Cricket World Cup Preview – June 25th, 2019 at 10.30 am
This is a huge showdown in the race for a top-four finish at the Cricket World Cup. Tournament hosts England are going to be feeling the pressure after a shock loss against Sri Lanka in their last outing. With such a tough finish in terms of fixtures, England have to come up with some kind of response to guarantee that they move ahead to the semi-finals. The Australians are all but there.
England v Australia Winner Odds*
England 3/4
Australia 11/1
* (Betting Odds were taken from bet365 on June 23rd, 2019 at 11:44 p.m.)
Can England deliver a positive response?
England were simply rocking and rolling along in the World Cup since their defeat against Pakistan in their second game. They were smashing off high scores and were expected to come out on top against Sri Lanka last time out. It didn’t happen. A batting collapse on a tough Headingley pitch for scoring, saw England toppled. Ben Stokes was the one who got them close in the end to their chase of 233 but no-one could stick around with him to help out. England lost by 20 runs.
Now it’s on to Lords. These two will be seeing plenty of each other this year with the Ashes coming up. There is still a strong likelihood that England and Australia could be meeting at some stage against in the final four of this competition as well. This is a huge test of mental character for England. Just because they had one poor match doesn’t mean that they are a bad side of course. They have all the batting power needed to take apart the Australian attack and it is the usually unflappable Joe Root who is the 5/2 favourite to be England’s Top Batsman* (Betting Odds were taken from bet365 on June 23rd, 2019 at 11:23 p.m.).
England v Australia Head to Head
These two met for ten ODI matches last year. In January they met Down Under and it was England who took a 4-1 series victory. Then back in England for another five-match series in the summer, England went even better and took a 5-0 whitewash over the Australians.
England hosted the Aussies at Lords back in 2015, which is the most recent meeting between them there. England lost by 64 runs. In the last five meetings at the ground, Australia have taken four wins. England’s only success in that sequence was in 2012.
Can Australia beat England?
The Australians look better right now than they did when they toured England last year. They are back in the zone and they are on the brink of a top-four finish in the table. They have collected a win in five of their six games played so far, the one loss coming when they met India on June 9th, with the Australians finishing a long way short of India’s 352 total in the fixture. The loss against India in this World Cup is Australia’s only loss in their last fourteen ODI matches. That’s some form that the reigning champions have.
They don’t have the betting depth that England have, but David Warner is the tournament’s top scorer and so his return to the set up has been crucial. Aaron Finch has weighed in with the fourth-highest amount of runs in this World Cup so far as well. When it comes to having the ball in hand their star man is Mitchell Starc who is just so deadly, especially with the death bowling. He has a joint tournament leading 15 wickets to his name so far. They will know very well what they are up against in this one. It is not only the huge boost that they could give their own qualification hopes a boost, but they could at the same time, heap some major problems on England.
England v Australia Predictions
What a contest this is going to be. Even with those two blips that they have had so far, England are favourites to win this fixture. That really has to be supported. Yes, Australia are a threat but they are not as well of a rounded side as England have. England are more than capable of handling the pressure that they have put on themselves. England to win at 3/4* (Betting Odds were taken from bet365 on June 23rd, 2019 at 11:23 p.m.).
