Chris Woakes: England can handle the pressure at World Cup

Under the astute leadership of captain Eoin Morgan, England have dominated ODI cricket over the past couple of years, thrilling with their front-foot style and rising to the top of the world rankings

Chris Woakes has rubbished concerns over England’s ability to cope with their status as World Cup favourites – insisting they already have a blueprint in place that can take them to a historic success this summer.

Under the astute leadership of captain Eoin Morgan, England have dominated ODI cricket over the past couple of years, thrilling with their front-foot style and rising to the top of the world rankings.

With a heavy-duty artillery of batting talent making waves across the globe and a string of impressive victories behind them, hopes are high that Morgan’s side can go all the way this summer – becoming the first England side to do so in the process.

That has brought added pressure to what is already a high-profile summer – they also face an Ashes series against old foes Australia starting in August – but Woakes, a key part of both the Test and ODI setups over the past couple of years, believes England are perfectly placed to cope with the intensity of what is to come.

^{Chris Woakes at the launch of #OneDay4Children at Guildhall}

“I keep hearing people talk about how we're going to deal with being one of the favourites, but I think we've dealt with the expectation that comes with being ranked No. 1 in the world for a while now,” Woakes said at the launch of ICC’s One Day for Children initiative in conjunction with UNICEF.

"As a team, we're a tight-knit group and we've handled it well so far. We've got a great squad and played some great cricket over the last few years. We effectively don't need to do anything different.

"That'll stand us in good stead heading into the competition, but playing in a tournament is a completely different experience to playing in a bilateral series.

"What's good about the squad of 16-18 players is that we're always striving to get better. We have lost games along the way and we always review and see how we can get better.

"You look at world-class players like Joe Root, Jos Buttler and Ben Stokes, they're always striving to get better. That helps us as a side continue to improve.”

Key to England’s development as a side has been the steady movement of the likes of Buttler and Stokes to IPL franchises.

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Playing against the world’s best limited-overs cricketers in front of packed out crowds has only helped the squad develop their craft.

And Woakes reserved special praise in particular for the way in which the swashbuckling Buttler’s game has evolved.

“Jos is a bit of a freak. He's unbelievably good and maybe doesn't always realise how good he is at times,” he said.

“Having the opportunity to play in the IPL is such a good thing for us as England players.

“It wasn’t really an option in the past, but it has exposed us to playing in front of huge crowds.

“Playing in that pressure cooker can only make us feel like we can handle that environment.”

ICC Cricket World Cup Trophy Tour, driven by Nissan, commences 100-day tour of England and Wales and will be at over 100 locations and events before arriving back in London ready for the opening match on May 30

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