England call up Cox and Stone with Zak Crawley ruled out with broken finger

England have called up the Essex batter Jordan Cox and the Nottinghamshire bowler Olly Stone for the three‑Test series against Sri Lanka starting at Old Trafford on 21 August.

The two new players come in for the injured Zak Crawley and Dillon Pennington. But the primary beneficiary of the changes forced on the team looks most likely to be Dan Lawrence who, having been a regular but unused member of many recent squads, is in line to make his first actual appearance for more than two years as a stand-in opener.

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Crawley fractured a finger during the last game of the recent 3-0 series win against West Indies and hopes to recover in time for the October tour of Pakistan. Pennington was in the squad for all three games in that series without making what would have been an international debut, and pulled a hamstring on Friday while making his first appearance for Northern Superchargers in the Hundred. He is considered unlikely to play again this summer, and the Superchargers have replaced him with Derbyshire’s Pat Brown.

The 23-year-old Cox left Kent to join Essex at the start of the year, partly to further his international ambitions. He toured Pakistan with England’s white-ball squad in 2022 but has yet to play for his country. His performances in the County Championship this year – he is averaging 69.36 with three hundreds – have convinced the England head coach, Brendon McCullum, and the captain, Ben Stokes, to call him up as backup batter.

“Test cricket is the pinnacle of cricket,” Cox has said. “With how Baz [McCullum] and Stokesy seem to be doing this Bazball type of cricket, why wouldn’t you want to play? It looks great fun.”

Stone won three Test caps between 2019 and 2021 and has since been extraordinarily unlucky with injuries, which have included four stress fractures of his back as well as numerous muscle problems. He and Matthew Potts will provide seam bowling cover for Mark Wood, Chris Woakes and Gus Atkinson, who formed the pace attack for the last two Tests against West Indies.