England vs West Indies, World T20
West Indies won the toss and Darren Sammy chose to bowl and rely on his deep batting line-up to pull off a successful chase against England at the Wankhede. Both sides will have been encouraged by India’s defeat in their opening tie in World T20 into believing that the tournament is wide open and that they can both be regarded as serious contenders.
Pace bowlers can expect more assistance in Mumbai than any other surface in the tournament. “The wicket has a bit of grass and we look to exploit the conditions first up,” Sammy said. “I will then back our batters to chase it down.”
Help for pace or not, both sides fielded two spinners, with Jason Holder missing out for West Indies and David Willey, who took a hat-trick against England in a warm-up match on Monday, getting the vote ahead of Liam Plunkett.
England’s side could show only 23 international appearances in India, with seven playing their first international in the country.
“It is about learning as much as we can while we are out here,” said Eoin Morgan, England’s captain, “but hopefully as the first two games are here in Mumbai here won’t be too much adapting needed.”
All eight of West Indies’ previous World T20 winners were chosen and Samuel Badree, whose economy rate of 5.39 in T20Is is the best among all bowlers who have bowled 50 or more overs, was selected despite missing both warm-up games.
England 1 Alex Hales, 2 Jason Roy, 3 Joe Root, 4 Eoin Morgan (capt), 5 Jos Buttler (wk), 6 Ben Stokes, 7 Moeen Ali, 8 Adil Rashid, 9 Chris Jordan, 10 David Willey, 11 Reece Topley
West Indies 1 Chris Gayle, 2 Johnson Charles, 3 Marlon Samuels, 4 Dwayne Bravo, 5 Denesh Ramdin (wk), 6 Andre Russell, 7 Darren Sammy (capt), 8 Carlos Brathwaite, 9 Samuel Badree, 10 Jerome Taylor, 11 Sulieman Benn
