England braced for an ‘intense’ Australia clash
CHRIS Jordan has warned England will face a tough test of their resolve against Australia today after starting their Twenty20 World Cup campaign with comfortable wins over the West Indies and Bangladesh.
England’s bowlers have been instrumental to their fortunes in the United Arab Emirates so far as the Windies were blown away for a meagre 55 last weekend before Bangladesh were restricted to 9-124 on Wednesday.
Those totals were easily overhauled with six and eight wickets to spare respectively, but Jordan accepts they face a step-up in competition when they take on Australia in the first of potentially seven meetings this winter.
Speaking ahead of Australia beating Sri
Lanka by seven wickets on Thursday, to join England on four points from two games in group one of the Super 12 stage, Jordan said: “Any England v Australia game is always right up there when it comes to stakes and intensity, and I don’t expect this game to be much different.
“It will be a tough game. They have so many good players in their team, a well-stacked batting line-up and we’ll have to be right on top of our game once again to try to get a result.”
Both teams have several players who will feature in this summer’s Vodafone Ashes series but Jordan rejected a suggestion their Dubai dust-up is a chance for England to land an early psychological blow.
“I wouldn’t say that’s the focus because on any given day, regardless of the opposition, we try to set our own standards,” Jordan said.
“We treat every single person, every single player, every single team, with that respect. We’ll try to do our diligence, try to do our homework, and try to see in what way we can put pressure on them and try to get that victory. That’s the way I see it.
“I definitely want to be taking on responsibility, definitely want to continue to be in those pressure situations, those pressure moments, and to really stand up when it’s time to be counted for the team.”