England currently languish in the bottom two of the points table of the 2023 World Cup, but they can still make it to the semi-finals.

Four matches, one win, three defeats, two points is not how England, the defending champions, had expected their 2023 World Cup to begin. Yet, here they are, at ninth place, barely making it above bottom-ranked Afghanistan, on a net run rate difference of 0.002.

England’s chances of qualifying for the semi-finals seem bleak… yet, perhaps not outlandish.

It is not as bad as it looks

To begin with, the bottom five sides – Bangladesh are sixth, the Netherlands seventh, Sri Lanka eighth – are all on two points. Bangladesh and Afghanistan, the extremes of this group, are separated by a net run rate of only 0.466.

Thus, England may be ninth, but really, with more than half of the league stage left, they are as good as sixth.

What about the top half of the points table? Australia (net run rate -0.193), now fourth, and Pakistan (-0.456), fifth, are on four points apiece. In other words, all that separates the fourth and tenth sides is one win.

England’s net run rate is -1.248 – poor, yet not as much as one thinks. To give an idea of where they stand, if they played Pakistan next (they do not), they could leapfrog Pakistan – in both points and net run rate – with one big win and jump to fifth place.

The England route to the 2023 World Cup semi-final

Every team plays nine matches. In an strictly ‘hierarchical’ tournament, the best team wins all nine, the next best wins eight, and so on: the worst team wins nothing. Here, teams with nine, eight, seven, and six wins qualify for the top four.

Of course, these scenarios are seldom replicated in actual competitions. At the start of a ten-team round robin, t is mathematically possible for a team to win seven games and not make the top four, or to win three games and make the top four. So what will England realistically need?

The bad news is, even six wins might not be enough, especially given the state of England’s net run rate. It’s eminently plausible that more than four teams end up on at least six wins, even if England win their next five. Take the following: Australia beat Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Netherlands and New Zealand. New Zealand beat Sri Lanka and South Africa. India beat Netherlands and Sri Lanka. South Africa beat India, Bangladesh and Afghanistan. Pakistan beat New Zealand, South Africa, Bangladesh and Afghanistan. England win all of their next five. In that scenario, six teams would have at least six wins. Given this involves only the top six taking wins off each other, and that only five teams need to finish on six for England’s net run rate to be a factor, it’s not encouraging.

On the other hand, it is possible that even should England lose one more, that they will be tied with one of the top four on five wins. And it is even just about possible for five wins to be enough without net run rate being a factor, but that would rely on upsets. New Zealand will reach five wins by beating Sri Lanka. South Africa will do so by beating Bangladesh and Afghanistan. Australia will do so by beating Netherlands, Afghanistan and Bangladesh. India will do so by beating one of Sri Lanka or Netherlands. This is before even considering games between the assumed top four.

So England probably can’t afford to lose another, and even winning five matches in a row might not be enough. In other words, they will have to do what one of India and New Zealand are about to complete at Dharamsala today, and then hope things go their way.

For inspiration, England need not look beyond their own performance in the 2019 edition. They did not win five in a row back then, but they had lost three of their nine league matches and still qualified for the top four, and went on to win the World Cup. There, too, England had lost consecutive matches, against Australia and Sri Lanka, just like they lost to Afghanistan and South Africa here. And they beat good teams on their run to the title, with consecutive victories over India, New Zealand and Australia, the three other semi-finalists. England are also 1/3 favourites to win their next World Cup game against Sri Lanka with Betway.

All hope is not quite lost, then.

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