The ODI series between England and West Indies began with a relatively comfortable win for the home side on Tuesday and they will be looking to take a significant stranglehold on the series when the two teams meet in the second game at Trent Bridge on Thursday.
That defeat for West Indies means they are confined to the qualifying tournament for the next World Cup. They can either use the final four matches of the series to prepare for that or they will sack it off. We will only know which approach they take when the match gets underway.
England
It was a really complete performance by England at Old Trafford. They might have been disappointed with their bowling in the first five overs but Chris Gayle can put pressure on any attack so they should not be too down. The rest of the performance was exemplary and showed a real intent to dominate the game.
England batted with style while taking every opportunity to rotate the strike and by and large their fielding effort was good too. As far as opening matches go it was very good and the fact there is still room for improvement will probably please them. Had they been perfect in the opening game there is only one way to go from there.
West Indies
To be fair to West Indies they got off to a wonderful start at Old Trafford and you would have expected them to build on the platform that the openers provided but that didn’t happen. Whether that was down to the damp conditions or a lack of cricket since landing in the UK I’m not sure but they will hope it is the latter.
If there was a real down side for West Indies it came with the ball. To be fair to them they started the Test series in that fashion and came good in the next match. I would imagine they will bolster their seam attack for this match which should give them some extra confidence with the ball. They need it though.
Team News
There is no need for England to make any changes to their side. Usually they have gone down the route of winning a series before they make any switches which may mean Tom Curran sits out again.
West Indies need to change their bowling. Teams don’t play two spinners at Trent Bridge so Devendra Bishoo could sit out for either Alzarri Joseph or Miguel Cummins. Chris Gayle fielded in the last match which suggests his hamstring issue was nothing serious.
Trent Bridge
This will be ODI number 42 at the Nottingham venue. England have played in 30 matches on this ground and have a 15-13 winning record with a couple of no results. West Indies have been very good here. They have won five out of six ODIs at Trent Bridge.
We’ve seen throughout the summer that scores on this ground are high. Nottinghamshire often posted well in excess of 300 in the Royal London One Day Cup and 200 was barely par here in the NatWest T20 Blast. Expect runs to flow once again if the weather allows it.
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Betting
Annoyingly there is a band of rain going across England from west to east on Thursday and it is due to hit Nottingham right in the middle of this match so we are going to get a truncated match, if we get one at all, which is so frustrating because the sixes line here is very low.
I can’t get involved in a bet that is likely to be voided though but given the high potential for a shortened clash it could be worth siding with West Indies here. We know they are an excellent 20 over side and we’ve already seen that on this tour. Although their personnel would be different here the shorter the game the more chance I think the tourists have of winning. It could be worth taking them at a shade under 3/1.
Tips
VOID – Back West Indies to win 2nd ODI for a 3/10 stake at 3.75 with Betfred
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