STAR PREVIEW Fri: England v Australia ODI with RYAN SIDEBOTTOM

England v Australia, 1st ODI
Australia Tour of England
Emirates Old Trafford, Manchester
Friday 11th September
Live from 12:30 pm on Sky Sports Cricket HD & Test Match Special

---

Hello all! It was a shame for England not to get over the line in the T20’s but another series win for the guys is always welcome and there’s more positives than negatives to take out of the matches.

Before the ODI series Maddie and I had the honour of meeting none other than the Captain Sir Tom Moore – who’s a fan of Yorkshire no less! he was lovely and it was wonderful to be in his company this week.

3rd T20 Reflections

The lads will be gutted not to take the third win – they’d have been desperate to get the Number 1 spot – but over the whole series they showed how capable they are in T20’s, and they’ve proven that they’re right amongst the world’s best.

England didn’t quite get enough runs on the board – Jos Buttler was missed dearly, and Ashton Agar taking Johnny Bairstow was the big blow of the innings – but the Australian bowling attack has a lot of quality and they bowled well, especially Adam Zampa in the middle overs – and one always felt that England were 20 runs behind their ideal total in the end – now it’s onto the ODI’s.

ODI Series

Since the World Cup there hasn’t been a lot of ODI cricket anywhere due to lockdowns, and we should see a highly competitive series with Australia desperate to prove a point with a strong squad. England have only played Ireland in their series but that should stand them in good stead, and it’ll be interesting to see where their ODI players – many of whom will have faced their opposite numbers already – are.

I can see England being too strong once again – we’re the World Champions for a reason and we’ve got a squad full of in- form batsmen who’ve had plenty of gametime. It’s a good headache to have, but England are almost overloaded with high quality ODI batsmen, and Dawid Malan’s excellent T20 series surely has him pushing for a place in the side, whilst Jason Roy is set to return along with Jos Buttler, who’s back from his place into bio-secure bubble. Eoin Morgan is also fit too, which is important for not only the leadership but middle order stability.

Joe Root and Chris Woakes, who’ve had a rest since the Pakistan test series, could also be picked which gives England tremendous firepower. Those new options should change things from the third T20, where England really missed Buttler (as well as Jason Roy) to lay down the foundations.

We’ve seen the quality Australia have – in Mitchell Star, Pat Cummins and Josh Hazelwood they’ve got a quality fast bowling line up but Adam Zampa and Ashton Agar did the damage in the third T20 and a suit they managed to shut down the more destructive parts of England’s innings.

There’s also plenty of quality shot-making too, with David Warner bringing the power but being complimented by Aaron Finch and Marcus Stoinis, Australia’s two highest scorers in the T20 series, whilst we ought to see the best of Glenn Maxwell and Steven Smith in this format.

Selections

As said before, England are stacked with batting talent and that gives gives us value odds about Jos Buttler being the leading series run scorer. It feels like a long time ago that he was getting stick for his wicket-keeping, but with the bat he’s had a brilliant summer and is arguably England’s form white ball player at this point in time. Buttler would surely have been the top scorer in the T20’s if he’d played all three games – he scored 121 runs compared to 129 for Dawid Malan – and if he continues in the same vein then he’s got every chance of leading the charge for England.

Australia will give it a good go of fighting fire with fire, and Glenn Maxwell could end up leading the charge. He didn’t really hit form in the T20’s but he’s a much better ODI player with an average of nearly 50 in this format, and he scored 108 in a 50 over warmup game at the beginning of the tour. He should have his eye in more now and there’ value in a price of 7/1 about him being the top series run-scorer.

RECOMMENDED BETS (scale of 1-100 points)
BACK Jos Buttler Top England Series Runscorer 1 pt at 5/1 with starsports.bet
BACK Glenn Maxwell Top Australia Series Runscorer 1 pt at 7/1 with starsports.bet

---

PROFIT/LOSS SINCE JAN 1 2017: PROFIT 145.83 points
(Excluding Cheltenham 2021 antepost, Six Nations Outright, Six Nations Specials, Tour De France)

STAR PROMOTIONS