England v South Africa: T20 World Cup – live

Is there such a thing as too much T20 cricket?

Yes. A thousand times yes. I know it. You know it. But for some reason, the people running the sport know it too.

To say all of that during a T20 WC match between two top sides might seem overly negative, but if they build a tournament and no one comes, then we need to ask difficult questions at difficult moments.

How are you feeling about this World Cup? Has it captured your imagination? Are you fizzing with T20 fever?

Ali Martin has highlighted two key players for England with against South Africa

One is Jofra Archer, who has not quite reached his apex just yet, but has looked devastating in spells.

The other is Phil Salt who is England’s top run scoerer after his unbeaten 87 against the West Indies underlined his potential.

Apart from their importance, Salt and Archer have something else in common. Want to know what it is? Get stuck into this:

Back to cricket matters, the other top dogs in the competition are looking pretty slick.

Australia hammered Bangladesh and India gave Afghanistan the business.

No question that England have to navigate the harder of the two Super 8 groups, but having walloped the Windies, a win here would all but put them into the last four.

Before we get into the frivolity, it’s important we highlight some awful news.

David Lawrence, the first British-born black player to feature for England, has been diagnosed with motor neurone disease.

Nothing else to say except it’s a horrible situation and everyone in the cricket world wishes David and his family strength and positivity through it all.

Funny ol’ game this, eh? Six days ago, England were a few more rain drops from an early exit. But after beating Namibia in a truncated game, and thanks to Australia’s squeaky win over Scotland, Jos Buttler’s team reached the Super 8 where they kicked off in style, hammering the West Indies by eight wickets on Wednesday. Now, in a flash, the reigning champions will be confident of defending their crown.

A victory over South Africa will effectively guarantee their passage to the semi-finals. Sure, they’d need to beat the USA, who proved they’re no mugs in their narrow loss to the Proteas, as well as but you’d expect a side with in-form opening batters and a blistering pace attack would be too much for the lowest ranked team left in the tournament.

South Africa have been the toughest bunch to analyse. They swatted aside Sri Lanka in their opening game but were lucky in their wins over Bangladesh and Nepal. In truth, they should have lost both and were made to sweat by an expat in American clothing – Andries Gous from Welkom – who clobbered an unbeaten 80 off 47 balls.

Aiden Markram’s team is fallible but is littered with superstars. It’s just a case of enough of them firing at once.

This should be a cracking game. Both sets of players appear to be peaking at the right time. A win here could propel them to greater heights.

If you want to get in touch (and promise not to stick the knife in if things go sideways for South Africa) please drop me a mail.

Toss and teams to come. First ball at 3:30p,BST/10:30am in St Lucia.