MICHAEL Vaughan has urged England’s selectors to stick with Steven Finn for the first Ashes Test with Australia next week.

The former Ashes winning skipper believes the toss-up between the Middlesex quick and his (Vaughan’s) fellow Yorkshireman will be the toughest call for Geoff Miller and his selectors ahead of the first joust of the summer between the sport’s oldest adversaries.

However, given Trent Bridge Nottingham’s recent trend to be hard and flat, Vaughan would plump for Finn who he sees as England’s ‘joker in the pack.’

He said:  “I would go for Finn. He did enough in the second Test match against New Zealand on a pretty flat wicket.

“You know what you are getting from Jimmy Anderson and Stuart Broad pretty much and Finn is that fire cracker that a little bit different so I expect the selectors to keep with him.

“Traditionally Nottingham it has been a swinging ground, but just recently it has been very flat and then taking a little bit of spin, so someone like Finn is what you will probably require because he brings something different.

“He hits the pitch hard and he has that little bit of extra height.”

The choice between Finn and Bresnan is one Vaughan sees as exercising the selectors throughout the series.

He claimed the notion the team you pick for the first Test Match is your best team, so you stick with it had become old school thinking.

He feels the intense schedule of an Ashes series packed into a seven-week window means juggling of the pace-men will be necessary and therefore Finn and Bresnan, a man he sees as an under-rated cricketer will be chopped and changed as conditions dictate.

He added: “There will be changes with five matches in seven weeks – you are going to see different bowling attacks pretty much every week I reckon, so Bresnan will play a part in the Ashes.

“Everyone points a finger at the first Test Match and thinks that is your best team, but  the game has changed a bit and I think England look at it as five contests now and it is a matter of who is a particular track going to suit.

“I don’t understand this thought that Tim Bresnan is a bit part cricketer – he is a quality player who I think would get into most other teams.

“So the selectors will be pencilling in Finn and Bresnan for two or three games in the Ashes series and they will be thinking which conditions are going to get the best out of them.”

Vaughan was speaking at a Laureus sponsored lunch organised by the Sports Journalists Association.

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