After two reasonably emphatic wins in the ODI series so far, England head up to Nottingham on Tuesday looking to seal the five match series against Pakistan with two matches still to be played. Pakistan go to Trent Bridge knowing they are in no lose territory from here on in.
England
It has been the bowlers that have won both matches for England in this series so far but that doesn’t mean that they are not performing with the bat because they are but the bowlers have restricted Pakistan to such weak totals that the batsmen haven’t had to push themselves at any stage to get the side home.
Mark Wood in particular has stood out with the ball for England in this series and if he can continue to keep up that form then England are going to be very hard to beat especially if the weather stays good for another week to bring England’s spin twins right into play.
Pakistan
The tourists won’t need to look too deep to find out where they need to improve if they are to get themselves back into the series. Quite simply they have to bat much better. Whether that means keeping more wickets in hand for a dip at the end or sending someone up the order to have a bit of a dart I’m not sure but something has to change.
We saw at Lord’s that if their bowlers do get something to defend they will be very adept at doing it but so far in the series their batsmen haven’t threatened a total big enough for that. On a good batting wicket it will be interesting to see if their batsmen can put up a score and give us a thrilling match which the series needs.
Team News
Talk is that Alex Hales’ place in the side is under threat but were England to drop him in this series it would mean Moeen Ali would have to open the batting and that could just disrupt the side a bit too much. With Ben Stokes able to bowl again in this match England should be unchanged.
Pakistan surely have to change something. Mohammad Irfan has been drafted into the squad to replace Mohammad Hafeez and it would be pointless him coming over if he wasn’t going to play. After another dry outing at Lord’s, Yasir Shah could be left on the bench.
Trent Bridge
This ground has already been the scene of a fantastic game of ODI cricket this summer when Liam Plunkett belted a six off the last ball to tie against Sri Lanka and hopefully we get more of the same from these two sides here.
This will be the 41st ODI to be held on this ground. In the 29 matches England have played here they have won 14 and lost 13 with a couple of ties while Pakistan have a much better record of seven wins and four defeats from 11 matches. That doesn’t surprise me because this is a ground where the ball swings and nobody swings a cricket ball like a Pakistan side.
When the weather is good this is a high scoring ground as evidenced by the Nottinghamshire vs Northamptonshire match in the Royal London One Day Cup earlier in the summer when both sides made 400. Three of the last five ODI first innings here have yielded more than 285 runs.
Betting
I’ve a sneaky feeling that the Pakistan bowlers might get their side over the line in this match but I’m not convinced I want to bet on it even though 5/2 is a perfectly acceptable price. If I’m going to bet on something I want to have seen something from their batsmen because the problem is England have probably got even more to come so I’ll give that a miss and go with two bets here.
The first is one I took earlier in the series which was for Mark Wood to take more than 1.5 wickets. He should have done that in the opening match and then took three at Lord’s on Saturday. He is bowling fast and fiery and none of the Pakistan batsmen have really got to grips with him. I think he is perfect for this deck and given that he opens the bowling and comes back at the death cheap wickets can cover this line.
I’ll also have a go at Imad Wasim to be the top Pakistan batsman. If Pakistan are going to do something different it could come here where the left hander can target the short boundary to the New Stand and given what he showed us at Lord’s we know he’s in decent nick with the bat which not many of his teammates can be accused of. At 20/1 it is worth seeing if Pakistan do something different with him or whether they crumble again and allow him to top score anyway.
Tips
Back M.Wood – Over 1.5 wickets for a 4/10 stake at 2.00 with Coral
Back him here:
VOID – Back I.Wasim Top Pakistan Batsman for a 1/10 stake at 21.00 with Skybet
Back him here:
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