After suffering a heavy defeat in their opening ICC Cricket World Cup match England are firm favourites to kick start their campaign when they take on Bangladesh in Dharamsala on Tuesday
England
Defending champions England were involved in the opening match of the tournament against New Zealand on Thursday of last week, they were firm favourites at around 9/20 to make a winning start in what was a repeat of the 2019 final but they crashed to a 9 wicket defeat.
New Zealand won the toss and opted to bowl and on what looked like a very good deck and they will have been satisfied to restrict England to 282/9. Joe Root top scored with 77 and Jos Buttler made 43 but wickets fell at regular intervals and many England batsmen got starts but failed to score big.
Sam Curran took a wicket with his first ball of the second over but that was all the England attack could muster as big tons from Conway and Ravindra took New Zealand home in just 36.2 overs, a margin of victory which leaves England with a damaging net run rate.
Squads and Team News
This was how England lined up against New Zealand
Jonny Bairstow, Dawid Malan, Joe Root, Harry Brook, Jos Buttler (c & wk), Liam Livingstone, Moeen Ali, Sam Curran, Chris Woakes, Adil Rashid, Mark Wood
Did not play: Ben Stokes, Gus Atkinson, Reece Topley, David Willey
World Cup Form
England were the host nation in 2019 and they won 6 and lost 3 of their 9 round robin matches before a comfortable semi final win over Australia. The final against New Zealand went to a Super Over which also finished tied and England were declared winners on a superior boundary count. That was a first CWC title for England who had previously finished runners up on 3 occasions.
Bangladesh
Bangladesh have the benefit of having made a winning start at this venue. They took on Afghanistan here on Saturday and they came out on top by 6 wickets.
After winning the toss and opting to bowl first Bangladesh bowled out Afghanistan for just 156 in 37.2 overs. Shakib and Mehidy Hasan Miraz both took 3 wickets with the latter the most economical with his 9 overs costing just 25 runs.
At 27/2 in the reply Bangladesh were in a bit of trouble but Mehidy Hasan Miraz made 57 and Najmul Hossain Shanto was unbeaten on 59 as they got up in 34.4 overs.
Not surprisingly Mehidy Hasan Miraz was named Man of the Match.
Squads and Team News
This was how Bangladesh lined up in their opening game.
Tanzid Hasan, Litton Das, Najmul Hossain Shanto, Mehidy Hasan Miraz, Shakib Al Hasan (c), Mushfiqur Rahim (wk), Towhid Hridoy, Mahmudullah, Taskin Ahmed, Shoriful Islam, Mustafizur Rahman
Did not play - Mahedi Hasan, Nasum Ahmed , Hasan Mahmud, Tanzim Hasan Sakib
World Cup Form
In CWC 2019 Bangladesh finished eighth on the log with record of 3 wins, 5 defeats and 1 no result.
Head to Head
Overall the teams have met 24 times with England winning 19 to Bangladesh's 5
The teams met in a 3 match series in Bangladesh in March this year and England won 2-1.
In CWC 2019 England beat Bangladesh by 106 runs.
The Betting
England are currently trading at around 0.16/1 to win the game and Bangladesh can be backed at around 7/2
Note all prices are correct at the time of writing but are subject to change
The Verdict
England now have far less margin for error after their poor show in the defeat to New Zealand and one would imagine they will come out firing, perhaps with a couple of changes to their line up.
I think they will stick with Dawid Malan who was pre-tournament favourite to top score for the defending champions which means his price boost with Sportingbet to score a 50 makes some appeal.
Sticking with the price boost theme I will also go with Mushfiqur Rahim to hit a six
Bets: To Score a 50, Dawid Malan was 12/10 now 1.75/1 with Sportingbet
Mushfiqur Rahim to hit a six was 14/10 now 2/1 with Sportingbet
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Note all prices are correct at the time of writing but are subject to change
Discussion Forum
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