Darren Gough cricket blog: 'He's going to be one to watch'

Ahead of the ICC Champions Trophy kicking off on Wednesday (February 19), Ladbrokes shares its first blog from its new ambassador, Darren Gough.

It's been eight years since the last Champions Trophy, which Pakistan won, so they're going to be the host nation and defending champions - it's going to be played in Karachi, Lahore and Rawalpindi. That's where most of the games will be played except, obviously, when they play India, that'll be in Dubai. If India make it to the semi-finals and the final, those games will be in Dubai as well.  

Pakistan versus New Zealand kicks things off in Karachi on Wednesday, and we're all set for a great tournament. I used to love playing in the Champions Trophy - it's a shame we've had so many pull out with injury; Australia will be without Mitch Marsh, Josh Hazelwood, Mitchell Starc and Pat Cummins, Marcus Stoinis has retired just two weeks before the tournament, which was a strange one for me. Steve Smith will captain Australia, while Spencer Johnson also comes in, and he's going to be one to watch, I think. 

India will be without Jasprit Bumrah. Harshit Rana - who has got serious pace, by the way, has been playing in this current series against England, and he'll come in for Bumrah. And India have decided - from the provisional squad - to let Yashasvi Jaiswal, their opening batter, go. That's probably because Rohit Sharma has come into a bit of form in this current series. They've also brought in a bit of mystery spin in Varun Chakravarthy.

New Zealand will be without Trent Boult and Tim Southee, so it'll be interesting to see how they go without those two mainstays of the last 10 years. They're going to be skippered by Mitchell Santner, and they have got Kane Williamson in their batting still, who plays a big, big part for New Zealand. 

For South Africa, no Anrich Nortje or Coetzee, but they look steady. I do think they'll cause problems - I just don't think they'll have enough to win it. 

If I had to pick a winning team, I think I would go for the favourites, India, purely because they've got just about everything. You know, they've got experience in Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli, KL Rahul, Hardik Pandya, Mohammed Shami, and Ravindra Jadeja... that's serious experience in your starting eleven. Then they've got the stardust players, the likes of Rishabh Pant - who couldn't get in the starting eleven against England, but what a player he is. Shreyas Iyer, Axar Patel, Harshit Rana, who has come into the squad, and Shubman Gill. These are all wonderful players to watch, and they they've got the spin of Kuldeep Yadav, Washington Sundar and Varun Chakravarthy. They've got a bit of everything in there; Arshdeep Singh is obviously the left-arm seamer as well, who'll give them a bit of difference if they wanted to go with that.

I just find it hard to look past them, to be honest. If I was to go for a surprise team, with the conditions, I would go with Afghanistan. I think they surprised everyone at the World Cup a couple of years ago, and being in the easier group of England, South Africa and Australia, they might just surprise everyone once again, and do the business.

This is a hard one to predict, actually, but I'm going to go for an England win. I know they've not been in great form recently, and it doesn't look a balanced squad on paper. But Australia are without their first-choice seam attack of Hazelwood, Starc and Cummins, and that's going to be a huge loss for them to have to deal with. And then you've got their all-rounder, Marcus Stoinis, who retired just two weeks before the tournament started.

They've still got strong batting; people like Glenn Maxwell and Marnus Labuschagne in the middle order, and a lot of youngsters in there.

I look at England and I'm a little bit worried, really. They've lost Jacob Bethell, now, he's going to be out, and they've brought in Tom Banton who has been playing most of his stuff in franchise cricket this winter. Looking on paper, for England, it just lacks a little bit of balance, it really does.

But in terms of this opening match, look at the players still in this England squad, who have proven they can do it at this level. Jos Buttler, Phil Salt, Joe Root, Harry Brook, Liam Livingstone, Jofra Archer, Mark Wood, Gus Atkinson, Adil Rashid - probably one of the best three bowlers in the world - you know, they've got the talent, but can they do it consistently?

That's the biggest question when it comes to England. They've got some serious talent in that squad - but can they do it consistently? Coming up against India before this tournament probably wasn't the most ideal team to play against, because they're the ultimate team. But against Australia, I think England might just win that game.

Looking ahead to England's chances in the Champions Trophy, 50 overs isn't a tournament our boys play much of - in fact world cricket doesn't really play much 50 over cricket, so it's going to be an interesting tournament full-stop, really. 

The tour of India hasn't gone too well just recently, and off the back of a poor World Cup in 2023, we've now gone into this series against India and been totally, totally outplayed, in the T20s, and in the 50 over competition. England have got to find something; they've got the players, there's experience in there, and there's pace. We've got Adil Rashid, who is right up there as one of the top three bowlers in the world for me. But someone needs to come in and back him up. 

Jacob Bethell is a batter who can bowl left-arm spin, but they've replaced him with Tom Banton, which will probably surprise a lot of people. There's people like Liam Dawson who could have come in and done a job, but let's see what happens. Look, England can surprise teams, they've got good, quality players. But they're going to come up against some good teams in this Champions Trophy. Preparation hasn't been ideal; coming up against the best team in the world and getting thrashed. So confidence will be low, but we've still got some high quality players within that team.

As far as Group A is concerned, it should be straightforward for India, and then I think it's going to be a shootout between the other three. Realistically, Pakistan have the advantage because it's on home soil for the most part of the tournament. Will there be an upset, though? New Zealand always perform; they're a real team who work together. But with no Tim Southee, and no Trent Boult, they're going to have to rely on Kane Williamson to get them some serious, serious runs. 

It's a shootout, for me, between Pakistan and New Zealand, to join India in getting out of Group A. 

In Group B, Afghanistan, England, Australia and South Africa. Obviously, I want to go with England, but they're in disarray at the moment, they haven't really got a game plan. We've got quality in our line-up, but the game plan seems to be out of the window. Afghanistan are the team I've tipped to be the surprise package in this tournament, and they're in the better of the two groups for their own chances of progressing to the semi-finals. So I'm going to go with Afghanistan to go through, alongside England - purely because they're my team. So, unfortunately, South Africa and Australia... bye-bye!

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