World Champion Australia will take on their traditional neighbour rival New Zealand in their group match of the ICC 2011 world Cup. The match will be played at Nagpur which has history to assist spinners in the later stage of the game. This match is very important for both the teams as a win for either of the team will put them in a comfortable position to qualify for the quarter final. In the first match Australia though won comfortably but their batting line up was exposed to the mere weak Zimbabwe bowlers. On the other hand New Zealand showed a strong bowling attack against Kenya.
Much will depend upon the Aussie skipper Ponting who drew a lot of criticism for his ill behavior in the dressing room by the way of breaking the TV in their last game against Zimbabwe. Michael Clarke along with Shane Watson will try to carry on with their good batting form from their last games. While the Aussie pacers will try to run through the New Zealand formidable batting line ups. Fast bowlers Brett Lee, Mitchell Johnson, Shaun Tait and spinner Jason Krejza is expected to show good performances.
New Zealand will try to regain some of their lost reputation with a win over the champions as their performances in last few series was far below their ability specially when then lost 4-0 to Bangladesh then to Pakistan too at their home ground.
For New Zealand, their key players will be Brendon McCullum, Ross Taylor, Jesse Ryder, Kyle Mills, and Martin Guptill along with their Captain Daniel Vettori. Now days Vettori himself is a good left handed batsman down in the batting order. As usual the match is expected to be a close contest. And Australia is definitely has an edge over New Zealand.
