- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
Such is the strange nature of international T20 cricket that the sport’s oldest rivals, Australia and England, have clashed only once in the format in the past four years.
Australian fans would be familiar with the results of recent Ashes series, and most would know where the two nations sit respective to each other in ODIs.
But even the teams themselves must have no idea how they match up in T20s.
The last time Australia played England in the shortest format was a whopping two-and-half-years ago, in Cardiff. Since then, they have faced off in no less than 11 ODIs, highlighting the curious position T20 occupies in the international game.
In the past 17 months, Australia have played a paltry seven T20s, with these matches often shoehorned into the schedule at odd times. Take last summer, for example, when Australia’s home series against Sri Lanka started on the same day the Australian Test team was playing India A in Mumbai.
That meant Australia fielded a T20 team without the likes of David Warner, Mitchell Starc, Glenn Maxwell, Steve Smith, and Mitch Marsh, and lost the series to a full-strength Sri Lanka line-up.
[latest_videos_strip category=”cricket” name=”Cricket”]
This is what makes it hard to accurately assess Australia as a team – they have so rarely fielded anything close to their best side in recent years, and when they have, that line-up has had no time to gel.
Currently, they are ranked seventh, but they could leap to second if they go undefeated across their next three matches in this tri-series against England and New Zealand.
Australia clinically disposed of the world’s number three team, the Black Caps, in the series opener on Saturday. The Kiwis were overwhelmed first by the startling pace and bounce of beanpole quick Billy Stanlake, then by the thunderous strokeplay of Glenn Maxwell and Chris Lynn.
Today in Hobart, Australia play fourth-ranked England, who also have an ordinary recent record in T20s, having won only four of their past ten matches.
England won that aforementioned one-off match, in August 2015, as Australia fell five runs short batting second. Australia’s team today will be almost unrecognisable from the one which lost that match, with only David Warner, Marcus Stoinis and Maxwell remaining.
Glenn Maxwell and David Warner (AP Photo/Themba Hadebe)
England will field a team missing arguably their two best T20 players – dynamic all-rounder Ben Stokes and star batsman Joe Root. But they will still boast generous power with the blade thanks to the likes of Jason Roy, Alex Hales, Jos Buttler and Eoin Morgan, while also owning a strong lower order.
It will be interesting to see if they play bowling all-rounder Liam Dawson as a second spinner to complement leggie Adil Rashid. Rashid had a brilliant ODI series against Australia, finishing as the leading wicket-taker from either side, and also had a fantastic Big Bash League last summer.
England would be wise not to stack their side with fast bowlers, and instead field two spinners, as several of the Australian batsmen are far more potent against pace than slow bowling. One of those is Lynn, who belted 44 from 33 balls against New Zealand. The other two are BBL player of the tournament D’Arcy Short and Adelaide Strikers star Travis Head.
England may well look to use Rashid and Dawson to put the brakes on Australia’s innings in the middle overs. Australia likewise should field a pair of spinners in Ashton Agar and Adam Zampa, the former having bowled impressively against the Kiwis.
But the firmest attention of fans, and of the Englishmen, will be on the towering Stanlake after his dominant display against New Zealand.
Billy Stanlake (AAP Image/Richard Wainwright
Predicted teams:
Australia
1. David Warner
2. D’Arcy Short
3. Travis Head
4. Chris Lynn
5. Glenn Maxwell
6. Marcus Stoinis
7. Alex Carey (wk)
8. Ashton Agar
9. Adam Zampa
10. Andrew Tye
11. Billy Stanlake
England
1. Jason Roy
2. Alex Hales
3. James Vince
4. Eoin Morgan
5. Sam Billings
6. Jos Buttler (wk)
7. David Willey
8. Liam Dawson
9. Liam Plunkett
10. Adil Rashid
11. Chris Jordan