England Cricket / Editor / 01 February 2007 /

The major tournament on the horizon for Michael Vaughan's (or Andy Flintoff's, or Andrew Strauss') side is the World Cup, which kicks off in the West Indies in March.

Currently England are in the position you would expect in the outright market; complete outsiders of the major Test-playing nations. A record of two wins in your last 10 games is likely to see that kind of price-drift, with 18.5 now on offer, albeit for small money.

They are quite clearly playing cricket on a different level to current favourites Australia (2.56) at the moment and it would really be no surprise to see bigger prices available as the tournament nears.

England's lack of international experience means they will go into the event with little confidence.

The absence of the likes of Vaughan, Simon Jones, Marcus Trescothick and, most importantly for the one-day side, Kevin Pietersen would affect any squad, even one wearing the Baggy Green.

Imagine the Aussies without Ricky Ponting, Adam Gilchrist, Andrew Symonds and Glenn McGrath and you can see things would not be quite the same.

The problem with the England side at the moment is that it is a struggle to know who is going to be in it from one match to the next. Apart from a fully-fit Pietersen, Flintoff and perhaps Monty Panesar, no-one is in the form to command a definite place in the side and that could give punters kittens when it comes to betting on England's individual matches in the Caribbean.

And it is Pietersen's absence that would most worry any backer brave enough to support England at the moment. Although the South African-born star is fully expected to recover from his broken rib in time for the start of the World Cup, whether he will be at 100% is another matter, and there is no doubt that as he goes, so goes the fate of his adopted country.

Markets such as top England batsman and bowler will be available nearer to the March starting date when a 16-man squad for the tournament has been named. Likely outsiders to be included, such as all-rounder Ravi Bopara, paceman Stuart Broad and former one-
day stars Owais Shah and Vikram Solanki, could be part of the squad and should be of some interest at decent prices if they make it onto the plane.

But the rest of the outright market for the tournament shows just how open it is. Forgetting about the classy Australians, South Africa are ranked as second favourites for the title despite some ropey form of their own, with more likely threats from Pakistan (11.5) and India (10) at longer prices because of their lack of overseas success in the one-day game.

The problem for England at the moment is that no-one can even be 100% sure that they will even beat their preliminary group rivals, and that is saying something when you realise that two of them are minnows Canada and Kenya. Kenya have given England some trouble in past World Cups and, although the class difference should still be enough, punters may struggle to predict a certain England win even in that clash, the last one in the Group C schedule in St Lucia.

By all known form it should be England and New Zealand progressing to the Super Eight stage, where they come up against the six qualifiers from the other three first-stage groups, most likely India, Pakistan, South Africa, Australia, Sri Lanka and the host West Indies.

Hopefully by then England will have played themselves into some sort of form and found a settled side that has put in some improved performances, but their current price suggests Betfair punters feel that chance to be a slim one.

Don't forget that there will also be a multitude of markets available on Betfair for the duration of the World Cup and keep an eye out for them as soon as squads start filtering through from the 16 competing nations.

England's players do not get much of a break when they get back from the Caribbean as, once again, the England and Wales Cricket Board has planned yet another busy season of games against the touring parties from the West Indies and India.

Unbelievably there will be a total of seven Tests and 10 one-day internationals played from May until September and Betfair will again be the place to visit for the most wide-ranging selection of markets.

After the Ashes debacle, it would not be the biggest of shocks to see England rebuild over the summer with the aforementioned Bopara, Broad and others champing at the bit to kick off their international careers and, with a number of under-achievers in the current set-up, the chance to field some new blood against a rebuilding West Indies could do England a power of good.

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