It's time for another World T20, as it starts today out there in Bangladesh..

Eight teams in two groups fight for 2 places to join the Super 8 to make it a Super 10 tournament...

Qualifying Group A: Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Nepal, Hong Kong
Qualifying Group B: Zimbabwe, Ireland, UAE, Netherlands

Bangladesh kicked it off this morning against Afghanistan and a easy win, well it should be shouldn't it...
Afghanistan: 72 all out (17.1 overs)
Bangladesh: 78 for 1 (12.0 overs)

with Nepal vs Hong Kong this afternoon

See full list of fixtures here

Bangladesh should win Group A and they will join with West Indies, India, Pakistan & Australia in the Super 10 Group 2...

Now Qualifying Group B will be the one to watch as Zimbabwe, Ireland and the Netherlands will all fancy themselves, so should have some great matches there (I hope) - and whoever does win it will join with Sri Lanka, England, South Africa & New Zealand in the Super 10 Group 1...

As for England, well they're without Joe Root as we know and also without Ben Stokes because the knobend punched a locker after getting out in the last T20 against West Indies!!! So Chris Woakes replaces Stokes and Ian Bell was called up for Root.

England's World Twenty20 Squad:
Moeen Ali, Ian Bell, Ravi Bopara, Tim Bresnan, Stuart Broad (Captain), Jos Buttler (wk), Jade Dernbach, Alex Hales, Chris Jordan, Michael Lumb, Eoin Morgan (Vice-Capt), Stephen Parry, Chris Woakes, James Tredwell, Luke Wright.

Bad news for Australia, and good news for everyone else as Mitchell Johnson also misses out with a toe infection, so Dougie Bollinger replaces him...

Squad lineups, although maybe a little out of date here

Who's going to win, well I called for the West Indies last time out and they did me proud, 7/1 if you fancy them this time, with Australia the favourites at 3/1.. Where is England, 14/1, nice odds but not much hope IMO... So an E/W bet on the West Indies again for me.

The mighty cricketing nations of Nepal and Hong Kong went at it in the 2nd match of the day...

Nepal ended up the winners with a 80 run victory, after bowling out the opposition for a mere 69 in 17 overs...

Nepal 149 for 8 (20.0 overs)
Hong Kong 69 all out (17.0 overs)

The first real match is tomorrow when Zimbabwe take on Ireland, well at least they're better known for their cricket than the above lot... 11/10 if you fancy Ireland for the win.

With the UAE vs Netherlands the afternoon match... 11/10 for UAE to beat the Dutch?

It was time to see some real cricket today as Ireland take on Zimbabwe, Ireland won the toss and decided to field..

Zimbabwe: 163 for 5 from their 20 overs

It was looking good for Ireland going into the last over only needing 4 runs, but 2 wickets saw an element of despair set in until Stuart Thompson took a single off the last ball of the over to win by 3 wickets!!! phew...

Ireland: 164 for 7
First blood to Ireland, they should see off the UAE on Wednesday and then comes down to their match against Holland on Friday...

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Time for Holland to get off to a good start also as they take on the UAE who win the toss and decide to bat first, and they almost manage to bat out their 20 overs missing out by just 1 ball...

United Arab Emirates: 151 all out from 19.5 overs


The Dutch made it relatively comfortably with 7 balls to spare..

Netherlands: 152 for 4 from 18.5 overs

They now need to beat Zimbabwe on Wednesday to set up that exciting last game with Ireland...




Back to the other group for tomorrow and Afghanistan take on Hong Kong... 3/1 if you fancy Hong Kong to make a surprise victory, only 1/4 for the Afghans..

Following that will be Bangladesh vs Nepal, 7/1 for the Nepalese to cause an upset, and again a paltry 1/12 for Bangladesh...

I don't think we'll be seeing any upsets tomorrow, and at those prices, keep your money in your pocket...

Since when did the format of the World T20 change? I dont ever recall there being a "qualifying stage" consisting of the lower teams. Usually you would see the big guns in action straight away

The success and marketability of the T20 format seems to have made the ICC rethink about including more of the associate nations in the World Championship Tournaments, rather than weedling them out before hand.
At least this way they can then have their own mini tournament in the qualifiers and probably doesn't hurt the likelihood of gaining additional sponsors when their country is being beamed across the world. It may seem like a little bit of a joke to us but it's all about the Wonga isn't it?

Good for the emerging nations to get some (semi) proper tournament experience too. The likes of Ireland would never improve otherwise, in fact 15-20 years ago they'd have been nowhere near Zimbabwe.

Easy enough to ignore if you're not interested, but if you are, extra cricket! Win-win!

Afghanistan vs Hong Kong got us under way this morning with Hong Kong winning the toss and deciding to bat first.. and making a pretty respectable score, and at least managing to bat out their full 20 overs..

Hong Kong: 153 for 8 from 20 overs...

However it appears their bowling was not such a force as the Afghans only need 18 overs to complete the job and eliminate Hong Kong...

Afghanistan: 154 for 3 from 18 overs.

Afghanistan were already beaten though by Bangladesh so their only hope now is if Hong Kong demolishes the home nation in their last game to give them a chance!!! Well they can dream can't they...

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

But first Bangladesh would have to see of Nepal...

Bangladesh wins the toss and elects to field..

Nepal also manages to bat out their 20 overs...
Nepal: 126 for 5

as you may have guessed, there was no real fuss as Bangladesh make it with 27 balls to spare...
Bangladesh: 132 for 2 from 15.3 overs.




Tomorrow sees Zimbabwe vs Netherlands, 7/4 if you fancy the Dutch, maybe worth a punt...

and Ireland v UAE and Kevin O'Brien insists Ireland will not underestimate the United Arab Emirates, read more here, which is all fine but the bookies still make Ireland the 1/7 favourites...

But wouldnt the association nations usually play a mini qualification tournement before hand to decide who makes it to the real tournament. So this is essentially the same thing except its tied into one tournement. Strange that..££...

To be fair im liking the fact that the lower nations are getting some air time. The matches between the lower nations are surprisingly not low in quality, and they would have gone unnoticed without tv coverage

Ok I thought these were warm up matches? But are they qualification matches? When does the real tournament start?