Nasser Hussain predicts how Champions Trophy would unfold

Former England captain and Sky Sports broadcaster Nasser Hussain, prior to the start of ICC Champions Trophy, made various predictions on how the tournament would unfold when it comes to Group A which features heavyweights such as Australia, New Zealand, England and Bangladesh.

Nasser Hussain also mentioned the names of all the players who would stand out according to different teams in the pool. Hussain feels that the tournament would be evenly contested and out of the two pools, Group A is the more difficult pool to progress through to the semi-finals of the tournament.

The renowned commentator picked England and Australia as favourites to progress to the semi-finals of the tournament from Group A. Having said that, Hussain also mentioned that one can only eliminate teams like New Zealand and Bangladesh only at their own peril, as they stand equal chances to qualify too.

Nasser’s Speculations

“I see England as favourites – the form they’re in, with home conditions, under Eoin Morgan’s captaincy. The other spot is going to be between Australia and New Zealand. If Australia can keep their bowlers fit throughout the tournament, then I’ll just about give it to them.” stated the English commentator. However, Nasser Hussain was remindful of the fact that it was Bangladesh who knocked England out of the tournament in the World Cup of 2015.

“This is the harder group of the two, for sure. It’s a funny tournament: England could slip up – look at what happened the last time they played Bangladesh at a world tournament, they got knocked out of the 2015 World Cup. But this is a different looking England side. I’d be very surprised if they didn’t make it through the group.” added the Chennai-born former cricketer.

Nasser Hussain also dwelled on the fact that it has become a norm to term the Kiwis as the perennial dark horses and it is time for them to convert their tag into something substantial. Looking at Hussain’s statement it is clear that he was way Bangladeshis’ progression in World Cricket post the ICC World Cup of 2015.

“Write off New Zealand at your peril in any world tournament. They get forever labelled as dark horses, although how long can that continue until you aren’t the dark horse anymore? And Bangladesh, I wouldn’t completely rule them out either.” augmented the 49-year-old according to skysports.com. He stressed on the fact that Bangladesh needs to hold their nerves in key situations to come out trumps during the business end of the tournament.

“They have progressed so much in the last two years, but the key for them is, can they handle the real pressure situations? Go back to the World T20 a year ago, they seemed to be celebrating beating India before the game was won and ended up losing. They can get a little too excitable at times.” concluded Nasser Husain. England plays Bangladesh in the opening fixture of the multi-lateral tournament at Kennington Oval, London on June 1.