In a World Cup group containing Rashid Khan and Josh Hazlewood, the world’s two top-ranked Twenty20 bowlers, as well as such luminaries as Trent Boult, Tim Southee, Mitchell Starc and Pat Cummins, one man now reigns supreme. It is the perhaps unlikely figure of Sam Curran, who has become for England a source of energy and also inspiration, and who as of Tuesday night had taken more wickets in the Super 12 stage than any other player, and as many as Australia’s three famous seamers combined.
And he is not only sweeping through the lower order: in Tuesday’s crucial game against New Zealand in Brisbane he accounted for Finn Allen and Glenn Phillips, two of the Black Caps’ most explosive and dangerous batters. In England’s opener he dismissed Afghanistan’s two top scorers, Ibrahim Zadran and Usman Ghani (before sweeping through the lower order).
