Harry Brook believes the thick Kolkata smog contributed to England’s hapless display against spin in the opening T20 against India.

Vice-captain Brook was the first of five batsmen to fall to India’s spinners at Eden Gardens, as the tourists were bowled out for 132 on the way to a thumping seven-wicket loss.

Brook and Liam Livingstone fell in the space of three balls to Varun Chakravarthy’s brilliant googly, and said England’s batsmen were struggling to pick the variations of India’s two wrist-spinners due to the smog in Kolkata.

“I didn’t face [Ravi] Bishnoi but Chakravarthy is an exceptionally good bowler, tough to pick,” he said. “I think actually with the smog the other night, it was a lot harder to pick as well. Hopefully, the air is a bit clearer here and we can see the ball a bit easier.

“He’s an exceptional bowler and has got a lot of skills with extreme accuracy as well. We’ll look to put him under immense pressure and hopefully we can get hold of him.

“Their spinners are their key threat, so we will look to put pressure on them, take them down, put as much pressure as we can on them, and hopefully they crumble from there.”

The air in Chennai, where the second T20 takes place on Saturday, is clearer, although England’s task will be made more difficult by a red-soil pitch that makes Chepauk better known for taking spin than Eden Gardens.

England have chosen not to bring Rehan Ahmed into the XI to bolster their spin options, but Brydon Carse has replaced Gus Atkinson, who endured a bruising night in Kolkata. Jacob Bethell missed training on Friday due to illness and is likely to be replaced by Jamie Smith, who would be on debut.

Brook revealed that Brendon McCullum, who took over as England’s all-format head coach on this tour, invited him to be vice-captain by messaging him from the other side of the hotel bar.

“We were sat in the bar the other night and Baz texted me from across the other side of the room,” he said. “He just said ‘Congrats, you’re the vice-captain’ and I just put: ‘Beautiful, thanks.’ There wasn’t really much conversation.

“Obviously, I captained the ODIs in the summer so I kind of knew that it was going to happen. You don’t have to do too much as a vice-captain; Jos [Buttler] is extremely experienced, I’ll give him a few suggestions here and there and if he comes to me, I’ll give him my opinion but it’s up to him whether he takes it or not.”

Brook said there is no need for England to “panic” and that he will be watching clips of his maiden Indian Premier League hundred from 2023 as inspiration.

“I was going to watch it on the way in but my phone wouldn’t work, so I’ll have a look a little bit later,” he said. “We’re only one game in, I don’t think there’s too much need to panic. I’ve had a break and Jos has had a break and a few other lads haven’t been playing cricket, so it was nice to get back out on the pitch in front of an amazing crowd.”

Brook cannot be called world’s best until he overcomes issue with extreme spin

Joe Root recently declared that Harry Brook was “by far and away the best player in the world”. Brook had just made a stunning hundred in Wellington, his fourth in 12 Tests in 2024, and a few days later, overtook Root to go top of the ICC rankings for the first time.

Brook’s stay there lasted only a week, with Root back at the top now. But in 2024, Brook had gone up another level, showing newfound endurance levels in his epic 317 in Multan, and even greater style and audacity in his two hundreds in New Zealand. He also stepped up as a leader in a new-look England team, and found his feet in ODI cricket, too.

But for Root to be right, and for Brook to become the world’s best batsman, whatever the format, he has one problem to solve: his play against extreme spin.

At this point, Brook is an excellent player of slow bowling – as evidenced by his first four Tests in Pakistan – but not an average player of spin – as evidenced by his most recent two Tests in Pakistan. When the surfaces were slow and flat in Pakistan in 2022 and Multan last year, Brook filled his boots, bullying spin and seam alike on his way to four staggering centuries, including that triple. But when Pakistan pivoted to raging turners and called in Noman Ali and Sajid Khan, Brook struggled, with 56 runs in six innings.

Brook missed last year’s tour of India when his grandmother, Pauline, died meaning he is yet to play Tests in this country. But his white-ball record is modest here, and he did not look comfortable against the brilliant Varun Chakravarthy on Wednesday in Kolkata, eventually being bowled through the gate. In his sole IPL season, 2023, he made one brilliant hundred, but scored just 90 runs in 10 other innings, and he did not make an impression on the ODI World Cup in 2023, either.

Brook has all the ingredients to be an excellent player of spin: lightning-quick feet, a brilliant eye, rubbery wrists and hands that can be soft one ball and full of power the next. Right now, though, he has a habit of backing away, which opens up scoring options, but also offers his stumps to spinners aiming right for them. It is a method that needs some work, a charge he accepts.

“Yeah, absolutely,” he said on Friday, when asked if he remains a work in progress against spin, as you might expect a 25-year-old from the north of England to be. Rather than technical issues, Brook – rarely one to take a backward step – believes his approach needs some tactical tempering.

“Facing spin in T20 cricket is probably the hardest thing in the game, I think, especially because I always get out trying to absolutely smack it,” he said. “Maybe I’ve got to rein in a little bit, but we’ll see. I think I do have a method. It’s just trying to do it consistently and more often. I come in the middle order, so the first few balls I face are usually spin. So if I get out early, it’s usually against a spinner.”

Brook remains inexperienced in extreme spinning conditions, and will only improve with exposure. This tour, against some outstaying spinners, provides the perfect opportunity to do just that.