The International League T20 competition continues on Saturday where we have one match in the ILT20 as Abu Dhabi stages the tournament for the first time when the MI Emirates take on the Sharjah Warriors.
MI Emirates went into the tournament as the favourites to land the title and have the chance to lay something of a marker down here. Sharjah Warriors could be dark horses if they can cope with players coming and going so this looks a decent match on paper.
MI Emirates
Mumbai Indians have been a busy franchise over the last few days. They have seen MI Cape Town pick up a win and a loss in their two matches in the SA20 competition and now their UAE tournament team will get their existence underway here. They will do so with the Mumbai Indians regular Kieron Pollard steering the ship and that continuity could be vital. We saw with the Dubai Capitals on Friday how key that could be.
This MI Emirates team is a pretty old team when you consider that franchise competition regulars Dwayne Bravo, Imran Tahir and Samit Patel could play here but there is a mix of youth too with the powerful and exciting Will Smeed and Nicholas Pooran also included in this squad. They probably have the two best associate players in the competition in Muhammad Waseem and Bas de Leede too which could be significant.
Sharjah Warriors
The good thing for the Sharjah Warriors is that they go into the tournament looking pretty strong. That is going to change when the England players depart for their ODI series in South Africa in a week or so but for now they look like they have the personnel to go very well in this competition, assuming they all blend nicely. I think we saw in that opening game that powerful batters are going to be important which bodes well for Sharjah.
Moeen Ali is a clean hitter of the cricket ball as are Chris Benjamin, Mohammad Nabi and Paul Walter while Dawid Malan can hold it all together. The Warriors have plenty of spin options at their disposal and a couple of clever seamers too. They also have some good associate talent in their squad not least Karthik Meiyappan who took that hat trick in the T20 World Cup for the UAE. Sharjah could be dangerous outsiders in this one.
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Key Players
The world probably hasn’t seen too much of Will Smeed but it has the chance to see it here. If he comes off he can put the game beyond any team that he plays against which is a huge asset to any team that he plays for.
Moeen Ali is always key to any team he plays for in limited overs cricket but especially the Sharjah Warriors in these conditions which his ability to play spin and then bowl spin will be valuable. As the captain he needs a positive start.
Betting
I’ll side with Moeen Ali in this match. These conditions should suit him perfectly and I often find when he captains a team he bats with more responsibility than when he is just a player and he can sometimes be guilty of leaving the job to others. He is going to be a huge figure in this contest with the bat but he should have a big role to play with the ball too. As the captain he will field in catching positions as well so he should always be in the game.
He has a performance line of just 29.5 points which is very low for a player who has the scoring potential in all three departments of the game. If anything is a concern it would be where exactly he will bat but even if he is down the order I think he’ll come up to get on with it. His four over spell should be very important and he’s quite capable of covering this line without having to bat so I’m happy to be on the over here.
Tips
Back M.Ali’s Performance – Over 29.5pts for a 3/10 stake at 1.83 with Bet365
