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Australia begin their Cricket World Cup defence against Afghanistan, the lowest-ranked team in this tournament, yet a side who possess several players with enormous talent.
In theory, this is the easiest possible start to the tournament for Australia. In practice, it could become hard work for the defending champions if Afghanistan’s battalion of fine spinners find their groove.
Key strategy: Afghanistan’s trio of spinners will try to choke Australia
Afghanistan look certain to play three frontline spinners against Australia, a team which has often faltered against slow bowlers in ODI cricket in recent years.
England and India have both successfully used multiple spinners to stall the Australian batting in the middle overs over the past 18 months. Afghanistan will know this strategy is their most obvious path to an upset and they have just the spinners to execute this tactic.
In leg spinning prodigy Rashid Khan, mystery spinner Mujeeb Ur Rahman, and veteran off-spinner Mohammad Nabi, Afghanistan have three precise and frugal slow bowlers.
(Photo by ISHARA S. KODIKARA / AFP)
What’s more is that each of them has a contrasting style. Rashid is a natural wicket taker thanks to his swift leg breaks and the best googly in world cricket. Mujeeb is a truly unique bowler who sends down an odd assortment of off breaks, arm balls, leg breaks, googlies and carrom deliveries. Nabi, meanwhile, is very adept at tying down batsmen and is among the most economical bowlers in ODI cricket, giving up just 4.26 runs per over across his 112-game career.
Australia’s batsmen likely will have to contend with 30 overs of quality spin in this match. Those overs may well be spread out across the entire innings, too.
Mujeeb has opened the bowling for Afghanistan in the past and could do so again. Nabi is an expert in the middle overs, while Rashid also has the ability to bowl at the death.
Key Australian: David Warner
The left-handed batsman is Australia’s most complete player of spin bowling. Against the slow men, he combines the best of Steve Smith and Glenn Maxwell, who are Australia’s next best batsman taking on spin. Like Smith, he has the ability to build an innings against elite spin, consistently getting off strike by using his feet and finding the gaps. Warner also possesses a Maxwell-like ability to tear apart world-class spinners, launching boundaries with lofted drives, sweeps, reverse sweeps and punishing cuts and pulls.
This versatility against spin is a major reason that Warner has long been Australia’s most valuable ODI batsman. Depending on the state of the innings, and where he is positioned in the order, Warner may look to launch a pre-emptive strike on Afganistan’s spinners, to try to disrupt both their rhythm and their team’s plans.
He is familiar with all three Afghani spinners, having come up against them in T20 leagues.
(AP Photo/Rajanish Kakade)
Key Afghani: Rashid Khan
This tournament is the first proper test for the 20-year-old Afghani prodigy at international level. Rashid has easily the best record in ODI cricket among current bowlers, with 125 wickets at 15.
Yet, he remains unproven against the big ODI teams, having never played a single match against Australia, England, South Africa or New Zealand, and just one match against India.
Cricket fans are intimately familiar with Rashid’s enormous talent due to his consistent and generous success in T20 leagues around the world. Rashid has been phenomenal in the Big Bash League and has also starred in the world’s strongest T20 competition, the Indian Premier League. Despite his youth, Rashid has a wealth of experience, having played 231 limited overs matches at professional level.
Rashid’s strengths are many. He is perhaps the most accurate leg spinner in world cricket, so rarely offering genuinely loose deliveries. The youngster also benefits from being very fast through the air for a wrist spinner, which makes it difficult for batsmen to use their feet against him.
The added benefit of this pace is that batsmen don’t have the luxury of reading his deliveries off the pitch, and it’s very tricky to decode them from the hand.
Wildcard players
Afghanistan: Mohammad Shahzad
Shahzad looks less like a professional athlete and more like a professional hot dog eater. His Mark Cosgrove-like build suggests he prefers to deal in boundaries over singles and this is also the reality.
Shahzad is an unpredictable attacking stroke-maker who is happy to risk his wicket to try to take on the bowlers. He is not just a slogger, Shahzad has plenty of talent.
That was underlined last September when the opener scored a fantastic 124 from 116 balls in the Asia Cup against India, helping Afghanistan to a thrilling tie with those ODI heavyweights.
Shahzad was brutal against the Indian spinners in that match. He likes to intimidate the slow men and will very likely take on Australian leg spinner Adam Zampa, or off-spinner Nathan Lyon, in this World Cup opener, pending Australia’s choices at the selection table.
Australia: Mitchell Starc
Starc at his peak with the white ball could single-handedly destroy the vulnerable Afghanistan batting lineup.
Few of the Afghani batsmen would ever have encountered a 196cm tall bowler getting precise, late swing at 150km/h. If that is what Starc can produce in this contest, then it’s hard to see how his opponents will cope.
But, Starc’s pace could also work against him if he cannot locate his rhythm and begins to spray the ball.
Exactly which Starc we will see in this match – the wrecking ball or the scattergun – is very difficult to predict given his lack of cricket over the past four months. But he has showed some good signs in Australia’s recent 50-over practice matches, taking five wickets at 17 from three outings.
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