New Delhi: After going down hard against the South African team, the defending champions, England, will be looking to make a comeback against a more disoriented Sri Lanka at M. Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bengaluru, on Thursday.
England and Sri Lanka both are reeling in the bottom half of the points table with just one win in four matches.
The match on Thursday is going to be a sort of do-or-die game, as a loss for either of the teams at this stage might result in them getting out of the top-four race.
After a staggering loss, Team England is ready to pick up the pace!🔥
With Sri Lanka bound to fight, will they be able to repeat the result from #CWC2019? 👀
Tune-in to #ENGvSL in the #WorldCupOnStar
Today, 12:30 PM onwards | Star Sports Network#CWC23 #Cricket pic.twitter.com/AnOY3bhLnK— Star Sports (@StarSportsIndia) October 26, 2023
Journey so far
The defending champions, England, started their campaign on a rather depressing note as they lost their opening game to New Zealand by 9 wickets. They made a comeback by winning against Bangladesh, but once again, they found themselves in trouble as they lost back-to-back matches against Afghanistan and South Africa by 69 and 229 runs, making their life even harder in the ICC World Cup 2023.
England, with one win and three losses, sits at the number eight spot in the points table.
🇮🇳 Touchdown in India… and straight to training.
Welcome to the group, Carsey 💪#EnglandCricket | #CWC23 pic.twitter.com/ERfWuWrBAW
— England Cricket (@englandcricket) October 25, 2023
Interestingly, England has already lost the exact number of matches, that they lost in the entirety of their 2019 World Cup-winning campaign.
Sri Lanka, on the other hand, had the worst start than any other team in the World Cup as they needed to wait for their fourth match to get their first points of the tournament.
Sri Lanka, in their first three matches, lost to South Africa, Pakistan and Australia by 102 runs, 6 and 5 wickets, respectively. They finally made their way to the winning ways after defeating Netherlands by 5 wickets.
🚨 Mathews approved as replacement for Pathirana in Sri Lanka squad 🚨
The Event Technical Committee of the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023 has approved Angelo Mathews as a replacement for Matheesha Pathirana in the Sri Lanka squad.
Mathews, who has played 221 ODIs, was named… pic.twitter.com/AIx1GIpzuR
— Sri Lanka Cricket 🇱🇰 (@OfficialSLC) October 24, 2023
Sri Lanka is going to have a little advantage against their English opponents as they are coming into the match after winning their last match, and the way things are going in this World Cup, they can very well get the better of England, marking a huge dent in the defending champions World Cup 2023 campaign.
Face-to-face records
If we are to talk about the head-to-head records of the two teams, they are not very far away from each other.
England and Sri Lanka have locked horns against each other 78 times in One Day International cricket, in which the English team have emerged victorious 38 times, meanwhile, the Lankan Lions have managed to deal the final blow in 36 matches, 3 matches between the team has ended in no contest while 1 ended in a tie.
In the ICC World Cups, they have faced each other 11 times, and once again England has a slight edge as they won 6 matches, while Sri Lanka managed to win 5 of them.
