‘The road to the World Cup starts here!’
The 2023 ODI World Cup may be ten months away, but the competition for places in England’s squad for the defence of their 2019 crown is fierce. Experienced players such as Jason Roy are under pressure, and captain Jos Buttler, fresh off T20 triumph down under, is yet to craft a statement victory with the One Day team. South Africa, meanwhile, face the humiliating prospect of failing to qualify outright for the 2023 tournament after a dismal showing four years ago - they need to win both this series and defeat the Netherlands to qualify automatically.
The qualifier will be a tough competition, with only one of West Indies, South Africa, Sri Lanka and Ireland able to secure automatic qualification. The rest must compete in a 10-team competiton for one of the final two spots.
So the series, awkwardly placed as it is in the middle of the new SA20 tournament and before England’s Test tour of New Zealand, is of significant importance to both teams. England have a strong and experienced core of World Cup winners, but the rest of the side is in flux - it needs to settle and bed in with a strong home summer before the trip to the subcontinent.
Harry Brook, David Willey, Dawid Malan, Phil Salt, Jason Roy, Olly Stone, Reece Topley and Sam Curran are playing for their plane tickets to India. Others, such as Alex Hales, Will Jacks and Liam Livingstone, will be watching on with interest. Jofra Archer will make his first appearences after a long injury layoff.
As the above chart shows, England have a core of vastly experienced players, but the remainder of their squad lacks caps. South Africa have fewer players with 100 ODI appearences, but vastly more in the 20-50 range. England will want to see big performances from their less experienced players, but will be able to place less of a premium on victory than their opponents.
How will they play?
England became double World Champions by playing a simple game: score as quickly as possible, laying a platform in the powerplay and exploding at the death, then bowling to take wickets and put the opposition under pressure. That’s borne out by the graphs below:
All England’s batsmen score quickly, while Miller, de Kock and Klaasen are the standouts for South Africa. The graph above is limited to batsmen with more than 100 ODI runs, but England have five players with career strike rates over 100 - and Roy, Buttler and Salt all average 39 or more. Now, most of Salt’s runs came in a run-soaked series against the Netherlands, but South Africa have only one player who scores at more than a run a ball - David Miller (average 41). De Kock scores at a strike rate of 96, but their middle order players score slower than England’s. On the other hand, South Africa hold the four highest individual averages of the two squads. Aggression, then, meets accumulation.
The bowlers, meanwhile, seem pretty evenly-matched. England’s take their wickets slightly quicker, and concede their runs slightly slower, but these should be two high-class attacks. For England, it feels like Curran is in a straight shoot-out with Willey for the role of England’s first-choice left-armer (and having that change of angle will be key during the World Cup). South Africa have a fabulous pace attack, but will want to see more from spinner Keshav Maharaj, in their quest to replace Imran Tahir’s vital wickets.
So the series, while in strange contest, is set to be fascinating: South Africa, needing to win for World Cup qualification, versus England, with individuals under pressure and in desperate need of good performances.
Will England’s aggressive batsmen come off again? Can Jason Roy put his continued struggles behind him? Will Harry Brook make the middle order his own, as in Tests and T20 (and score some runs outside Pakistan, while he’s at it)? Is Jofra Archer going to replicate the pace like fire we saw in 2019?
For South Africa, how will Maharaj go? Will Klaasen carry his SA20 form into the ODIs? Can Rassie van der Dussen maintain the exceptional start to his career?
Whatever happens, the state of play for both sides in their World Cup buildup will look significantly different in ten days’ time…