The Australian men begin their international summer on Sunday when they take on Sri Lanka in the first of three T20 matches over the next week or so which sees both sides beginning to take a look towards the World T20 down under next winter.
Sri Lanka have just completed a T20 whitewash of Pakistan so they should be tuned into the format whereas Australia haven’t played international cricket for a while and so it wouldn’t be a total surprise if they have to warm into things.
Australia
I think it is fair to say that this is the one format of the three that Australia haven’t really cracked but given that they are hosting the next World T20 I would imagine a lot of their attention is going to go into over the coming weeks and months. A lot of that is shown with the quality of squad they have picked for this series. There is no trialling franchise performers. They are going with seasoned international campaigners.
I still think if Australia are going to do some damage in this format it will be in their bowling attack in the main. They have some powerful batsmen at their disposal but I’m not convinced they have the right order for those players. They all seem to want to play in the same role which is not ideal. They have enough matches to work out who is best for the role these players want to play but at some point they’ll need to find a complete order.
Sri Lanka
Given that Sri Lanka took a largely second string side to Pakistan with them, their selectors are going to have one or two issues in the future and their established stars are going to have to perform with credit and quality if they are to remain in the side. Sri Lanka’s fall from grace means they will have to come through the first section of the World T20 to mix it with the main team so they really need to build up a head of steam and get some confidence.
Sri Lanka probably have their strength with the bat in this format of the game but to be fair to them they have some mystery bowlers and the one thing they did almost at will in Pakistan was hold their nerve with the ball. A lot of this game is all about that so if they can do that again then there is no reason why they can’t be competitive in this match even if they don’t come out on top in it.
Place 5 accumulators either in a Boylesports shop or online and get an acca free! Click the image above to bet. 18+ T&Cs apply. Gamble Aware.
Team News
Andrew Tye has been ruled out of the series which means that Kane Richardson is expected to be the third seamer. Ashton Agar is expected to play while Dave Warner and Steve Smith are likely to feature.
Sri Lanka will bring Lasith Malinga back into their ranks after he missed the Pakistan series. He will captain a side which is likely to include Oshada Fernando who went well enough in the warm up match.
Betting
We know the square boundaries at the Adelaide Oval are pretty short but the straight ones are long and I think 37.5 boundaries could be a tough on the high side in terms of a line for this match. I say that because I don’t expect a high scoring match anyway. Sri Lanka may well struggle against this bowling attack that Australia have and if they bat first that should see the scoring stay low.
Australia aren’t guaranteed to score big in this match. Their players could be rusty after a fair amount of time off and Sri Lanka have a lot of good disguise in their bowling attack to be fair. We might see some high scoring matches in the summer down under but I’m not convinced that this will be one of them. I’ll side with under 37.5 boundaries in this summer opener.
Tips
Back Under 37.5 boundaries for a 4/10 stake at 1.91 with William Hill
Back it here:
Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2019
