ICC World T20: England Wary Of Dutch Surprise

The hosts will be hoping there will be no Dutch delight on the first day of the ICC World Twenty20 in England.

England will take on the rest of the world with a new captain in tow. The ECB preferred Paul Collingwood to be England’s captain for the second edition of the Twenty20 World Cup and instead left out Andrew Strauss.

Kevin Pietersen made some startling statements about the fact that he was still learning the ways of the Twenty20 game and that the likes of Yuvraj Singh, Chris Gayle, Brett Lee and Fidel Edwards were the ones who were taking the game forward.

With the former skipper, who captained the Royal Challengers Bangalore for six games before Anil Kumble took over in the IPL 2 in South Africa, sounding off a non confident note regarding his own game in the Twenty20 context, and with Andrew Flintoff injured and not expected to take part in the game for some time, England will undoubtedly be hampered with the less than enthusiastic presence of their all rounders.

But it does provide opportunities for the likes of Ravi Bopara who now have the chance to lead the game for England in a stronger position within the team.

But England will not be taking their first game of the tournament against the Netherlands lightly. Netherlands may still have some way in learning the ropes. But the Twenty20 format does provide more opportunities for lesser known teams and with Dirk Nannes turning up in orange colours, the team’s strengths would have only been boosted further with the likes of Ryan ten Doeschate already having made his mark.

England will be expecting to turn up in their Friday best, for they would not want fireworks on a turf they are expected to play well on.

Let the games begin.

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