England Team Preview

Best Odds for England to Win

At betting odds of 4.75 with Betway, England are the third-favourites to win in Australia, behind the hosts and India, who are a bit shorter in price, both available at odds of 4.0.

Those aren’t bad odds, but they’re not brilliant, either.

They certainly have the batting line-up to take any team down but their bowling line-up isn’t the strongest, while they’ll also have to build on two disappointing losses where they should probably have won both the 2016 and 2021 editions from strong positions.

They’re always extremely competitive but they may have blown their chance of a second World Cup triumph last year when they had a better side than this one.

England’s T20 World Cup Performance

England’s World Cup Performance in 2021  

It was looking so good for England after beating the West Indies, Bangladesh, Australia and Sri Lanka in their first four matches before losing against South Africa in a game they didn’t need to win.

Their batting was typically aggressive in featuring lots of boundaries and all of their bowlers were making contributions either by taking wickets or keeping the runs down under the assured captaincy of Eoin Morgan.

Jos Buttler had hit a brilliant century against Sri Lanka, while Moeen Ali was making important contributions with both bat and ball.

Then they ran into New Zealand in the semis. A score of 166/7 was about 15 runs below a par score, despite the best efforts of Ali (51 off 37) and Dawid Malan (41 off 30).

And so it proved.

At Abu Dhabi, where chasing was easier all tournament New Zealand got home with an over to spare as Daryl Mitchell and Devon Conway scored 72 and 46 to ace the chase.

And with that, it was all over for England, who have only ever won the tournament once.

England’s World Cup Performance in 2016

England’s defeat in the 2016 World Cup final will go down as one of the most heartbreaking moments in the history of English cricket.

Defending a below-par 156 thanks to a well-constructed 54 from Joe Root, England had the West Indies in all sorts of trouble when they dismissed openers Johnson Charles and Chris Gayle cheaply.  Lendl Simmons, their hero from the semi-final also got out cheaply, as did skipper Daren Sammy and monster-hitter Andre Russell. Dwayne Bravo hit a valuable 25 but was also dismissed.

However, the one man England couldn’t get out was Marlon Samuels. The middle-order batsman ended the match not out on 85 off 66 and won his second man-of-the-match award in a T20 World Cup final. But the last over of the match wasn’t about him.

As Ben Stokes prepared to defend 19 off the last ball of the innings, it was Carlos Brathwaite at the striker’s end. The next five minutes are some of the most famous ever seen in any World Cup final with Brathwaite hitting four sixes in a row to win the match, with two balls to spare. The image (below) of Stokes at the end, on his haunches, almost in tears, won’t be forgotten too soon.

In the semi-finals, they’d beaten New Zealand very comfortably and before that they ended the Group Stages as runners-up to the West Indies. Joe Root, Jos Buttler and Ben Stokes (despite that meltdown in the final) were among their star performers at the tournament.

England Since 2016

If anything, England have gotten better and better since that fateful night in Kolkata. The last couple of years have seen the emergence of fast bowler Jofra Archer, a real menace who has impressed for Rajasthan in the IPL and Hobart Hurricanes in the Big Bash, as well as his county Sussex.

They can now also count on batsman Dawid Malan, currently ranked the Number 1 T20 batsman in the world. However, Joe Root seems to have been discarded from England’s plans as he now focuses on Test cricket.

Since the start of 2017, England have played 34 T20Is and won 20 of them. In 2020 they beat Australia 2-1 at home and then South Africa 3-0 away, so are in good form of late.

England facts

Here are some cool facts about England and their performances at the T20 World Cup over the years.

• England won it back in 2010 when it was held in the West Indies, beating Australia in the final, with the now-retired batsman Kevin Pietersen being named Player of the Tournament.
• In 2009, like every other team who has hosted the WC, it didn’t end well for them. They failed to get out of the Super 8s so missed out on a semi-final appearance.
• Stuart Broad, who doesn’t play T20 for England anymore, was famously hit for six sixes in an over by Yuvraj Singh at the inaugural 2007 World Cup in South Africa.
• England’s win percentage at T20 World Cups (51.35%) puts them in just eighth place for best win-loss ratio.
• England have never tied any of their 32 games at the T20 WC.
• Alex Hales, who returned to the side after a three-year absence in the England side, is one of two England players to have hit a WC century, alongside Jos Buttler, who struck one against Sri Lanka last year.
• Current Number Dawid Malan is rated Number 1 for best T20I batsman ever on the ICC rankings.

Captain: Jos Buttler

He had been vice-captain for a while, was extremely popular in the dressing room, had some experience of captaincy before and was an automatic selection as a gun batsman with one of the highest strike rates in the world in T20 cricket.

A few months earlier he had been the top batsman in the IPL for Rajasthan and also Player of the Tournament.

But his tenure as captain certainly didn’t get off to the best start with home Series losses to India and South Africa. He then suffered an injury that kept him out of most of The Hundred and some matches against Pakistan in Pakistan.

As the team’s star opening batsman, wicket-keeper and captain he certainly has a lot to do so let’s see how one of cricket’s true ‘good guys’ handles it all.