A winter featuring Ashes humiliation and off-field scandal avoided a new low on Sunday when Sam Curran held his nerve to avert minnows Nepal scalping England at the start of the Twenty20 World Cup. They might also have been felled by Scotland but for the intervention of the Barbados weather at the 2024 event. With Bam set on 35 off 15 deliveries, the Surrey all-rounder began a sequence of unerring accuracy, starting with a dot and getting the set batsman off strike next ball. Teeing up India’s upcoming fixtures against the Netherlands and Namibia, it asks whether they will feature the first occurrences of 300 being scored in a Twenty20 World Cup. But in tournament cricket, scores tend to be more modest and were thankful for having just enough to avoid embarrassment.

Source: Daily Mail February 08, 2026 13:23 UTC