Having lifted the 50-over World Cup trophy for the first time in July this year, England wicket-keeper batsman Jonny Bairstow is hoping that his team’s success in the format over the last four years can translate into a superlative performance at next year’s T20 World Cup in Australia.
England have lifted the 20-over trophy on one previous occasion, in the 2010 World T20, under the leadership of Paul Collingwood, and made the final of the 2016 edition of the tournament in India, finishing as runners-up.
Good morning, England! 🏴
An impressive 78* from @jbairstow21 took us to victory in our first T20 warm-up in New Zealand.
Scorecard: https://t.co/Nz4XHkXlqj pic.twitter.com/WcsSvrPB0K
— England Cricket (@englandcricket) October 27, 2019
Now, Bairstow is hoping that the World Cup high at home can rub off on the team’s preparations for next year’s showpiece event and take them all the way, making them world champions in both the shorter formats.
“I think it does feel like the start of that journey towards the T20 World Cup,” Bairstow said. “It’s going to come around thick and fast. Seeing guys who’ve played county cricket taking the step up to international cricket is going to be fascinating. That, coupled with the guys that are not on this tour but will come back into the team, there’s going to be competition for places.
[breakout id=”0”][/breakout]
“The cycle for the 50-over World Cup started four years ago. Hopefully we’re fortunate enough that the way we’ve played our 50-over cricket will lead us well into our T20 cricket.
“It’s a fascinating period to be playing cricket for England. There’s some very, very talented guys that have played a lot of cricket now for England that are all together and have the experience of going through the ups, the downs and everything in between.”
[breakout id=”1″][/breakout]
The build-up to that event starts with a five-match away series against New Zealand, the side they trumped, on boundary count, to lift their maiden World Cup title, after an exhilarating final at Lord’s in July. Bairstow said that the home team would still be feeling the scars of that heartbreaking finish and expected them to come out hard.
“They’re dangerous no matter what,” he said. “We’ll be expecting a very tough challenge and that’s every time you play against New Zealand because they’ve got quality all the way through. They are a great bunch of fellas but naturally what happened at Lord’s is going to be quite tough for those guys and there will be a fire in their belly and a hunger to put things right.”
