BIRMINGHAM, England - Injury-hit England has called up three players, including opening batsman Mark Butcher, to bolster its squad for the first Ashes cricket Test against Australia.

Butcher, off-spinner Robert Croft and uncapped Nottinghamshire batsman Usman Afzaal were added to the existing squad on Tuesday.

The first of the five-Test series starts at Edgbaston in Birmingham on Thursday.

Surrey left-hander Butcher played the last of his 27 Tests against South Africa in January 2000.

The 23-year-old Afzaal was born in Rawalpindi in Pakistan.

England, already the underdogs for the series, announced on Monday that class batsman Graham Thorpe and Mark Ramprakash, drafted in as cover, had been ruled out of the 14-man squad for the first Test.

Frontline batsman Michael Vaughan is also expected to be ruled out with a knee problem later on Tuesday, while left-arm spinner Ashley Giles is struggling with tonsillitis.

Captain Nasser Hussain (broken thumb) and all-rounder Craig White (back strain), meanwhile, are only just back from injury.

White missed the drawn two-Test series against Pakistan while Hussain was injured in the first match at Lord's.

© 2001 AAP