Nepal are taking on England in their first match of the 2026 ICC Men’s T20 World Cup at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai, India today. Having won the tournament twice before, England are the clear favourites. But England’s captain Harry Brook has hinted that they were not taking Nepal’s challenge lightly.

“Obviously, we got Nepal in the first game,” Brook said in a short video posted by the England Cricket Board on Friday. “And we are just trying to stay in the moment as much as possible.”

He added that England would treat every opponent with respect and try to play their best cricket.

Brook’s words were backed by the strong English squad revealed on Saturday to play against Nepal.

England have rested pacer Josh Tongue, Jamie Overton, Regan Ahmed and Ben Duckett for their T20 World Cup opener. The playing set they have revealed includes skipper Brook, wicketkeeper-batsman Jos Buttler and power hitter Phil Salt.

The other players in the squad against Nepal are Jacob Bethell, Tom Banton, Sam Curran, Will Jacks, Liam Dawson, Jofra Archer, Adil Rashid and Luke Wood.

England look to exploit Wankhede’s conditions

Wankhede Stadium does not have big boundaries: the straight boundaries average 66 metre and the square boundaries 70 metre.

The shorter boundaries are expected to help Nepal as Wankhede’s dimensions are similar to those of the home of Nepali cricket, the TU International Cricket Stadium, where the longest boundary is 65 metre. Yet that will present an even bigger opportunity for England.

Jos Buttler and Phil Salt are two of the hardest hitters in white ball cricket. Moreover, they have experience playing in India during the Indian Premier League, making them familiar with the Indian conditions.

Buttler and Salt have been the two leading runscorers for England in T20Is in the past year. Similarly, skipper Brook is in good form as he is among the top three runscorers in all three formats—Test, ODI and T20I—for England in the past year.

Similarly, the red-soil pitch of Wankhede favours pacers in the early hours, which will be exploited by Jofra Archer, whose bouncers have troubled the best batsmen in the world.

As Wankhede’s pitch also helps spinners, England will employ plenty of spin options against Nepal. Leg-spinner Adil Rashid, off-spinner Will Jacks, and left-arm spinners Liam Dawson and Jacob Bethell will be keen to trouble Nepali batting order.

Further, Sam Curran, the left-arm medium pacer, is going to be another trouble. IPL 2023’s most-expensive player, Curran, has a good understanding of Indian pitches.

Moreover, England are on a high after whitewashing a three-match T20I series in Sri Lanka before they reached Mumbai for the World Cup.

England, where the ‘gentleman’s game’ was invented, have won 10 of their last 11 T20Is.

“We expect a good crowd of our fans, who have been travelling everywhere with us, in the upcoming World Cup,” Brook told the ECB. “They are a big motivation for us.”

During the Captain’s Press Conference on Tuesday, Brook stressed that his team would be looking for a high score, up to 300 or more if they bat first.

While Nepal cannot be compared to England skill-wise, the Rhinos are expected to have an upper hand when it comes to fan support at Wankhede on Sunday. And such support had always had a positive impact on Nepal’s matches, as was apparent during the previous T20 World Cup jointly hosted by the US and the Caribbean countries.

Can Rhinos turn the tide?

India and South Africa were the two finalists of the 2024 ICC Men’s T20 World Cup. But before reaching the finals, the most nailbiting win for the Proteas was against Nepal: by one run, while defending 116.

Had Nepal managed eight runs in the last over, it would have been one of the biggest upsets in international cricket’s history. And what remained unfulfilled in the previous edition, Nepal are aiming to achieve this time.

Nepal could not handle the pressure, it was said, when Nepal lost the close encounter with South Africa and then fumbled in the chase of 107 runs against Bangladesh.

But the Rhinos might not be under pressure this time.

“We got very close against South Africa and Bangladesh in the 2024 T20 World Cup,” Nepal’s skipper Rohit Kumar Paudel said during the Captain’s Press Conference on Tuesday. “We also got the opportunity to play the West Indies in Sharjah last year, and the win [against them] gave a lot of confidence to the boys. We are taking all these motivations to the 2026 World Cup.”

Even Harsha Bhogle, a senior cricket commentator, wants to watch Nepal closely.

In a video about Associate nations at the T20 World Cup on his YouTube channel on Friday, Bhogle said, “I have been hearing so many good things about Nepal. I read the scorecards and they seem to be doing very well. Some very, very good results in recent times, especially beating the West Indies in Sharjah.”

He also argued that beating Scotland at Scottish soil in June last year was a similarly big achievement for Nepal. “In the evolution of a team, how you play in away conditions, in difficult conditions, is often an indicator of how good you are likely to be,” Bhogle added.

Both the West Indies and Scotland are Nepal’s group opponents for the 2026 T20 World Cup.

Nepal are yet to announce their squad. But Stuart Law is likely to give priority to the spinners—especially the most experienced Sandeep Lamichhane. Sher Malla, who made headlines in the second Nepal Premier League, could also make his debut for Nepal.

“The players will be new for us, but we will be researching about them,” England’s Will Jacks said during the pre-match conference on Friday. The way Brook and Jacks spoke about Nepal and the squad England revealed on Saturday shows that the Englishmen are serious.

Nepal were scheduled to train and hold their pre-match conference at DY Patil Stadium on Saturday. But both the plans were cancelled.

But the team has been doing well since the arrival of Stuart Law, and the addition of Nic Pothas as consultant coach and Ian Harvey as bowling coach has further motivated them.

“To compete against the top teams, you need pace, and you need good spinners, which we do have,” Pothas told the Cricket Association of Nepal on January 30 while Nepal were training at the Brabourne Cricket Stadium in Mumbai.

Pothas also argued that Nepal were improving with the experience they had gained from playing abroad. He said Nepali bowlers were benefitting a lot from Harvey, who, according to Pothas, is “one of the best white-ball bowlers Australia have had.”

But Pothas accepted that Nepal needed bowlers who can bowl fast and batsmen who can play against fast bowling to move forward in international cricket.

Until then, Pothas said, “It is always going to be a challenge to compete against top teams.”

Yet, Nepal are expecting to make this World Cup go in their favour and qualify for the Super 8 with what they have.

Moreover, the way the two Associates, the Netherlands and the USA troubled two of the cricket heavyweights Pakistan and India in the opening day of the T20 World Cup on Saturday suggests that Nepal could upset England if the Rhinos keep their calm on Sunday.

The Nepal vs England fixture begins at 3:15 pm Nepali time (3pm Indian time).