Coach Collingwood: There will 'definitely be an upset’ at the Cricket World Cup

Coach Collingwood backs his Scotland to take on the world

Paul Collingwood has just led Durham to their third title in six years

Paul Collingwood has been round the block a time or two. He played 68 Test matches, 197 one-day internationals and was captain of England when they won the World Twenty20, the country’s first and so far solitary success in a global event.

The all-rounder shows no sign of losing his allure. Collingwood, sometimes known as “Brigadier Block” for his doughty defensive skills, is still playing county cricket at 38, with resounding success; he is one of Scotland’s coaches in the World Cup; he has been a regular presence as a television pundit during the recent Australian Big Bash.

He has been a perpetually involved eye-witness as the limited-overs game has evolved, rapidly so in the last five years. This vast experience heightens the validity of his observations. He has seen the international game from top to bottom.

“There will definitely be an upset in this World Cup,” he said at his Durham home as he prepared to pack his bags for another tour. “I have seen enough associate cricket over this past year to know that these teams sometimes do the unexpected. The skill level is there and you will get a big performance. Once you put an international team under pressure, the consequences of losing the game aren’t as great as for the associate.”

Although Afghanistan and Ireland are seen as the lesser nations most likely to, the claims of Scotland are far from negligible. With scant resources but a well-directed policy of encouraging the game in its few fertile pockets, they deserved their third qualification for a World Cup. This may present their most viable chance of winning a match.

“They have an opportunity throughout the tournament to do something special as a team and individually, to put cricket on the map in Scotland,” said Collingwood. “Not many people know Scotland are in the World Cup, this team can put it on the front pages.

“I have been really impressed with the skill levels of all the associate sides. It shocked me last year when I got involved with Scotland, how they were playing better cricket. It was more the mental side that was lacking. It was almost as if they were finding ways to put themselves under pressure rather than the opposition, and I told them that as soon as I had a week with them.”

Scotland’s qualification was sealed with three consecutive wins in the qualifying tournament in New Zealand last year, when they defeated Canada, Kenya and the UAE. In the first of those Calum MacLeod struck 175 from 142 balls, in the third their captain, the South African-born Preston Mommsen, made 139 from 149. Along with Kyle Coetzer and Matt Machin, who play in the County Championship for Sussex and Northamptonshire respectively, they provide Scotland with their most realistic aspirations of scoring enough runs quickly enough to make more illustrious opponents apprehensive. In the case of Afghanistan and Bangladesh, it may do something more.

The associate flavour de nos jours may rightly be Pakistan but Scotland prevailed crushingly when the sides met in an associates triangular series in the UAE last month. Afghanistan’s mercurial batting folded and they were all out for 63. That may be part not only of Afghanistan’s charm but of the brand of cricket of all the smaller countries in this World Cup.

“Sometimes I have just laughed,” said Collingwood. “Like when Afghanistan came out and lost five cricket balls in the first six overs of a T20 qualifier in Sharjah. The sixes were going out of the stadium, they were hitting shots like Mahendra Singh Dhoni from outside off stump. Bowlers were trying to execute plans and the guys were playing helicopter shots going out of the stadium.

“You’re always going to get small-time players coming up against big-time players. There are always going to be a few nerves around, but what you can do as a player is try to play your best cricket by going out there and knowing your own game and being confident.

“You’re facing a cricket ball rather than a player. These guys have shown that they have got the skills to face 85mph bowlers and guys with mystery spin – now they have got to prove that they can face the big names and not worry about that.”

The most resonant match for Collingwood, naturally, will be on 23 February in Christchurch when his Scotland face what was his England, the side he led on 25 occasions. There will be mixed emotions. “I want England to do well in the tournament, of course, but I am desperate to get one over them.”

But that aside, Collingwood wants England to have a good World Cup. He played in three tournaments in which the team never progressed beyond the quarter-final. And he still describes them as “we”.

“It’s the most powerful batting line-up we’ve had in a while. How are we going to bowl? I’m a big believer in being ahead of the game. Almost every World Cup you go into, someone does something different and the only time we did something different we won a global competition.”