It has been a great start to the tournament and I’m looking forward to the Super 12 games getting underway on Saturday with England playing the West Indies in a repeat of the Men’s ICC T20 World Cup 2016 Final.
It is going to be an exciting game, the T20 format generally brings all the teams closer together and the West Indies have had a good record in recent years in the World Cups, so it’s going to be a tough start for England.
But coming off the back of a win against New Zealand in the warm-up game they will be pretty confident going into this competition.
They’ve got lots of high-quality players which can sometimes make selection very difficult but I think bowlers win World Cups and T20 games so the depth will need to be in the bowling.
It’s disappointing England have lost a few key players going into the tournament, like Sam Curran, Jofra Archer and Ben Stokes, but the likes of David Willey and Tymal Mills, who is a real point of difference, have performed well.
I think they need to go with the extra bowling option and that means one of the batters missing out which is a tough call on someone with maybe Dawid Malan missing out.
As a captain sometimes you have to have those difficult conversations for the benefit of the team, and you have to go on conditions - if this tournament was in Australia, for example, the makeup of the team would be different.
It’s horses for courses in tournaments like this and England have some really dynamic players who have been in form in the IPL.
Eoin Morgan’s form has not been particularly great of late but for me he is a guaranteed starter with his contribution as captain and the runs he has previously scored.
I wouldn’t bet against him, I think he’ll have a good tournament, sometimes it’s not a bad thing going in without too many runs because he’s too good a player not to come good at some point.
I know Morgan has said he would drop himself from the team if it was the right thing to do and that is a huge statement. It just shows that he has got the team’s performances at heart.
He knows if he’s not playing well enough, he will be prepared and has faith in someone like Jos Buttler who would take over.
But I think England are a stronger team with Morgan and you can see how much the boys enjoy playing under him, he’s a big match and big tournament player. It just shows what a team person he is, he’s not too proud to say that.
I never found myself in that position, but I think I would feel exactly the same. If you are not playing well, you are desperate for the team to do well and because it’s a short tournament you know how important it is to get up and running early doors, but I think he will be absolutely fine.
I think England will be up there with any of the major teams, it is such a wide-open tournament, there’s some brilliant teams but I’m sure England will be one of the teams that others are looking at.
They have world class players and people like Liam Livingstone have come in and he’s an absolute X-Factor player and that shows the depth of the white-ball side, something they have prided themselves on in the last few years.
The growth of England’s white-ball cricket has been incredible since that World Cup in Australia and New Zealand and how they turned things around to become one of the most feared teams in the format, obviously winning the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2019 at Lord’s.
There’s lots of players pushing for positions in this team, which is really exciting and I think they are a really exciting team to watch.
I was there in 2019 and I’ll be glued to the TV watching them now as they are certainly a team you want to tune in and watch.
This column by the former England women’s team captain is being provided by the ICC for free editorial use.
Courtesy: ICC Business Corporation FZ LLC 2020 via Online Media Zone.
