The knockout stage of the Cricket T20 World Cup doesn’t officially begin until next week but England and Sri Lanka will play elimination cricket earlier than the rest of the teams in the tournament as that is what their match on Saturday afternoon has become.
England go into the contest knowing if they win they will be into the semi-finals but if they lose they’ll be flying home to prepare for the county season. Sri Lanka are in the same boat. Win and they face another do or die clash with South Africa on Monday. Lose and that becomes a dead rubber.
England have had a mixed tournament so far. They ran into a Gayle Force in the opening match then stormed past South Africa before almost coming a cropper against Afghanistan. It isn’t the English way to do anything easily and they’ve certainly lived up to that in this tournament so far. Eoin Morgan will be hoping his side have no dramas here.
Alex Hales was rumoured to be kicking a football around in practice on Friday so we can assume from that his back problems are behind him and he will replace James Vince at the top of the order. Hales hit a century when these two met two years ago. Liam Plunkett’s inclusion worked well against Afghanistan and he is set to retain his place.
Sri Lanka’s title defence has become a do or die scenario and if they are to survive then they will need to find a way to score more runs. They were slightly unlucky against the West Indies in that their key man with the bat – Dilshan – fell victim to a shocker of an lbw decision and the side never recovered. The engine room of the batting line up needs to stand up and be counted.
Given how England struggled against spin on Wednesday it might be that Sri Lanka pack their side with spinners in which case Sachithra Senanayake could come into the side. Thisara Perera or Nuwan Kulasekara could be more likely to make way for him.
This is the second game of the tournament in Delhi. England struggled in the first but got the job done in slow and low conditions. Sri Lanka have the same problem England had in that they’ve played on two better tracks in the tournament and now need to adjust to the slower conditions – not always an easy thing to do.
I can’t be backing England regardless of how Sri Lanka have to adjust. To be fair I can’t see Sri Lanka having an issue adjusting. They are used to Asian conditions. There is so much pressure on England in this game and we’ve just seen against Afghanistan how they are vulnerable to pressure.
It could easily work out that England bat first, look to go too big and come up short and get found out. Alternatively Sri Lanka could get away from them with the bat and set England a daunting total to chase to stay in the tournament and I wouldn’t be comfortable sitting on England at 1/2 in those circumstances.
The argument is that England have chased down 230 in this tournament when they needed to but they were in batting friendly conditions which this match won’t be played in and there was always the odd chance England could still have qualified with a tight loss to South Africa. They have no fall back in this match. It is win or bust – a totally different pressure now.
There are a couple of bets I like though. The first comes in the most sixes market where England look a shade too big to me at 4/5. I accept these aren’t their best conditions but we’ve just seen them hit four sixes in an innings where they were 57/6 approaching halfway. No matter how badly they bat in this match I can’t see them being 57/6 again.
We saw in that game against Afghanistan that England hit all the way down and apart from Chandimal, Mathews and Perera there isn’t really a hitter in this Sri Lanka side so that is a positive. Sri Lanka’s batting is so out of form that I would imagine they will be a bit tentative especially coming from Bangalore to Delhi and the difference in conditions that brings. Even on the small ground of Bangalore, Sri Lanka only hit three sixes which is a pretty low total. All things being equal I’m expecting England to belt the most sixes here.
I also think there is an opportunity to dip into the Top Sri Lanka Bowler market where Jeffrey Vandersay appeals at 4/1. England have just failed miserably against the leg spin of Rashid Khan from Afghanistan on this ground and I’m not expecting them to go much better here if Vandersay bowls like he did against the West Indies.
He was excellent on that occasion. He took 1/11 with a maiden in his four overs which is crazy in Bangalore especially against such a powerful batting line up like the one the West Indies have. Johnson Charles was bamboozled by Vandersay in Sri Lanka’s last game and I wouldn’t be surprised if a couple of English batsmen go the same way. At 4/1 the leggie looks a decent price here.
Back England Most 6s for a 4/10 stake at 1.80 with Unibet
Back them here:
WON – Back J.Vandersay Top Sri Lanka Bowler for a 2/10 stake at 5.00 with Betfair
Back him here:
