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This World Cup got off to a rough start for Chris
Woakes. He had statistics of 0 for 34 after four against Bangladesh in
Dharamsala, giving up six early boundaries as Reece Topley got going at the
other end after losing 45 runs in six wicketless overs against New Zealand in
Ahmedabad.
With Mehidy Hasan Miraz caught behind while driving a
ball that did just enough off the seam to take the outside edge, it is
understandable why Woakes seemed relieved when he eventually registered for the
competition. In his second outing, he came back to bowl Litton Das out by being
caught behind. He finished with figures of 2 for 49 off eight overs as England
won by a score of 137 runs.
Woakes, meanwhile, is accustomed to a slow start. In
England’s first five World Cup games of 2019, he got four wickets at 54.75,
giving up 6.25 runs per over; in their final six games, he took 12 wickets at
18.91, giving up 4.54 runs per over. He produced combined numbers of 6 for 57
in the semifinal and the championship.
It is not a conscious strategy. “You want to hit
the ground running,” he said on Thursday, a rest day for England after
they flew to Delhi ahead of Sunday’s fixture against Afghanistan. “But
they are long competitions, and you don’t want to peak too soon… I have built
into tournaments in the past and into series, which I suppose holds me in good
stead.”
Woakes assessed his own form as follows:
“Ideally, I’d like to have gone a bit better… I wouldn’t have said that
I’ve probably bowled as well as I know I can.” By his own admission, he
got things wrong against New Zealand, when he erred too full and was picked off
by Devon Conway and Rachin Ravindra, particularly in the initial powerplay
“The conditions did change, and we probably
didn’t quite adapt as well as we’d have liked,” he said. “I probably
haven’t executed as well as I can, but I picked up two really important wickets
in the last game. In a game like that, wickets are really important, so I was
pleased to have picked up those two and it gives me confidence moving forwards.”