Cricket-Match-Special ... A forum for discussion

Tue, 15 Mar – New Zealand v India (M) (Eve), Nagpur

Wed, 16 Mar – Pakistan v Q1A (M) (Eve.), Kolkata

Fri, 18 Mar – Australia v New Zealand (M) (PM), Dharamsala

Sat, 19 Mar – India v Pakistan (M) (Eve.), Dharamsala

Mon, 21 Mar – Australia v Q1A (M) (Eve.), Bengaluru

Tue, 22 Mar – New Zealand v Pakistan (M) (Eve.), Mohali

Wed, 23 Mar – India v Q1A (M), (Eve.), Bengaluru

Fri, 25 Mar – Pakistan v Australia (M) (PM), Mohali

Sat, 26 Mar – Q1A v New Zealand (M) (PM), Kolkata

Sun, 27 Mar – India v Australia (M) (Eve.), Mohali

What a coincidence India and Pakistan are in the same group!

7th ICC tournament running it's happened. Shame that no major journalist ever writes on how all these tournament draws are rigged.

Really difficult group for Australia. They have a terrible record against Pakistan in the World T20, India in India is always tough, NZ are no pushovers but its not just these 3 but the likely qualifiers in this group (Bangladesh or Ireland) are much tougher than the other. I'd have much rather preferred facing the Narine-less West Indies or the Sanga-Mahela less Sri Lanka (with Malinga also looking past his use by date). I suppose the venues are the saving grace. 2 matches at Mohali, including against India, a venue where they have a very good ODI record against the hosts. The other matches are at Bangalore and Dharamsala. None of these pitches known to be spin friendly in the IPL, have good pace and carry and would be to the liking of Australia's strokemakers. Starc is a huge blow in the bowling department of course.

I have Aus as one of the favourites actually. They have explosive batting till No 8 so they can chase almost anything. Worried about India... Dhoni, Kohli, Dhawan all out of form. Rohit hasnt played much recently.

This is a tough group, with any of these four good enough on their day to win the whole thing. The Oz-NZ game is obviously the blockbuster match in the group.

dan08 wrote:What a coincidence India and Pakistan are in the same group!

7th ICC tournament running it's happened. Shame that no major journalist ever writes on how all these tournament draws are rigged.

yep it is rigged, the proof is the 2011 world cup and 2015 world cup considering the criteria to make the groups were changed.
I made a post day before the launch and got it hopelessly wrong.
Although to be fair this time it actually hasn't been rigged, made a post around September after the cut off date, where I made a post about the possible groups for the T20 since ICC said these rankings would be used for the tournament in a press release.
And India, Pakistan, Australia and NZ were all in one group assuming all odds or evens were in the same group.

Although I have to admit they do change the criteria to suit certain fixtures.

TBH I don't mind the overload of India vs Pakistan since they hardly play each otherwise.
But England vs NZ, Sri lanka is getting boring now these 3 teams are usually group together in the past 6-7 events, for the past 4-5 ICC events the whole groups look so similar literally only one or two teams change.
From the last T20 world cup only West indies and NZ have changed places, 2013 Champions trophy and 2015 worlds cup were the same groups.

My Oz squad for this comp:

Dave Warner
Aaron Finch
Chris Lynn
Steve Smith
Shane Watson
Glenn Maxwell
Tim Ludeman or Ben Dunk
James Faulkner
Josh Hazlewood
Jason Behrendorff
Nathan Lyon

Michael Klinger
Mitchell Marsh
George Bailey
A fast bowler to be named later

And I'd find a place for Travis Head.

Lucky Clarke isn't still around or Bailey wouldn't get a look in.

from_the_stands wrote:And I'd find a place for Travis Head.

I'd find a place for Alex Ross and Cameron Boyce too.

India squad

MS Dhoni (capt. & wk), Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan, Virat Kohli, Ajinkya Rahane, Suresh Raina, Yuvraj Singh, Hardik Pandya, Ravindra Jadeja, R Ashwin, Jasprit Bumrah, Ashish Nehra, Harbhajan Singh, Mohammed Shami, Pawan Negi.

This squad makes no sense at all. No Bailey, Boyce, Lyon, Lynn, Wade...

Both of Australia's specialist spin options haven't even debuted in T20Is yet...

Nevill feels a bit unexpected.

dan08 wrote:This squad makes no sense at all. No Bailey, Boyce, Lyon, Lynn, Wade...

I can unxderstand the no Wade and no Lynn - Lynn has shown a weakness to spin, and he will get no let up on that front. Nevill(e) I assume is selected for superior keeping skills.

No Boyce is the biggest surprise for me.