India v England Fifth T20I: Expert Predictions & Analysis

India v England predictions:
- England to make highest six over score - 2.10 @ Rajabets Sports
- Varun Chakravarthy 2+ wickets - 1.83 @ Rajabets Sports
- Suryakumar Yadav under 22.5 runs - 1.83 @ Rajabets Sports
When: Sunday 2 February, 7:00pm IST
Where: Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai
Watch: Star Sports, Hotstar
Best Odds: India 1.53, England 2.50
India will remain unbeaten in the bilateral T20I series on home soil for more than six years (W15, D2) after Shivam Dube and their spinners wrapped things up for the team in Pune on Friday night.
It certainly wasn’t without its controversies, namely the concussion substitute of Harshit Rana for Shivam Dube, but England can also point to the way they approached Varun Chakravarthy’s last over as a turning point in the game.
The tourists have nonetheless presented some significant challenges across the last three games of the series, which is why cricket betting sites have not moved the odds further in India’s favour for the fifth and final game.
Players from both teams are more than familiar with the conditions presented by the iconic Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai, and that’s perhaps another reason why England’s odds of winning have not been pushed out here.
Four of England’s top five batters from Friday’s match have played IPL cricket at Wankhede, as has fast bowler Jofra Archer, and their varying degrees of success have again influenced what will hopefully be three winning cricket bets to end the series with.
The Numbers That Matter
- The IPL 2024 run rate at Wankhede was 9.55 (191 runs per 20 overs)
- India now have a 9-6 T20I record at home to England
- Six of the eight opening partnerships in the series were under 20 runs
- England hit the most sixes in three of the four games
Baz’s boys to have the bigger start
Not for the first time in this series, England found themselves on par with India during the powerplay only to be thwarted by the slower bowling once the fielding restrictions were relaxed.
The opening partnership between Ben Duckett and Phil Salt got them into the 60s in the sixth over before scoring just 44 off the next seven overs, six of which were bowled by spin.
It was the second consecutive match in which England had the higher powerplay score, and in the second T20I, they found themselves just one run behind India, demonstrating some noticeable improvement, at least at the top of the innings.
With that in mind, it could very well be the case that England chooses to attack the powerplay even harder on this occasion, especially with nothing at stake, so it could be worth taking the price offered by the best Indian betting apps here.
Best of all for punters, it doesn’t matter for us if they lose three wickets in the powerplay going for broke - as long as they finish up with more runs!
Prediction: England to make highest six over score - 2.10 @ Rajabets Sports
A fifth straight success for Varun?
Varun Chakravarthy has matched the career-best 12 series wickets he took on the tour of South Africa last year and now has the chance to enter new territory and go one, or hopefully two, better here.
It seemed inevitable that, at some stage, the English batters would have learned to play him a little more cautiously throughout the series to smother his impact, but caution is not a word in Brendon McCullum’s dictionary.
As a result, he has claimed 2+ wickets in each of his last eight T20Is - all against South Africa and England - and there shouldn’t be much at the Wankhede to stop him from making it a ninth.
Against England’s top seven on Friday night, he has eight wickets in the series, averaging just ten deliveries and 12 runs per scalp, which sets him up for further success in Mumbai, where he took 2-22 for KKR against MI last season.
Prediction: Varun Chakravarthy 2+ wickets - 1.83 @ Rajabets Sports
Suryakumar’s struggles show no signs of abating
India's captain has been the worst out-and-out batter of the series in terms of runs, which seems to be a recurring theme across all formats for the national team recently!
He has just 26 runs to his name for the entire season, making it very tempting to back him to fall short of the 22.5 run mark set by Indian cricket betting apps for what would be a fifth consecutive time.
Finishing off the series at his IPL home ground is no guarantee of success after a very hit-and-miss season that saw him record a century, two fifties, and three IPL ducks from his six IPL innings at Wankhede.
Perhaps most concerningly for SKY, he has no single arch-nemesis in this series, meaning that there has been no relief and no opportunities for him to build an innings.
After being dismissed by Saqib Mahmood on Friday night, he has fallen to four different English fast bowlers in the series. He now averages less than 18 (125/7) against the eight bowlers used by England throughout the entire series.
Prediction: Suryakumar Yadav under 22.5 runs - 1.83 @ Rajabets Sports
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