Brampton Wolves vs Vancouver Knights, Global Canada T20 League, Match 14: Preview, predictions, likely XIs

Brampton Wolves, hosts of the entire Global Canada T20 2019, will take on defending champions Vancouver Knights in Match 14. Having won all 4 matches, Brampton are guaranteed to enter Round 2 at the top spot, where they will play either Toronto Nationals or Edmonton Royals.

A win, on the other hand, will more or less ensure a second spot for Vancouver, for their net run rate of +0.306 is way superior to Montreal Tigers’ -1.917.

Vancouver had easily beaten Toronto the tournament opener and Edmonton in their most recent outing. On the other hand, they lost to Winnipeg Hawks comfortably. Their other match was washed out after they had smashed 276/3 against Montreal.

Brampton’s wins have been more or less convincing. Toronto came close, but even they lost by 11 runs. They have scored at over 10 thrice in four attempts, and have bowled out Montreal for 101 and Winnipeg for 116. They have steamrolled their way in all four matches, they will play at home, and there is every reason to believe that they will beat Vancouver – unless they rest their main players for the day, that is.

Head to head

This is just the league phase of Brampton’s first season, which means that the sides have never faced before.

Key players

Shahid Afridi (Brampton Wolves): Afridi has batted just twice in four matches, but 74 of his 89 runs have come in boundaries. He has struck at 185, so promoting him up the order may not be a bad idea. What is more, he also has figures of 14-0-98-5 in the tournament.

Chris Gayle (Vancouver Knights): To nobody’s surprise, Gayle is the leading run-scorer of the tournament at this point. His 273 – at a strike rate of 202 – is 71 clear of anyone else’s tally. This is going to be a feast.

Likely XIs

Brampton Wolves: Lendl Simmons (wk), George Munsey, Colin Munro (c), Nitish Kumar, Shahid Afridi, Babar Hayat, Abraash Khan, Nawab Singh, Ish Sodhi, Wahab Riaz, Cecil Pervez.

Vancouver Knights: Tobias Visee (wk), Chris Gayle (c), Chadwick Walton, Shoaib Malik, Andre Russell, Daniel Sams, Michael Rippon, Ali Khan, Saad Bin Zafar, Rayyan Pathan, Hayden Walsh.

Prediction

Brampton to storm to a win.