It’s Now or Never England’s Cricket World Cup Hopes
For a nation that invented the game itself, it’s a big shame that England have never won the ICC Cricket World Cup even after making appearances in all 10 all of editions so far. Cricket is the National sport of England for a reason. The birth of the cricket happened here in the 16th century and by 18th century, England pioneered the game. Nobody knows the game better than the British players but for some reasons, cricket’s most elite trophy has always slipped out of their hands. And being early movers certainly didn’t bring any advantage as even after hosting 4 editions of World Cup, and making it to the finals 3 times, the England team are still missing a crucial trophy in their cupboard, something they should have got, at least one till now.
And it is this very hunger and thirst that makes the England team very dangerous. They are surely the underdogs as they have never won the World Cup, but other teams may be in for a surprise if England continues their current run in the International cricket. England has vastly improved over last couple of years and they look better equipped than before. In Alastair Cook, they have a young and able captain who comes out to save his team in dire consequences. Luckily, since the current England squad has more experienced players than new players, this may work in favour of them. They have some solid batsman like Andrew Strauss, Paul Collingwood, Eoin Morgan, Kevin Pieterson, Jonathan Trott and Ian Bell. Luke Wright fulfils the role of a pinch hitter while Ravi Bopara and wicket-keeper Matt Prior are handy players at their playing position. But their weakness lies in their bowling department as apart from Stuart Broad and Monty Panesar, they don’t have any quality bowlers. Another concern is that some senior batsman may call it before the 2015 World Cup. In fact England’s star batsman Kevin Pieterson has already vented out his retirement plans once, although that was due to conflict with the board.
The England team have always been a strong side, but only on paper. In the 2011 World Cup, they had an embarrassing run, losing out to minnows Ireland and Bangladesh. The Ireland loss was a painful sting because England had failed to defend a high total of 327-8 in that game. And when they did somehow manage to crawl to the Knockout stage, hosts Sri Lanka buried them with a thumping 10 wicket win at Colombo. With all these things weighing heavily in their subconscious mind, pressure will be on the England players to deliver. It will be a desperate situation. A do or die tournament perhaps.
