Match News and Current Form
West Indies organisers may well have chosen the two best venues for this series from an entertainment perspective as Warner Park in Basseterre, St Kitts lived up to its reputation as a glutton’s delight. Our prediction for over 351.5 match runs needed only 31 overs to be vindicated thanks to a frankly ridiculous onslaught from Australia’s Tim David, who batted in the top five of the order for just the eighth time in his T20I career for Australia.
Rather than put the blame on a bowling unit that conceded more than 13 runs per over in the chase, Windies captain Shai Hope instead blamed his batters for the defeat, telling the post-game broadcast that they didn’t have enough runs to defend. Ironically, he would have to shoulder some of the blame if that was the case, for his century (102no) came at a strike rate in the 170s, whereas four Australian batters all posted strike rates of 225 or greater!
Australia captain Mitch Marsh says the series has been about “giving guys opportunities in different roles” such as opening with Glenn Maxwell and elevating Tim David to five, and he must be thoroughly pleased with how things have unfolded so far. The final margin - six wickets and 23 balls to spare - hides the fact that they were well behind the mark in the first half of the chase, falling to 92/4 after nine overs compared with the Windies’ 94/0.
Marsh has enjoyed the luxury of winning the toss and choosing to chase on all three occasions, so these final two matches present an ideal opportunity to test his batters in a different situation. There is also some room for flexibility as far as their playing XI for the remainder of the series is concerned with four men waiting in the wings, though it’s not likely that spinner Matthew Kuhnemann will be fancied on this tiny ground!
Head-to-Head History
The two teams came into this series with 11 wins apiece so Australia now leads 14-11, with victories in eight of the nine H2Hs to take place since the start of the 2021 T20 World Cup.
Hot Stats and Streaks
• Nine of the 11 completed T20Is at Warner Park were won chasing
• The 2017, 2020 and 2022 double/triple-headers at Warner Park all saw more runs in the second game than the first
• West Indies had the highest opening partnership of all three games, averaging 73 runs to Australia’s 18
• Australia struck the most or equal-most sixes in all three matches, averaging 15 sixes per innings compared with the West Indies’ 11
Key Players to Watch and Missing Players
Brandon King produced the highest individual score (75) of the Test series and has carried that form forward with two half-centuries in the T20Is. He now has 150 runs from three T20I innings at Warner Park. Nathan Ellis has earned praise for his death overs bowling, and whilst he’s yet to concede 40+ runs in a Caribbean T20I (six games), he’s also yet to take more than two wickets in one.
Alzarri Joseph is likely to return at some point in this series after being rested. Evin Lewis, Matthew Forde and Jewel Andrew are yet to take part in the series and could therefore feature. As well as Kuhnemann, Australia has Aaron Hardie, Xavier Bartlett and Jake Fraser-McGurk in reserve.
Betting Analysis
Runs aplenty have been forecasted for the rest of the series, so let’s look at a couple of players who were able to get consistent starts. Mitch Owen (x2), Mitch Marsh (x3), Brandon King (x2), Shai Hope (x2) and Cameron Green (x2) all cleared 20+ runs multiple times this series and any of them could be backed to score 20+ runs again here.