Cardiff ready on champion
THE dust will barely have settled after the UEFA Champions League final when another tournament, bearing a similar name, rolls into Cardiff tomorrow.
The ICC Champions Trophy may not quite boast the clout of a European football final between Real Madrid and Juventus, but it brings its own array of superstars to the Welsh capital.
The Cardiff public have been spoiled with glittering sporting lineups in recent years – the Rugby World Cup, the Ashes and Champions League added to the usual fare of Six Nations – but there’ll be no shortage of big names gracing The SSE SWALEC (known as the Cardiff Wales Stadium) over the next fortnight.
Modern one-day cricket teams don’t come much more exciting than host nation England, whose brash batting style has won admirers beyond the normal cricket-watching public in the past 24 months. With the home of Glamorgan set for sellout crowds for two of its four games, Eoin Morgan’s buccaneers will have no shortage of encouragement from the boundary.
They start, tomorrow, against New Zealand. The Black Caps are a young vibrant side in their own right, led expertly by the cool and composed captain Kane Williamson, the Kiwis’ answer to England’s Joe Root.
After a wash-out between New Zealand and Australia at Edgbaston on Friday and England’s domineering eight-wicket win over Bangladesh a day earlier, the game takes on added importance.
A victory for Morgan’s men could see them sail into the semi-finals before they’ve even started worrying about facing the Aussies. As tournament favourites, that will settle English nerves, famously so jittery on the biggest stage.
Next to grace the Cardiff stage are New Zealand again, in a game against Bangladesh that may not sound like a thrilling contest, but will whet the appetite of international limited-overs aficionados, who know all about the batting prowess of both sides. By then, both could be scrapping for their lives.
By the time Monday, June 12, comes around the tournament will be in full swing, with the afterglow of the Champions League final starting to wear off. Enter, Sri Lanka and Pakistan, two of the more inconsistent sides in world cricket, but both with a point to prove following the retirement of respective legends.
Without doubt, it’s a shame we won’t see Kumar Sangakkara and Mahela Jayawardena, nor Misbahul-Haq or Younus Khan in South Wales.
But the young captains Angelo Matthews and Sarfraz Ahmed are explosive all-rounders who only know one gear. Pakistan are famously mercurial but their tournament record speaks for itself.
The Cardiff public can look forward to watching a combative side who can steal victory from the jaws of defeat and – often – vice versa. Sri Lanka may struggle in a group containing India and South Africa but the Champions Trophy is renowned for producing unlikely results.
The bookmakers bill England as outright favourites at 5/2, but in truth the nature of the tournament with eight teams all playing within a short space of time make it impossiTABLE-TOPPING