West Indies vs England Prediction and Betting Tips: Three bets for T20 World Cup match
England take on the West Indies in each team’s first match of the Super 8s stage at the T20 World Cup in the early hours of Thursday morning.
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England needed a favour from Australia, who beat Scotland, to secure their passage from Group B after winning only two of their four matches.
But the Caribbean co-hosts left nothing to chance as they won all four of their matches to advance alongside Afghanistan and at the expense of New Zealand in Group C.
West Indies vs England Tips
Brook top scored for England in their win over Namibia last time out after being promoted up the order to bat at number four for what turned out to be a 10-over thrash.
It was the Yorkshireman’s most significant knock in this format since late last summer and, after an unbeaten 20 off 18 balls in Saturday’s defeat to Australia, he is clearly coming back into fine form.
England might decide to keep Brook at his elevated position of four for this one if they choose not to recall Will Jaccks and that should give him more time in the middle to bolster England’s run rate.
But there is also more of a responsibility at four to build an innings, which Brook ought to be able to do against a bowling attack that is solid but is not blessed with the sort of world-class stars that can conjure up wickets when they are needed.
The West Indies will probably keep faith with the same batting line-up that brought them 218 runs in that 104-run victory over Afghanistan on Monday.
They did the most damage at the start and the end of the innings with 152 runs coming across the powerplay (1-6) and death overs (17-20).
The total set a new record for any team aggregated across the powerplay and death overs in a men's T20I cricket where ball-by-ball data is available.
England will need to be just as good when they bat at a ground that has short boundaries either side of the wicket.
But the Three Lions’ powerplay batting has been below their previous standards for some time with Jos Buttler’s side outscored 74-54 at the front end of the innings against Australia.
These long-standing cricket rivals have met 29 times before in T20 internationals with the West Indies winning 17 of them and England victorious on 12 occasions.
Perhaps the most famous clash in this format came in the 2016 T20 World Cup Final when, needing 19 runs for victory off the final over, Carlos Brathwaite hit four consecutive sixes off the first four balls from Ben Stokes to seal the win.
This contest will be played at the Daren Sammy National Stadium in St Lucia, which was renamed in honour of the West Indies captain after that win.
The pitch used will be the same on which the West Indies beat Afghanistan in their final Group C game as they smashed 218-5 off their 20 overs before skittling the Blue Tigers for just 114 in reply.
Nicholas Pooran top scored with a stunning knock of 98 off 53 balls and he will be the key wicket in the West Indies line-up again here.
The 2016 champions edged a closely-fought bilateral series between these teams late last year 3-2 but they appear to have moved forward since then while England have declined.
Having shown the more impressive form at the tournament it seems reasonable to expect the Windies to take advantage of the home conditions to prevail again.
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