International Cricket: England vs. Pakistan 7/10/21 ODI Cricket Prediction

Pakistan’s tour of the England resumes tomorrow with the second ODI match being at the Lord’s Cricket Ground. The match will start on Saturday July 10th, 2021 at 6:00am EST.

England lead the 3-match series 1-0 with the series win in their sights in their return to Lord’s. Pakistan will be looking to level the series after a disappointing showing in the first encounter at Cardiff. The pitch at Lord’s is usually a batting one, either team if they win the toss will most likely bat first.

Pakistan was lackadaisical in their performance yesterday in the first ODI, it showed not only in their batting but also with the ball. Fakhar Zaman, the opening batsman and vice-captain Shadab Khan scored 47 and 30 runs respectively, being the only batsmen in to score past 20 for the Pakistanis. They will need their captain Babar Azam and Iman-ul-Haq to get off the mark and provide the impetus that is required to make a more respectable total. 141 was never going to be enough to defend and the Pakistani bowlers found a difficult acquire wickets. Shaheen Shah Afridi was the only bowler to pick a wicket up in the opponents’ innings. You cannot be too harsh on the bowlers but we all will expect better lines and lengths to ask the batsmen more questions in order to make some noise.

Pakistan have to grasp every opportunity in tomorrow’s game if not it will be over just as quickly as yesterday was. England dominated proceedings from literally the start of the match to the end, a truly powerful performance after everything that has been going on off the field. Saqib Mahmood was exceptional with the ball taking 4 wickets in his ten overs and was ably assisted by Craig Overton and Matt Parkinson with 2 wickets each to restrict the opposition to a way below par score. In reply to 141, England lost the early wicket of Phil Salt in the fifth over but Dawid Malan with an unbeaten 68 along with Zak Crawley’s 58 not out saw them to victory by 9 wickets within twenty-two overs. This side has not yet been tested, time will tell if they will be and if they are, will they be able to weather the storm?

A series win in sight for England and a chance to level the series for Pakistan, who will take the spoils in tomorrow’s keenly contested match? Pakistan has the ability in their camp to turn things around tomorrow and captain Babar Azam will know he needs to lead from the front. However, Ben Stokes’ men will take tomorrow’s game quite comfortably and win the series in the process 2-0. As shown in the first game, England’s inexperience together was not too big of an issue and they worked extremely well as a unit. I am expecting Pakistan to put up more resistance but they will fall short yet again.