The second part of the double header in the T20 World Cup on Saturday sees England and Afghanistan getting their tournament underway when they meet in Group 1 of the Super 12 stage in Perth.
England head into the tournament looking solely to win the title whereas for Afghanistan it is a chance to show the improvements they keep making and also to perhaps take a scalp or two along the way.
England
England have been recognised as one of the best white ball sides in the world for a good period of time but they haven’t been able to get their hands on this crown since then. Their weakness has come back to haunt them at the wrong moments in the last two T20 World Cups and they will be eager to ensure lightning doesn’t strike a third time. On the face of it the conditions in Australia should suit them better than anywhere so they are leading players.
One issue that England have in the tournament is a growing number of injury concerns. To be fair, they named a squad which took the fitness of one or two players for granted and they haven’t come as good as they would like so they need to find a settled bowling attack fairly quickly. The positive is that their batting could get them out of trouble because there isn’t a team in the competition with a stronger or deeper batting unit than this England one.
Afghanistan
It would be wrong to say that Afghanistan are emerging onto the scene in this World Cup as they have already done that. This is an opportunity to prove that they can be major players, if not here in conditions which might go against them, then certainly in the Caribbean in 2024 when the pitches out there should suit their spin attack and when their young players will be more established with two more years of cricket at this level behind them.
If Afghanistan can show that they have a batting unit which can score runs against the bowlers they will be coming up against on fast, bouncy pitches then the future will look bright for them because even without assistance from the wickets their spinners are likely to be a handful. The other thing they need to build is experience at tournament level but most of this squad played last year so they are getting more of that all the time.
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Team News
England will be without the now ruled out of the tournament Reece Topley and there are doubts over Chris Woakes for this match which could give Chris Jordan another go. Liam Livingstone has confirmed he is fit to go.
Afghanistan did have a concern over keeper-batter Rahmanullah Gurbaz after he was hit on the foot by Shaheen Shah Afridi in a warm-up game but he has been passed fit for this one. That leaves the combination of their bowling attack the only decision to make.
Betting
I’ll go with three bets for this match with the first of them coming in the form of the England sixes in the contest. I don’t think it is giving any secrets away to suggest that England are full of ego in the batting department. That isn’t necessarily a bad thing by any means but it does mean I think they will go after the Afghanistan bowling with a ‘you can’t bowl at us’ attitude. They have the perfect ground to do that on too because the boundaries straight here are incredibly short and with at least three spinners in the opposing attack they should get plenty of balls to go after. Regardless of the game situation England will want to stamp their authority on this tournament and I expect a number of sixes from them.
One Afghanistan player who could prove to be a thorn in the side of the England team is the captain Mohammad Nabi. He will have faced most of this English attack in his spells in county cricket and he’ll know all about conditions in Australia having played in the Big Bash in the past. He comes in here after a stint in the Caribbean Premier League so he should be up and running nicely. Nabi has hit 41* and 51* in two warm-up matches for this tournament against Bangladesh and Pakistan so we know he can bat on these tracks. He took 2/17 when these met at the 2016 World Cup and has a performance line of just 29.5 here. An average match will get him home there but a good one with either bat or ball also does it so I like the over on this line.
I’ll also have a small punt on Liam Livingstone to be the player of the match. This has been his home ground in the Big Bash League in the past so he’ll know all about the dimensions and where to target and everything else and he is the kind of batter who looks to excite and entertain. He might get some overs of spin with the England attack a little bit unknown in this match and he’s a decent fielder. If one or both of Jos Buttler or Alex Hales don’t come off then a Livingstone cameo could easily catch the eye enough to earn the player of the match honours.
Tips
Back England – Over 7.5 sixes for a 3/10 stake at 1.91 with BetVictor
Back them here:
Back M.Nabi’s Performance – Over 29.5pts for a 3/10 stake at 1.83 with Bet365
Back L.Livingstone – Player of the match for a 1/10 stake at 15.00 with Betfair
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