Graeme Swann Picks England as the Hot Favourites For 2019 World Cup
Published - 21 Jun 2018, 07:28 PM | Updated - 23 Aug 2024, 12:40 AM
The ICC Cricket World Cup is just a year away and all the top teams started off their preparations for the quadrennial event.
After the first time since the 1999 World Cup, the tournament will return to England and Wales. So, only 10 teams will be part of the competition this time around unlike previous years.
Interestingly, Associate nations were involved till the last tournament. However, the ICC decided to reduce the number of teams.
Meanwhile, the former English players are very excited about the chances of hosts in the tournament. Swann picked England as favourites to win the competition next year.
The Australian team is the reigning World Champions. However, they are not really at their best in the shorter versions of the game. They have lost all their three matches in the five-match series against England so far.
The void left by David Warner and Steven Smith following their suspensions made Australia a weaker unit. Hence, it will be a humungous task for them to go an defend their title, next year.
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While giving an interview to BBC, Swann picked the hosts as the hot contenders to lift the trophy for the first time next year.
Meanwhile, England set a world record after scoring 481 in their allotted 50 overs during the third One-day International against Australia. It was carnage on display and the English batters smashed them all around the park with disdain.
Ace spinner Swann believes the team looks pretty settled even without the likes of Ben Stokes and Chris Woakes, who is an integral part of the limited-overs side.
“For this team, the sky is the limit and that’s the way to play One-Day cricket. I’ll tell you what, they’ve got to go down as hot favourites for the World Cup as it is only a year away and they’ve got a balanced team. They’ve still Stokes and Woakes to come back into the team,” he said.
Graeme Swann further stated that the other teams won’t like to play England in the World Cup especially after their blistering batting performance the other day.
“Everyone around the world would’ve watched that and will now desperately not want to play England. They would not want to come up against the hosts in a crunch game,” Swann added.
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