Captain Eoin Morgan became the first England player to feature in 200 One-day Internationals during the World Cup opener at The Oval, which sees the hosts take on South Africa.
Morgan’s tenure as captain started with a few hiccups. England suffered an embarrassing group-stage exit in the 2015 edition. Four years on and England are the world’s top-ranked ODI side, a title they have owned for more than a year, and arrive at a home World Cup as favourites to win.
“It’s [stubbornness] probably one of the strongest sides of my personality. It’s something that I use quite a lot,” Morgan was quoted as saying by the ICC website. “And sort of to sum up, I never dreamt as a kid that I would captain England at a home World Cup.
“I dreamt about scoring a Test match 100. I dreamt about hitting the winning runs in a World Cup final, potentially. But I never dreamt not even in my wildest dreams that I would captain a home World Cup.”
The opening game will mark Morgan’s 223rd One-day international. He started his career with his native Ireland, where he scored 774 runs at an average of 35.42. “From the age of 13, I wanted to play cricket for England. I’ve never felt any shame in saying this is what I wanted to do.”
With 11 ODI hundreds for England, his place in the middle-order has been under lock and key for much of the intervening decade. He is England’s all-time record ODI appearance-maker and run scorer.