Indian fans would have been delighted to see their team finally win a game against England, albeit in a warm-up fixture. After a disastrous Asia Cup, fans are hoping for a good show by their team in the ICC World T20 2014. After winning the inaugural event back in 2007, the Indian cricket team hasn’t really set the stage on fire in Twenty20 cricket. So, will they fare any better this year?
On paper, the team does look balanced for a tournament in the Indian subcontinent. Fine, we are struggling with finding a good second and third medium pacer but we do have a couple of spinners in Ashwin and Jadeja who are reliable performers and can do the job in Bangladesh. The batsmen too do not have to fear the rising ball on these flat pitches, which has been their Achilles heel for quite some time now. Even David Lloyd in a recent tweet had given India a good chance to win the tournament.
But a look at the history of the World T20 warm-up matches might tell a story. In the first of the two warm-up games in the ICC World Twenty20 2009 held in England, India lost to New Zealand by 9 runs. India won the second game against Pakistan convincingly by 9 wickets with 3 overs to spare. Isn’t a similar “one win-one loss” pattern emerging in this year’s tournament? Eventually, in the tournament, India could win only two matches against minnows Bangladesh and Ireland, and could not win a single game against the big teams.
Fast forward to ICC World Twenty20 2012 held in Sri Lanka and a similar pattern emerges. While India won the first warm-up against Sri Lanka convincingly by 26 runs, they lost to Pakistan by 5 wickets in the second warm-up game. Although they did not play too badly in the tournament (won 4 out of 5 games), they lost out on a place in the semi-finals due to a lower net run rate.
For the record, India did not play any warm-up games in the first World Twenty20 in South Africa which they won and the third edition in the West Indies in 2010 where they could not win a single game in the Super Eight stage.
Interestingly, 2009 winners Pakistan lost both their warm games in 2009, while 2010 winners England won both. The exception being the 2012 winners West Indies who followed a similar “one win-one loss” pattern at the warm-ups. But their win came against minnows Afghanistan. One could argue that faced with a stronger team, the story might have been different.
Although this might not be a significant indicator of a performance, these patterns do seem to be playing themselves out. So, based on the warm-up match theory, let me stick my neck out and say West Indies or Australia (one match, one win) will be the most likely winners of this World Cup. India will not qualify for the finals while there is an outside chance for New Zealand and England to win the tournament. Do you agree?