England Cricket / Ed Hawkins / 21 October 2008 /

With the two of the best spinners around amongst their ranks, Middlesex could spring a suprise on a wicket which will only get slower, says Ed Hawkins.

When Middlesex take on England on Sunday in Coolidge, Antigua as a warm up for the $20m match against the Stanford Superstars six days later there will be no cash at stake, just something that one cannot put a price on: pride.

It is an alien concept for the Stanford Series. Middlesex, champions of the English domestic Twenty20, will themselves have dollar signs spinning before their eyes when they take on Trinidad and Tobago for a winner-takes-all pot of $200,000 on Monday. Of course that is chicken feed compared to the $1m each that either England or the West Indies - sorry Superstars - players will get.

The timing of these matches could not be worse, which makes one wonder whether there is something fatalistic about the whole thing. If the ordinary Joe was getting more bang for his buck he might treat the affair as a novelty but instead with the world in economic bust, he will surely find it obscene.

At least the game between Middlesex and England will not raise a sneer. Of all the six matches scheduled to be played (see the fixture list here) it is the most enticing. A county team taking on the cream of their crop should have needle not to mention the potential for a crowd pleasing giantkilling.

Middlesex are [3.00] to make Kevin Pietersen's mob look like fool's gold and if there is to be one bet to be had during the series of matches, they may be it. England are [1.40].

Admittedly there are few county teams who could give England, who have won their three previous matches in this format, a run for their money but Middlesex are most definitely one of them. Whisper it, but they could even embarrass their 'superiors'.

Middlesex boast two of the canniest spin bowlers around in Shaun Udal and Murali Kartik while England are still perceived to be flawed at working twirlers into the gaps in one-day cricket - consecutive series losses to New Zealand in the 50-over format suggest they have not soothed their Achilles heel.

Udal and Kartik were the main reasons Middlesex, who went into finals day at the Rose Bowl in July as the outsiders of the four, strangled the life from Durham and Kent to triumph. They were helped by the wicket being slow and low and Udal, who captains Middlesex instead of Ed Joyce, would dearly love the surface in Coolidge to be exactly the same.

It isn't. In fact it's much worse and if Udal and Kartik get their lengths and pace right, England's batsmen could be forgiven for thinking they are batting on a mud strip.

In the previous Stanford 2020 - which is the domestic Caribbean version of England's Twenty20 with all matches played at the Stanford Ground - the average first-innings total from the first round through to the finals was just 139. Now consider that out of 15 matches, 10 were won by the side batting first. It is a strong indication that the wicket is slow and will get slower.

Udal and Kartik will not be able to believe their luck. Four of the five top wicket-takers in the competition were spinners and in the semi-finals and final it was the slow men who made all the difference. Marlon Samuels' gentle spinners claimed 2-19 for Jamaica against Guyana in the first semi-final as his side defended 143. In the other semi, T&T's Dave Mohammed and Sherwin Ganga, an offie, shared four wickets for just 40 runs as 121 proved too much for Barbados. In the final it was Mohammed to the fore once more. His slow left armers claimed four wickets as Jamaica were trounced by nine wickets.

England will argue that Samit Patel and Graeme Swann are more dangerous than Udal and Kartik but it is not an opinion for punters to share if they want to see dollar signs too.

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