With England’s first match of the World Twenty20 being wiped out by rain, Mark Robinson says his side are keen to get under way against Bangladesh in St Lucia on Monday, weather permitting.
For the first time since their arrival last week, England were able to train outside on the eve of the game, with ground staff working hard to ensure the pitch will be playable after 66% of the average rainfall for the month of November fell in 24 hours on Saturday.
England’s opening match against Sri Lanka on Saturday was abandoned without a ball being bowled.
“Since we’ve been here it’s just rained and we’ve been stuck in the hotel,” the England coach said. “We can’t just keep putting the girls in a gym, it becomes too relentless. Getting to train is a big bonus.
“It looks like a decent wicket but we’ve lost all our chances to know what’s going to happen– we’ll be going in a bit blind. It’s that ability to try to adapt as quickly as you can. We’re going to have to work out very quickly what’s a good score.”
England are strong favourites, having beaten Bangladesh in both their previous international games. While the Asia Cup-winning side looked to be on the verge of causing an upset against the defending champions, West Indies, on Friday, restricting them to 106 for eight, they collapsed to 46 all out, the lowest score in the tournament’s history.
Robinson said it was important not to take the world’s ninth-ranked side for granted. “Bangladesh can be dangerous if they get on a roll,” he said. “What you’ve got to try to do is not give them an ‘in’. If you can take their confidence away quite quickly, they will fold. It’s a case of trying to start the game as well as you can.”
The forecast is for more rain over the next few days, and the International Cricket Council was on Sunday considering the drastic step of relocating the Group A games away from St Lucia to Antigua, where the semi-finals and final are being played, owing to fears of a washout of half of the group stages.
However, the ICC was expected on Sunday night to confirm that this option – which would have been a logistical nightmare involving chartered flights to transport the five teams – is no longer under consideration.
