England are considering handing Jos Buttler the wicketkeeping gloves, ahead of Jonny Bairstow, during their Test tour of New Zealand in November. England name their squad for New Zealand next week and believe the Test team retains significant room for improvement despite salvaging a 2-2 draw from the Ashes series.

Since reverting to being Test wicketkeeper in February, Bairstow is averaging only 18 from seven Test matches. He averages only 24 since the start of the 2018 summer. In the same period, Buttler averages 36 in Tests. England retain a strong belief that Bairstow, who has six Test centuries, can thrive as a specialist batsman in Test cricket, but do not feel like they are currently getting the best out of him.

All six of Bairstow’s Test hundreds have come either in games where he had yet to keep – because England batted first, and his century came in the first innings – or, as in his century in Sri Lanka last year, when he was a specialist batsman. Overall, in Tests when he is the wicketkeeper, he averages 52 in the first innings of the match but only 30 over the last three innings.