India start their campaign to win the Champions Trophy by playing an England team that has picked up its form somewhat at the end of their season. Earlier in the English season Sri Lanka thrashed the hosts quite comfortably and Pakistan also won the first two easily and then lost the next two. So England will be a lot more confident than if they had lost those games as well. They also have the return of their charismatic skipper Andrew Flintoff which is a huge morale booster and though Flintoff is unlikely to bowl, his very presence will lift the side as they look to go to Australia with some confidence. There have been stories of how both Australia and England are not really interested in the ICC Champions Trophy and would rather get on with the Ashes series but both teams know how important it is to win and get into the winning habit and so they will be out there trying their best. England have never won anything involving more than three teams and Australia have missed out on the Champions Trophy though they have just about every other silverware in their trophy cupboard.
India are always tough to beat at home and having beaten England 5-1 in the one-day series a few months ago, they will be high on belief. They have had a hard few months after that with the Windies beating them and then in the warm-up event at Kuala Lumpur too they did not inspire any confidence in their supporters with their lackluster performance. Still with the return of Tendulkar they look much better than when they beat England easily in March-April this year. It will be interesting to see how much of the batting is going to be shuffled around and especially who is going to open the batting.
The batting, which is their strength, has not been consistent much like the batting order but the familiar pitches should take care of that. The bowling too has been up and down but Harbhajan has been bowling superbly after being sidelined earlier in the year and he will be the key if India is to win the event.
Pakistan have come with a lot of emotional baggage and they will have to fire straightaway else the campaign will be over before one can say Inzamam ul-Haq. They have top batting line-up though they have yet to find a pair of openers to get them off to good brisk starts. Shoaib’s pace does not need helpful pitches and if he is in the mood then he will make it hotter for the batsman than the October heat in most of India. They also will have the advantage of being familiar with the kind of pitches India has and so depending on their mental makeup will be the side that will be feared by all.
New Zealand will be the team that comes in cold in this event. They haven’t played much cricket and coming from the cold winter of their country, will take a bit of time to get used, not only to the pitches but also the weather, but they have won this tournament in the past and will be wanting to prove a thing or two to the cricketing world who quite understandably forget they exist seeing the location of their country.
South Africa have fallen off in recent times and it will need a superhuman effort from them to surprise in this event. They would have learned a lot if they had stuck on in Sri Lanka but they preferred to go home and thus missed an opportunity to see where they can get better and the areas they need to improve. They have played some pretty easy games recently at home and so are not quite out of touch as New Zealand are.
The two teams that have qualified are the real dark horses of the tournament. The defending champions West Indies are angry that they have had to qualify in spite of being the Champions and the way they have demolished Bangladesh and Zimbabwe is testimony to their intentions. Their bowling is much improved and so they are capable of defending totals.
Sri Lanka are the form team at the moment with impressive performances against South Africa after their successful tour of England and they too have used the qualifying matches to make a statement of intent. Under Jayawardene they have regrouped magnificently and they bid fair to win the title they shared with India four years back.
There’s been a fair bit of off field happenings and so there will be lots of salt and pepper to add to the spice of the tournament. Australia as usual will be the favorites but they will find that it won’t be easy this time.
