As the world’s leading cricket teams play off for the ICC Cricket World Cup Trophy over the next month in India, my sense is that a new winner’s name might be on the trophy.
The final on Sunday November 19th in Ahmedabad, is going to be a massive sporting occasion – especially if the host nation India is playing. It would be a surprise to me if India do not make the Final – home advantage in the sub-continent can be significant.
Teams like Australia have rarely travelled well to India from a performance perspective (especially for test series) despite winning the first World Cup to be staged outside of England (1987) under the leadership axis of captain Allan Border and coach Bob Simpson. New Zealand have consistently played well in World Cups and in the last two tournaments, the Black Caps have made the Final, losing out by the narrowest of margins in 2019 to England at Lord’s.
England look a less-accomplished team than they did going into the previous World Cup. Can they retain their title as World Champions? I hope so, but I doubt it. England’s bowling attack looks less impressive than the 2019 version now that Jofra Archer is missing and Ben Stokes is unable to bowl.
Without being disrespectful to Netherlands, I cannot see them making the semi-finals, so it leaves 3 spots up for grabs assuming India takes the first one. Could it be another sub-continental success for Sri Lana? I doubt it. Despite my desire to see them excel because of my long-term friendship with their coach Chris Silverwood, I don’t see enough quality in their team to get past Pakistan and possibly Bangladesh too.
I don’t think Afghanistan will achieve much more than invaluable experience against the more established cricketing nations whatever the advantage, and possibly create an upset with a significant one-off performance. But, Pakistan are my sub-continental team to consider backing as the best challengers to hosts India’s supremacy and their ‘tournament favourites’ tag.
My strongest tip for ‘an outsider’ to triumph is South Africa. I think they might surprise a few teams in this tournament with tier power hitting and also tier pace bowling. Nortje, Rabada, Ngidi, Jansen, and Coetzee, look as good a collection of pacemen as any other team can put out. On slower surfaces, high pace through the air can prove to be a real handful to bat against. And, low bouncing pitches can prove to be very testing when the pacemen ‘bang the ball in’ and it doesn’t get up as it normally would do in Australia, at home in SA, or in England.
Can South Africa’s batting hold up? Can their bowlers adapt to the significantly different conditions? Can they rely upon Shamsi as a spinner to perform under the higher pressure that exists in major moments during a World Cup?
Since 1992, when they were first re-admitted to the ICC, they have been a highly-credentialed team and have come into each tournament as ‘a fancied team’. But, for different reasons, they have fallen short on each occasion. Great players have come and gone – Donald, Pollock, McMillan, two Kirstens, Kallis, Gibbs, Klusener, AB De Villiers, etc have not been able to help their nation get across the line when it mattered most and innovative coaches like Bob Woolmer (sadly no longer with us) were thwarted by the ‘rub of the green’ and also the ‘chokers’ tag that be-devilled South Africa’s teams for so long.
The 10-team round-robin format meaning everyone plays everyone else in a total of 9 games played before the semi final stage is the fairer format if you want to give the best teams the best chance of progressing to the knockout stages. In previous tournaments, I think some teams have been able to complain (justifiably) about the format because teams have enjoyed ‘the luck of the draw’. This 2023 tournament is set up to be a test of strength – plenty of matches, an opportunity for the best players to play themselves into top form in the conditions, and because of the volume of matches,
it will test ‘bench strength’ too. It might be the tan injury to a key player makes one nation much weaker, whereas another nation might not suffer the same outcome because the quality of reserve/squad player is better. For example, if Ben Stokes isn’t fit and Harry Brook plays in his place and excels, and England wins matches, they will deserve their success because the performance from ‘a weakened team’ reveals a depth of batting talent.
With this in mind, New Zealand may struggle if Kane Williamson doesn’t return to form and fitness, or if Trent Boult gets injured.
Predicting a winner is tough – most teams have destructive batters, and it may come down to which team has the most attacking bowlers and which captain has the tactics and clever field-placing to effect the matches most often. Can Jos Buttler lead England to back-to-back tournament victories? it might require more than a stroke of luck for England to reach the semi finals, let alone the World Cup Final this time around.
I’m going for the four semi finalists to be:
India (top of the group stage) followed by Pakistan, Australia and my ‘dark horses’ for 4th place, South Africa.This will mean a semi final line up of India v South Africa and Pakistan v Australia. I’m sure the sub-continent would love to see a Final between India and Pakistan but it might just be that the psychology of switching to a knock-out match, after playing 9 round robin matches might mean that a team who appear to have been playing with relative freedom might just ’tighten up’ when it matters most.
India are tournament favourites because of their home advantage – but will the expectation to deliver success for their nation be too much?
Under-performance in semi-finals and finals is a phenomenon that has impacted many top players and teams in top sport. Could it affect India in a negative way this time around in either the semi final or the Final? If they make it though to the Final, then ‘the big match’ could be even bigger if Pakistan are the opposition on November 19th. The anticipation of that possibility would delight the broadcasters and the locals, but it might just be that Australia or my ‘dark horses’ South Africa cause an upset.
I find it hard to see past India as tournament winners, but you never know …