The Cricket World Cup is back in Manchester on Tuesday when the tournament hosts England look to avoid another banana skin in a major tournament when they take on Afghanistan on what might be the worst track to play them at.
Afghanistan have not shown their true colours so far in the tournament and will be eager to display their talents before they depart the competition but England have to win this to maintain their challenge for the semi-finals.
England
After a wobbly start to the tournament, England have hit their stride in the last two matches and will be looking to continue to crank up the power heading into what they hope will eventually be knockout action for them. They looked a little tentative with the bat earlier in the campaign but they have ironed out those issues and look back to the brutal line up we have seen in the four years leading up to this World Cup.
Where England haven’t looked poor in this event has been with the ball, which is actually slightly different to what we have seen from them previously. Usually their bowling has had the potential to be exposed but apart from Pakistan, on what was a blinding wicket for batting it has to be said, nobody has really got after the bowling which is very much a positive. The only thing England will want to do for peace of mind is chase down a big total but that opportunity is not likely to come here.
Afghanistan
I feel a bit for Afghanistan in a lot of ways. I guess when you assess them you have to pick proper times to make your assessment and matches like when they took on Australia and New Zealand probably were not correct opportunities. Their outings with Sri Lanka and South Africa were and they were found wanting on both occasions although there is a little of sympathy in me because in both games the pitch visibly played worse while they batted which they didn’t need.
To be fair we haven’t been able to see what Afghanistan have got because their strength is very much their bowling and they just haven’t put up anything like enough runs for them to defend. The one time they did bowl first they restricted Sri Lanka nicely but were undone by the change of conditions. If they can find a way to bowl first here you just never know what might happen.
Team News
England are not short of injury issues heading into this match. Jason Roy has definitely been ruled out with James Vince expected to come in. Eoin Morgan is struggling with a back spasm so Moeen Ali is on standby while Liam Plunkett was ill on the eve of the game.
It is hard to know what is going on with the Afghanistan team selection at the minute but you would expect Najibullah Zadran and Mujeeb Ur Rahman to be back on a ground which should suit their skills nicely.
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Betting
This is a tough match to bet on which is kind of annoying as the forecast is good here and we might be dodging the weather again for the remainder of the week. Obviously England are highly likely to win this but they have slipped up against the lesser nations before and are missing two key batsman and are playing against a spin laden attack on a pitch that was already turning on Sunday.
There are much better betting opportunities to come in this tournament so I’m only going with a small punt here. It comes in the top England batsman market where Moeen Ali could be a decent price at 20/1. England switched their line up to bring Chris Woakes in at three in the last match and given that Moeen is probably England’s best player of spin and England are looking for a new opener and number four there are spots for him to go up the order into. Clearly we’ll need him to go up the order but this is a chance to get him into form. I’ll burn a point to see if he gets in and goes big.
Tips
Back M.Ali Top England Batsman for a 1/10 stake at 21.00 with Betfair
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