Clash of the titans: England and Australia gear up for T20 challenge

The much-awaited T-20 series between Australia and England is going to start at Southampton on Friday. This will be followed by the ODI series of three matches. The excitement will be at its peak as two heavyweights will be taking on each other in these series. England will be playing with two advantages in their favour in these series. First, England will have an advantage of playing in home conditions like in the past two series. The England team has played series against West Indies and Pakistan recently in the same conditions. English players have proved their fitness and all of them continue to be match-fit.

 The eyes will be set on the pace bowlings of both the teams. The two teams have relied on those fast bowlers who play all the three formats of cricket. England have included Mark Wood and Jofra Archer in the squad. When it comes to Test matches, only one of them is given a chance to be in the team. But both of them could prove to be big assets for the team in a T20 match. Wood has great speed, while Jofra Archer gets bounce as well as speed. If both the pacers take early wickets by virtue of their fast and furious bowling, then it will make the job for England quite easier. At the same time, Curran brothers will be in a supporting role. England also possess a specialist bowler for the T-20 format in the form of Chris Jordan who has bowled a good spell against Pakistan recently.

Australia too have avoided doing experiments. It inducted Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood in the squad. They are all Test specialists. Now it will be good to see Test bowlers playing in T-20. But the possibility is that Hazlewood is not included in the playing eleven. Possibly, England conditions are understood to be favourable for his bowling. He can do both swing and seam. But if batsmen crack his bowling too much then it will impact his game also.

 Pat Cummins is world number 1 bowler in the ICC ranking. He normally does not, however, swing the bowl. He focuses more on the cutter. He hits the ball on the wicket. His speciality is that he has good control over the ball despite speed. Mitchell Starc is the main fast bowler of Australia. His swing bowling could prove to be quite useful in England conditions. Mitchell has raw pace. And he has bowled at a speed of 160 km per hour. He has claimed again that he is going to bowl at the same speed. His yorkers are also quite dangerous. He can make a lot of difference in this series due to these specialities. Indian bowler Jaspreet Bumrah used to bowl in limited overs matches only and then he grew into a complete bowler, proving himself to be an asset for India. The same is with Cummins and Mitchell.

 It is good that both the teams have avoided doing experiments. And both have relied on their established players who have good track-record to prove. With this in view, the England-Australia series is going to be quite interesting and exciting.

 The writer is a former fast bowler of Indian cricket team. He is also a cricket analyst.