stopped him in his prime, Baker knows he did not give himself the best chance of succeeding in Dublin.<\/p>\n

“My little brother Blaise said to me after the game that I hadn’t been myself,” Baker tells BBC Sport.<\/p>\n

“I’m an absolute carry-on merchant. If someone plays and misses, I’m like, ‘woooaaahhh’. I can’t help but to give it a massive carry-on.<\/p>\n

“But in Dublin, I was still trying to clutch back my ODI debut. I’d beat the bat, be thankful not to have been hit for a boundary, then walk back to my mark to go again.<\/p>\n

“If I get the opportunity again it’s about being myself. If I get someone to play and miss, I have to carry on like I normally do. There’s no point worrying about what everyone will think. Who cares? That’s how I am. I have to be authentic.”<\/p>\n

And Baker will get more chances to play for England, quite possibly with a Test debut this summer.<\/p>\n

For all the talk of who might come into the batting line-up, it is the pace-bowling department that has most vacancies.<\/p>\n

In less than three years, Stuart Broad, James Anderson, Chris Woakes and – very probably – Mark Wood have exited the Test arena. England must find replacements for their combined 1,619 wickets.<\/p>\n

Brydon Carse is injured, Jofra Archer is at the Indian Premier League and Matthew Potts struggled in the final Ashes Test in Sydney.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sonny Baker has just started to tell a story about a bike he bought from someone on Facebook…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":558614,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[1721,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-558786","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-cricket","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/558786","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=558786"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/558786\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/558614"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=558786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=558786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=558786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}