England selection clues for World Cup squad

By naming their 14-man squad for the International Cricket Council Champions Trophy in Sri Lanka this morning England's selectors will give the clearest indication yet of their likely World Cup squad.

Having made reasonable progress during last winter's one-day series in India, New Zealand and Zimbabwe as well as in this summer's NatWest Triangular series it is unlikely there will be many surprises in the squad dspite there being long-term injuries to several of their leading players. Selectors will be hoping that Marcus Trescothick, Darren Gough and Andrew Caddick will be fit by the time the squad leaves in mid-September.

Nasser Hussain, the England captain, said: "There haven't been many new players in the squad from the winter tours. We have shuffled and made our batting more flexible and we are close to knowing our full squad, but we are still a little way from our starting eleven."

The England captain went on to say: "There is plenty of room to get that right though and the door is not shut by any means. You only have to look at Ronnie Irani as an example."

One player who may well have come into form at the right time is Yorkshire's Craig White. The all-rounder appeared to be drifting out of England's one-day plans following the winter tours. However an excellent performance in the first Test match against India at Lord's as well as yesterdays at Headingley, when he blasted Yorkshire to a 10 wicket victory over Surrey may well have been enough to get him the nod over Alex Tudor.

PROBABLE ENGLAND SQUAD (for ISS Chasmpions' Trophy, in Sri Lanka): Nasser Hussain (capt), Marcus Trescothick, Nick Knight, Michael Vaughan, Paul Collingwood, Alec Stewart, Andrew Flintoff, Ronnie Irani, Ashley Giles, Craig White, Darren Gough, Andrew Caddick, Matthew Hoggard, Jeremy Snape.