After the thrills and spills of the Indian Premier League the attention begins to turn back to the international game as England and South Africa begin a three match ODI series which acts as their warm up for the upcoming Champions Trophy.
The series begins in Leeds on Wednesday and will give us a good idea of where these two sides are heading into next month’s showpiece event which will also be held in England.
Schedule
1st ODI – May 24 at Leeds
2nd ODI – May 27 at Southampton
3rd ODI – May 29 at Lord’s
England
This will be England’s first assignment since a routine 2-0 series win against Ireland earlier in the month. That was largely a second string side in that series with the main hitters at the Indian Premier League but everyone is back for this one so we should get a clearer picture of the state of this English team.
England are one of the favourites for the Champions Trophy so they need to look good in this series if they are going to live up to that tag. It will be interesting to see how their batsmen in particular fare especially those who have been away at the IPL as the wickets here are going to play significantly different to the ones in India.
South Africa
South Africa are one of the strongest teams in this format of the game. They head into this series off the back of seven successive bilateral series wins with the most recent of them coming in New Zealand earlier in the year when they won 3-2. They have had a couple of warm up matches on this tour so they look to be taking the series seriously.
South Africa have had plenty of their squad in the Indian Premier League so those two warm up matches will have been needed and it might be that they have a bit of an advantage early on in this series because of them. They gave almost everyone in their squad a game which wasn’t the worst idea either.
Head to Head
These two have played eight ODI series against each other down the years with England being successful in three of them and South Africa four. They have also shared a series. South Africa won their last series 3-2 which was in South Africa last year.
The two sides have played 56 ODIs with South Africa winning half of those to England’s 24. They have tied a match and seen three no results so the history between these two is quite tight it must be said.
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Betting
I’m not going to bet on the series outcome because I expect both sides to go through their squads as the series progresses but there are a couple of players who could play all three matches for South Africa who I’m going to take for their respective markets.
Hashim Amla has often been a scourge of English bowlers, as he has been every side in the world, and he arrives to this series in excellent form after creaming the ball to all parts throughout the Indian Premier League. He has already notched a half century since arriving in England against a decent enough Northants attack and with all his county experience giving him knowledge of conditions I’m expecting a big series from the excellent opener.
English batsmen have often had a problem with leg spin and at the minute there is no finer exponent of the art than Imran Tahir. He has played in England long enough to know what works and what doesn’t and I expect him to have a big series too. Tahir has got a big month coming up and I think he can start it by leading South Africa’s wicket taking in this series despite the strong competition from the likes of Kagiso Rabada and Morne Morkel among others.
Tips
WON – Back H.Amla Top South Africa Series Batsman for a 2/10 stake at 4.00 with Bet365
Back I.Tahir Top South Africa Series Bowler for a 2/10 stake at 4.00 with Bet365
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