Pietersen must rethink - Butcher

Butcher feels spin bowlers holds the key to an England revival

Mark Butcher believes England captain Kevin Pietersen must alter his tactics to arrest a run of four defeats in the seven-match one-day series in India.

Butcher, who played 71 Tests for England, told BBC London 94.9: "Kevin needs to get his head around some strategies for the sub-continent.

"Certainly in the first two games England have gone in with completely the wrong game plan.

"Not playing a specialist spinner in those games was an error."

England suffered heavy defeats in their opening two matches and Butcher is adamant that Pietersen selected the wrong side for the conditions.

"England conceded runs at a rate of six an over simply because they didn't have the bowlers that were going to be effective on the pitches they were playing on," said Butcher.

"India bowled 30 overs of spin in the first two games and unsurprisingly won by a mile."

England can no longer win the series, having lost the first four games.

England's main error has been their lack of trust in specialist spin bowling

Mark Butcher

But Butcher feels they can use the remaining three matches to a far greater effect than just restoring lost pride.

He added: "This is a chance for Pietersen to say 'OK, we've got a World Cup coming up in the sub-continent, we've got three games here to try and get ourselves a strategy.

"Have we got the batting order right at the top of the order? Have we played the right mixture of bowlers?' Whether that be spinners or guys taking the pace off the ball.

"And to use them (three remaining games) to really find some facts out about how he as captain is going to run a side as captain on the continent in one-day cricket.

"For me, the main error has been the lack of trust in specialist spin bowling.

"They really need to think about 'we've got to trust Graeme Swann', maybe think about Monty Panesar playing and playing some proper spin bowlers in sub-continent conditions.

"I think Panesar suffered from being pigeon-holed early on and people saying he can't play one-day cricket.

"I guarantee you if he'd played 30 or 40 games by now he'd be a damn sight better at it than people think he could be.

"The Indian spinners bowl well in Test cricket, they bowl well in one-day cricket and there's no magic answer that they have a brain that they're more adept at that.

"It's just simply the fact that they've done it, they're experienced at it and they learn their game by playing.

"No disgrace to Samit Patel - he's a batsman that bowls. He'll do a good job for you as a third spinner like Virender Sehwag does for India.

"But to have him there as your one and only spinner in front of a proper spinner like Graeme Swann, it's not good thinking."