After the warm-up matches, a few were optimistic on how many matches would be completed after a series of washed out matches during the warm-up matches. Thankfully after 11 days and 13 matches, only one had to resort to the Duck-Worth Lewis method and one rained out. As in all Cricket World Cups in the past, there will always be a few expected and unexpected events
Expected
- Afghanistan is the only team to have played only one edition of the cricket world cup, their first tour in England and were expected to struggle. They have been beaten convincingly in their opening matches against Sri Lanka, Australia and new Zealand.
- England will put up big scores. The English have put up scores of 300+ in all three of their outings so far.
- New Zealand had a relatively easy first-week fixture and they have collected three wins against Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Afghanistan.
Unexpected
- Before the World Cup scores of 300+ were expected by only 5 out of the 13 matches have seen scores excess of 300 runs. England has been involved in three of them.
- West Indies- Pakistan match lasted just 35 overs with the Windies winning the match in the 13th over.
- Bangladesh scored 330 against South Africa, the last series the two had played Bangladesh were white-washed in all three formats of the game.
- The favourites, England fell to Pakistan who they had white-washed in an ODI series a fortnight earlier.
- South Africa despite being supposed dark-horses have almost ended their run before it has begun. They will need to win all their remaining matches if they are to be sure of a semi-final place and even that might not be enough.
Winners: New Zealand
After the first week, the Kiwis are on top of the table with three wins from as many matches. England, India and Australia are all two points behind and occupy the remaining semi-finals spots as it stands.
Losers: South Africa
The Proteas have lost their first three matches including a shock defeat to Bangladesh. The batting unit has struggled to get runs which has left the bowling unit with too much work. Perhaps the biggest blow came when they lost Dale Steyn and Lungi Ngidi due to injuries. Ngidi is expected to recover but Steyn is out of the World Cup. Steyn joins Anrich Nortje who was in the 15 man-squad but failed to play any match due to injury. Left-arm seamer Beuran Hendricks has linked up with the squad as Steyn’s replacement.
Top Bowler: Lockie FergusonÂ
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Ferguson has relished his role as the ‘enforcer’ and has picked up eight scalps so far in the tournament, He has an incredible average of just 12.37 so far and a strike rate of 19.12. The speedster has certainly announced himself to the world.
Top Batsman: Shakib Al Hasan
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The Bangladesh all-rounder is ranked number one in ODIs for good reason. He has scored 260 across three innings with an average of 86.66 and an impressive strike-rate of 95.94. His superb knock of 121 against England had a few home fans sweating. Al Hasan has picked up two fifties alongside his century and is 45 runs ahead of the next best who is Jason Roy (215).
Table
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Top Bowlers
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Top Batsmen
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