England and New Zealand. (Photo Source: Twitter)
England will host New Zealand for an 8-game contest in different formats, starting with the first T20I on 30th August 2023 at the riverside ground in Chester-Le-Street. The series consists of 4 ODIs and 4 T20Is.
England will be coming into the contest on the back of an Ashes series draw. They last played a T20I series in Bangladesh in March 2023 where the Jos Buttler-led England got white-washed in the hands of Bangla Tigers. England will play their full-strengthen squad for the series.
Gus Atkinson, who had an impressive season in Hundred, picking up 10 wickets in 6 games has been drafted to the squad and is expected to make his debut in the series while Jos Buttler and Harry Brook will look to continue their form in order to help England go big in the series and with a World Cup in a month ahead, senior players England might bench their senior players for the T20I series to balance the workload.
New Zealand, on the other hand, will be heading into the game on the back of a 2-1 away series win over UAE. They lost the second game against UAE and this was their first loss against a non-test-playing nation since 1975. Tim Southee will lead the team in the absence of injured Kane Williamson.
New Zealand have also come with their almost full-strengthen squad other than Williamson and Michael Bracewell. New Zealand have played 14 games in 2023 and have won 7 games and lost 5 games. They would look to start the tournament on a positive note.
Meanwhile, let us look at the stats and milestones ahead of first T20I between England and New Zealand:
Head-to-Head: In as many as 23 games played between the two teams, England dominated the contest with 14 wins while New Zealand have won on eight occasions. One game hasn’t yielded a result.
9 -Jos Buttler (241) needs 9 fours to complete 250 fours in T20Is.
61 -Moeen Ali (5939) requires 61 runs to complete 6000 T20 runs.
3 -Liam Livingstone (97) needs three grabs to complete 100 catches in T20s.
3 -Liam Livingstone (98) needs two wickets to complete 100 wickets in T20s.
4– Chris Jordan (96) needs four wickets to complete 100 wickets in T20Is.
5 -Adil Rashid (95) needs five wickets to complete 100 wickets in T20Is.
5 -Glenn Phillips (95) requires five fours to complete 100 fours in T20Is.
5 -Mark Chapman (46) requires four sixes to complete 50 maximums in T2OIs.
5 -Jimmy Neesham (45) requires 5 maximums to reach to 50 sixes in T20Is.
5 -Tim Seifert (995) requires 5 runs to complete 1000 runs in T20Is.