2024 T20 World Cup – Aus vs Sco – Mark Watt expected to go on 24-yard delivery against Australia

But during Scotland’s seven-wicket win over Oman on Sunday, umpire Chris Brown twice called “dead ball” when Watt bowled his 24-yarder, with batsman Khalid Kail falling behind on both occasions. The second of those two balls hit the top of the middle post, and Watt and captain Richie Berrington both asked for clarification from umpire Brown.

Watt suggested Kail had a “bit of a slip” in the withdrawal, a view shared by Tom Moody in the ICC commentary. “The batsman is looking up. He’s ready. To me, that’s a legal ball,” Moody said. “The ball is live. As soon as the batsman puts his bat down and looks up, looking up at the bowler, he’s ready to go.”

There was confusion in the Scottish camp as to why Watt had been killed. “He does it a lot, and he takes a lot of wickets with it,” said Michael Leask, the allrounder, on Friday. “I think they might have given one warning, but they saw he wasn’t looking, [when] the video shows you’re watching.”

There has been some speculation as to whether it should be legal for Watt to hit behind where the bowler’s umpire is standing, with ICC and MCC interpretations understood to be slightly different. In any case, both balls deemed dead to Oman were brought before umpire Brown.

Leask said Watt would not be discouraged by the decision to kill him: “He’s going to do it again. I can guarantee he’ll bowl more than one ball against Australia. It’s almost a surprise… And it’s a good way he plays. In terms of his height, he’s still that big of a man, he’s tough to deal with. , even for us on the nets.

“Actually, I don’t even know the rule: when you stand up and look up, do you say you’re ready? [for the bowler] howling? Actually I have no idea about this rule. I think it should be common sense in certain categories. I’m sure he is [Watt] will release it tomorrow at some point and we will see who is on strike; hopefully, not me.”

Where previously Full Members teams could be caught unaware of opposing players’ exploits, it is now common for commentators to post pre-game packets highlighting anything unusual, such as Watt’s 24-year-old. “You have to do a little research before the game to see what you’re getting,” Wade said. “We will do that tomorrow.

“One by one, we’ll go through their bowlers: whether it’s England or South Africa, we don’t actually sit down as a batting team and go through individual bowlers as a group. We’re getting little packages that will be sent tonight and we’ll go through their bowlers individually and I’ll look at them in the next 24 hours.

England’s victory over Oman ended speculation that Australia could join Scotland to win by a narrow margin to send England home on run-rates, and Wade said ownership of the second Group B qualifier was “not. to take any oxygen” in team discussions: “We’ll just go out and play a game of cricket and see what happens.”

Leask suggested Scotland expected England to beat Namibia on Saturday afternoon, saying: “It’s a must-win game – it always has been. We knew coming into this game it would be like that. We expected England to do well in the group and that’s exactly what they did… It’s a good opportunity for us to go we will play some good cricket and take one of the best. [teams] in the world.”