Trading Talk - WI v Eng ODI Series

Spread bettors who were behind England for any of the Test matches against the West Indies will not need reminding that the tourists are still yet to pick up a win this winter, although captain Andrew Strauss, along with buyers of England's series win index, will be hoping that can change when the first of five one-day internationals gets underway on Friday in Guyana.

After a frustrating and disappointing test series for England, expectation will not have been greatly improved after a less than convincing display in Sunday's Twenty20 match. Buyers of the West Indies would have been cheering the home nation on to their 122 run target, which they achieved with six wickets and 12 balls to spare.

The number of drawn matches in the Test series has not told us much about who is likely to come out on top in the one-day series but after placing England as favourites for every test, the Sporting Index traders place West Indies as slight favourites on the series win index spread at 37-40 compared to England's spread of 35-38 (10pts for a match win, 25pts bonus for winning the series, points shared for draw).

Buyers of the West Indies win index spread will be pleased to know that the last time the teams met for a full one-day series in July 2007, the Windies won by two matches to one, beating England by 93 runs at Trent Bridge and 61 runs at Edgbaston after losing the first match of the series at Lord's.

Prior to this, the last time the teams went head-to-head for an extended 50-over series in the Caribbean was in 2004 - the seven match series ended in a 2-2 draw, after three matches were either abandoned or produced no result. The only other time the teams have met since for a one-day match in the West Indies was at the World Cup in 2007, at Bridgetown, Barbados, in a match that went down to the wire - England successfully chased down a target of 300 with one ball to spare.

Sporting Index offer an enticing 300-up spread for the series, with every run over 300 in a single innings for either team contributing to the final make-up. The spread currently stands at 32-37 and both buyers and sellers may be interested to look at how many runs have been scored in previous innings when the West Indies have faced England.

Since 2004, the sides have contested (and completed) 13 ODI matches, and on only one occasion has either side scored over 300 runs - in the match just described at Bridgetown, and even then the spread make-up would have been a solitary run. Buyers of the spread may not be overly concerned though as throughout the tour so far we have seen some exceptionally high scores and the batsmen-favouring pitches have dominated the discussion.

Spread bettors may assume that the 2007 World Cup match is as good an indicator of what is to come over the next few weeks as any, as it was played at a similar time of year and many of the same names still feature in both sides.

Buyers and sellers of a whole host of other series spread markets on offer from Sporting Index might appreciate a closer look into the outcome of this match. Buyers of total batsmen 50-ups before Friday (at 370) will be feeling particularly confident after seeing the pitches in the West Indies so far this winter, and also because of the 50-up total of 120 in the World Cup match in 2007.

However, the same scores did not contribute anything to the equivalent ton-up spread (at 38-43 for this series), which may put buyers of this market off. With the involvement of both Chris Gayle and Kevin Pietersen, two of the biggest hitters in cricket, Sporting Index's traders are expecting plenty of action surrounding the total number of series sixes, currently at 36-39. In the Bridgetown ODI in 2007 a total of seven were scored so buyers of the spread for this series will be hoping for a few more in each of the five games.

Sporting Index also offer a number of player performance spread markets for both bowlers and batsmen. Of the batsmen, Kevin Pietersen is expected to score the most series runs, with his spread at 195-210, closely followed by Ramnaresh Sarwan at 185-200.

Buyers of Sarwan's spread will be thrilled by his performances in the test series, although sellers will note that in his last one-day game against the English he scored a miserable three runs. In the Windies' December / January series against New Zealand, Sarwan had a mixed performance recording scores of 5, 22 and 38 but he just about made up for it with a fantastic 67 not out in the 2nd ODI and was also named Player of the Match.

Of the bowlers, Powell and Edwards will lead the pace attack for the Windies, at 55-65 and 65-75 on the bowling performance spreads (10pts per wicket, 25pts bonus for a five-wicket innings) respectively.

A name in the West Indies side that has stirred much interest among spread bettors is all-rounder Dwayne Bravo, who is returning to ODIs for the first time since facing Australia in July 2008.

Sporting Index are offering special all-rounder spread markets on Bravo and Andrew Flintoff where one point is awarded for a run, 10pts for a catch, 20pts for a wicket and 25pts for a stumping. In Bravo's last 50-over appearance he took one wicket and scored just 13 runs - a make-up of 33. Flintoff's last one-day outing, against India in November, is sure to be one to forget for him but buyers of his spread on that day are unlikely to have done so just yet - he went for a duck and took no wickets for a make-up of 0.

With Bravo's spread currently at 240-255 for the series and Andrew Flintoff at 265-280, buyers will be certainly be hoping for a heroic performance from either man across the five match series.