Our online cricket betting analysis and Australia vs England betting predictions are coming up next so keep on reading because we’re going to talk you through all the important factors ahead of this important match at the World Cup. One of which is the rain!
It’s something of a do-or-die match with the loser likely to find it very hard to recover from a loss here. All of this just adds to the drama of it all!
The match will take place at the MCG on Friday, October 28 at 1:30 pm IST and could go a long way to deciding the winner of the tournament, so keep reading!
Up next are our cricket betting tips for this match and we’re going with Australia to win it and stay in the hunt for a semi-final place, with a loss for England just about meaning the end of the road for them.
As we explain below, there’s likely to be rain once again unfortunately but if we’re correct, it’s more likely to play into Australia’s hands than England’s.
Worry not because I’m about to explain why!
There’s also the toss prediction below so keep on reading and all will be revealed.
Recommended Bet: Back Australia to win @ 1.81 with Blue Chip.
As you can see from the venue and conditions section at the bottom, rain is expected in Melbourne for the game.
It’s a shame that in a World Cup a few matches have already been affected, whether that’s a reduction of overs or complete washouts with no result.
But that’s cricket.
So the rain may arguably be the most important factor of all on the day so our job is to work out who might benefit best from it or a shortened game.
The answer is Australia.
If it’s reduced to say 10-12 overs a side, they’re the team who have more big hitters who can come in and score quick boundaries: Stoinis, Marsh, Wade, David, you name them.
England’s batsmen have found a bad time to be out of form and whereas the likes of Jos Buttler and Dawid Malan can sometimes take some time at the start and then accelerate at the end, they may not have the chance to do so here where it might have to be a case of bang, bang, bang.
Add to that the fact that Australia also have a better bowling attack in general and you can see why we’re keen on Australia here.
Yes, they’re favourites but they deserve to be and like we say, the rain may play into their hands, not those of England.
And if the rain doesn’t come?
Australia look a better side than England in most departments anyway over a full 40 overs from what we’ve seen so far, so we’d be happy if there isn’t any rain as well.
And if you haven’t read it already, here’s our BlueChip review.
It’s no exaggeration to suggest this is the most important game of the tournament so far.
Yes, they don’t come any bigger than India v Pakistan, but that was the opening match for both sides, who then had a chance to recover if they lost.
For both England and Australia, with two matches under their belts, and a loss apiece in one of those two games, they’re quickly approaching do-or-die territory.
And it could have been even worse for Australia.
During their chase of a par score against Sri Lanka, they were going nowhere fast with opener David Warner out, Mitch Marsh soon following him after a couple of big hits and Aaron Finch struggling for rhythm.
At this stage Australia reached odds of around 1.6 in Live Betting, so if you’d followed our advice of backing Australia against Sri Lanka at any odds above 1.5 in-play, you would have secured a somewhat decent profit.
Of course, in the end they had man-of-the-match Marcus Stoinis to thank for not just winning the game but winning it extremely comfortably in the end.
Crucial in improving their net run rate.
His brutal 59 off 18 is right there as one of the most dominant displays of batting we’ve seen for a while and broke plenty of records in the process.
To put things into context: he hit 10 of the 18 balls he faced for either fours or sixes and took just 22 minutes to make that 58.
And that’s arguably Australia’s strength: that middle-order of Marsh, Maxwell, Stoinis, David and Wade is going to fire more often than not.
And if one of them doesn’t get you, one of the others generally will.
England’s defeat to Ireland has given Australia a decent chance of still qualifying from the group.
But defeat would probably mean the end of the road for them in a tournament where going into it they were defending champions, hosts and pre-tournament favourites.
Spinner Adam Zampa missed the win over Sri Lanka with Covid but as per ICC rules, is available to play here if Australia choose so.
And now keeper Matthew Wade got Covid.
He should be able to play anyway but with no reserve keeper in the side, it will have to be David Warner or Glenn Maxwell taking the gloves if Wade isn’t available after all.
England couldn’t have picked a worse time to put in a really poor performance in a T20I in losing to Ireland.
It was at a World Cup, it was up against a team they were expected to beat and it’s put them in serious danger of not making the semis.
With favourites Australia losing to New Zealand, then New Zealand themselves suffering a washout against Afghanistan, the win that was expected of them against Ireland would have put Jos Buttler’s men in a really strong position.
But they conceded too many runs first up by bowling too wide, they lost early wickets at the top and only Moeen Ali was striking the ball well before the rain came, at a time when DLS had Ireland four runs ahead.
So the inquest will begin.
One of Ben Stokes or Harry Brook may well be left out to allow them to play another specialist bowler, who will probably be Chris Jordan.
With Ali and Liam Livingstone making contributions with either bat or ball, they don’t need that many all-rounders.
So it may be Stokes, badly out of form with the bat, who is sacrificed.
Like Australia, a loss for England would make it incredibly difficult for them to progress from here.
21 (completed) matches between these two have produced 11 wins for England and 10 for Australia, with two no results in there over the years.
England have won all of the last three completed matches between them: a comprehensive win at last year’s World Cup in the Group Stages, to go with back-to-back wins here in Australia earlier this month.
The third match was washed out.
Venue & conditions
First things first: what’s the rain situation like?
It’s bad.
There’s an estimated 90% chance of rain in Melbourne during the game so it’s the usual story: we may be really lucky and get a full game, we might get a severely shortened match or we might not get a result at all.
So with that in mind, it may not be worth discussing par scores over 20 overs so much because we’re unlikely to get 20 overs a side.
As ever, batting second is generally an advantage in rain-reduced affairs so if you don’t want to follow our betting tip on the match winner market, there are worse strategies than going for whichever team gets to chase.
