Sri Lanka among favourites as T20 World Cup nears

THE ICC Men’s T20 World Cup begins at Kardinia Park in two days, and one of the Group A sides playing there is among the favourites to win it all.

Opening this Sunday afternoon and continuing on Tuesday, October 18 and Thursday, October 20, the tournament will see the stadium in Geelong host Sri Lanka, Namibia, Netherlands and the United Arab Emirates for six games between the four sides.

Namibia

Fresh from a memorable performance at last year’s T20 World Cup, Namibia are looking to build on their momentum and spring a few more surprises in Australia.

The Eagles qualified for the Super 12, beating Scotland in Group 2, in the UAE 12 months ago after coming through a tough first round group by overcoming Ireland and the Netherlands.

They renew hostilities with the latter in the first round of this year’s competition, along with Sri Lanka and the UAE, and will be confident of repeating their 2021 display as they look to test themselves against world’s leading nations once more.

Again led by Gerhard Erasmus, the experienced 16-man squad has a familiar look to it and Namibia will be hoping for more big performances from talisman David Wiese and paceman Ruben Trumpelmann, both of whom played key roles last time out.

Netherlands

Netherlands are a fixture at the T20 World Cup and the famous bright orange shirts will be on show once again in Australia.

Ryan Cook’s side head Down Under in search of a first win in the competition since 2016 having suffered three defeats in Oman last year but they boast a squad packed with quality.

That showed when they swept through July’s high-stakes qualifier in Zimbabwe, sealing a World Cup spot by beating USA in the semi-finals.

Sri Lanka

Fresh from their victory in the Asia Cup, Sri Lanka enter this year’s T20 World Cup with renewed confidence.

The Lions reached the Super 12 for the second consecutive edition in 2021 and will be hoping to repeat their heroics from 2014, when Dinesh Chandimal skippered them to glory.

Sri Lanka are without Chandimal, who is on their stand-by list on this occasion, with Dasun

Shanaka captaining his side for the second time at a T20 World Cup.

Kusal Mendis and Danushka Gunathilaka are two of the five players to have been included in the squad having missed out last time out in the UAE and Oman.

United Arab Emirates (UAE)

The UAE have reached the competition for only the second time in their history after winning their qualifying path against Ireland in February.

They face the Netherlands, Sri Lanka and Namibia in Group A, and must finish in the top two to reach the Super-12 stage, a feat they have never achieved before.

The UAE come into the competition off the back of two defeats to Bangladesh but pushed them all the way in the first match to only lose by seven runs, a result that would have given them immense confidence.

They also suffered defeat to Hong Kong in a T20 Asia Cup Qualifier but defeated Singapore by 47 runs before that.