The second offering in the T20 World Cup on Thursday comes from Barbados where Group B continues with two sides who are still unbeaten in the competition as Namibia go up against Scotland in a huge clash.
Namibia won their opening match in a super over against Oman while Scotland were denied a perfectly good chance of winning their first game when they saw the rain deny them the chance of defending a more than fair total against England.
Namibia
Namibia got off the mark for the tournament at the first time of asking but I’m sure if you were asking them to be true to themselves they would say that they weren’t overly glowing about their showing. They kind of fell over the line in the end despite their bowling unit pretty much setting the job up for them right from the very start of the match. They will be happy to have won but they’ll know they have to improve on that effort but the pressure is slightly off them with two points on the board.
That win, regardless of how it came, means that if they add another to it here then Namibia are going to be in a wonderful position to launch a qualifying bid, especially with England having already dropped points in this group. They are going to need to bat a whole lot better than they did against Oman but you would imagine that will happen quite naturally. The one thing they do have up their sleeve is the knowledge that their attack can function well in these conditions.
Scotland
It is hard to truly judge the Scotland effort against England because it was stop-start and in the end the rain eventually won the day but there is no doubt that the two batters who did get to the crease batted well and looked in good touch and if they can get the Scots off to a similar start here then they could break the back of this match and they would certainly force Namibia to bat a lot better than they did in that first game.
The acid test for Scotland will come should one of the opening pair get out relatively early. They bat pretty deep but none of the other players saw the crease in the first game so they could be a little short of a competitive hit. Anything they get from their batting will work well though because I do think that the strength of this Scotland side comes in the form of their bowling attack, one which should go very well on a used pitch.
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Team News
There is no real reason for Namibia to change their side having won their opening match but they might feel the need to change their batting order around a bit and get JJ Smit up the order to do more damage.
Scotland probably aren’t going to change their side given that they were restricted to just 10 overs against England. Unless they want to strengthen their batting and rely on a part-time spinner to bowl some overs they should be unchanged.
Betting
I’m a little surprised that Namibia are the price that they are to win this match. They have won the last three T20 internationals against Scotland and have beaten them at the World Cup back in 2021 in Abu Dhabi where conditions wouldn’t have been a great deal different to the ones they are going to play this match on. They also have the confidence of a win behind them and while Scotland will be buoyed by their showing against England, there is no guarantee that they would have won that match.
The big issue that Scotland have here is all bar two of their players will be making their first appearance on the field in this tournament and if there is rust there or nerves or anything then you would imagine that Namibia will have more than an edge with all of their players having been involved in the win over Oman. The other area Namibia can rule this match is the back end of both innings where the extra class of David Wiese can come to the fore so at odds against I’ve got to be on the Africans here.
Tips
Back Namibia to beat Scotland for a 3/10 stake at 2.40 with Betfred
