The England cricket team is playing their warm-up match for the World T20 2016 against the Mumbai Ranji team in a unique way. Four England players are playing for Mumbai against England in that match at Brabourne Stadium in Mumbai.
To give all of their 15 players a chance to get some match practice the Three Lions requested the Mumbai team to allow four of their players to play from the Mumbai side against a full strength England team.
The four players are leg-spinner Adil Rashid, wicketkeeper-batsman Jos Buttler, fast bowler David Willey and middle order batsman James Vince. England batted first in the 20 over match after mutual consent.
England have been in a great form since the last couple of years as they have seemed to have their limited overs combination right. In the ODI series against South Africa at home, they have scored 400 runs and successfully chased down a 350 plus target.
Captain Eoin Morgan is very confident of his team to do well, in the tournament as they are coming from a very good ODI and T20I series against South Africa. Morgan, who plays for Kolkata Knight Riders in the Indian Premier League (IPL) along with Alex Hales, who plays for the Mumbai Indians are exceptions in the England team as most of them skip IPL for their domestic season and preparation of Test cricket.
The Mumbai team recently lost the Irani Trophy to the Rest of India after ROI chased down a record 482.
David Willey picks up a hat-trick against England
In the match, England have scored 177 runs for the loss of eight wickets in their scheduled 20 overs. David Willey claimed 3 wickets against his own teammates and Adil Rashid also sent two of his teammates to the pavilion.
For England Joe Root was their highest scorer with 48. Even David Willey’s teammates cannot handle him as he took a hat-trick in the last three balls of the England innings. His performance makes a good case for him ahead of the World T20.
In reply, Mumbai Cricket Association went off to a flying start but couldn’t finish it off in the last stages of the match as England won the match by 14 runs. Reece Topley and Chris Jordan both picked up two wickets each to restrict the opposition on 163/6 in 20 overs.
Brief Scores - England 177/8 (Root 48, Hales 37; Willey 3/35, Rashid 2/33) beat MCA XI 163/6 (Bista 51, Vince 45; Topley 2/26, Jordan 2/34) by 14 runs.
England are grouped with South Africa, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan and West Indies in Group 1. England claimed the World T20 title back in 2010 when it was held in West Indies. It remains to be seen if this new look English team will be able to repeat that performance in the slow and turning wickets against some quality spin.
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