The 2011 winners India head into the Cricket World Cup in 2019 as the second favourites to win the title behind the tournament hosts England. Having lost out in the semi-final four years ago when defending the crown they will be eager to go a couple of steps better in what could be the last chance for further success at 50 over level for the likes of Virat Kohli, MS Dhoni and Ravi Jadeja et all. India are respected in the 50 over game and they will see anything other than winning as a failure.
Profile
Captain: Virat Kohli
Previous Best: Winners (1983 & 2011)
Key Players: Virat Kohli & Jasprit Bumrah
Best Odds: 10/3 General
Fixtures
June 5: vs South Africa at Hampshire Bowl
June 9: vs Australia at The Oval
June 13: vs New Zealand at Trent Bridge
June 16: vs Pakistan at Old Trafford
June 22: vs Afghanistan at Hampshire Bowl
June 27: vs West Indies at Old Trafford
June 30: vs England at Edgbaston
July 2: vs Bangladesh at Edgbaston
July 6: vs Sri Lanka at Headingley
Squad
Virat Kohli (c), Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan, KL Rahul, Vijay Shankar, MS Dhoni (wk), Kedar Jadhav, Dinesh Karthik (wk), Yuzvendra Chahal, Kuldeep Yadav, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Jasprit Bumrah, Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, Mohammed Shami
Team Guide
The classy batsmen of India will be assigned the task of putting up a number of runs in each match that their relentless bowling attack can defend. India have a wonderful record when chasing but as with a number of sides in this tournament the scrutiny will come when they are setting a score. That said this is a side who even without much in the way of brutal power are used to putting up sizeable scores in this format of the game.
One of the reasons why India are a successful side are their spin options but with a lack of assistance likely in this tournament it will be interesting to see if they can still be effective. Even if they are not India have a number of seam bowlers who can operate in English conditions now so they are worthy second favourites. Whether they can put it all together enough to win the tournament remains to be seen.
Betting
I’ll take a couple of Indian bets for the tournament. In their run market Rohit Sharma looks a big price. He might not be the most consistent player in the world but when he starts tournaments well he can be hard to contain and he has the tendency to go very big. Kohli is all the rage in this market and understandably so but while he is the leading light he doesn’t have a fantastic record in England or when India set a score. Sharma has three double hundreds in this format of the game and anything approaching that makes him attractive at 9/2.
Jasprit Bumrah is all the rage in the top bowler market but I wonder if the value lies elsewhere. He will pick up wickets at the end of the innings but there will be times when India’s spinners bowl sides out just through teams not reading them whether it turns or not and if that is the case I suspect the value could well lie in the form of Kuldeep Yadav. He’s been around for a while but even now few teams appear able to read him and if the new ball doesn’t yield many runs teams will have to go after the left arm chinaman which brings him right into the game. At 4/1 there is enough juice in the price to merit a bet.
Tips
WON – Back R.Sharma Top India Tournament Batsman for a 2/10 stake at 5.50 with Sky Bet
Back K.Yadav Top India Tournament Bowler for a 2/10 stake at 5.00 with Betfred
Back him here:
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