Bangladesh will be a handful for their rivals

By the time you read this, the first phase of the tournament will be over, and it has proved to be both interesting and entertaining. It has been great to see eight good teams battling out for two places in the main competition and both Bangladesh and Afghanistan have stood out clearly as the most deserving.

Bangladesh, of course, have already sounded a warning to all the world’s top cricket nations that they are no longer ‘minnows’ after finishing runners-up in the recently concluded Asia Cup. They could be a real handful for their opponents during the coming two weeks.

India’s opening game with New Zealand promises to be an absolute cracker. India have the strongest batting line-up in the tournament and a very fine spin attack. They have just bagged the Asia Cup and in their home conditions they are obviously being dubbed the favourites by some pundits.

New Zealand, meanwhile, as they proved in the 2015 World Cup, have developed into a very skilled, innovative and aggressive limited-overs team. They have a great balance with good all-round skills. They may not match India in the spin department, but they will bowl with tremendous discipline.

You would expect the big contest to be about how their batsmen cope with India’s spinners. The pitch in Nagpur often offers a little bit of turn and you would expect that to be the case on Tuesday. There are also plenty of runs to be scored in Nagpur and that should ensure it is a high-scoring game.

From Sri Lanka’s perspective, the guys are working hard and looking forward to their first game later in the week. We lost the practice game to New Zealand but the result of your warm-up game is not the priority and the objective is to have as many players as possible getting a chance out there in the middle.

We were pretty pleased with Lahiru Thirimanne and Chamara Kapugedera getting some good time in at the crease and the bowlers had a good run-out. We just need to keep working hard and draw confidence from a great record in ICC events over the past decade.

It will not be easy, though, because this ICC World Twenty20 has lots of very strong T20 teams. The two main groups are very strong and I don’t think you can really pick a favourite. Matches are going to be very close and no team can afford to take anything for granted.

— Gameplan