Bell relishing another opportunity to put things right

Almost four years ago in St Lucia, England had already lost their opening World Cup group match to New Zealand and took on Canada without Andrew Flintoff.

The heavyweight all-rounder had been stripped of the vice-captaincy and dropped after infamously taking drunken charge of a pedalo.

England were warming up in Fatullah this morning against the country they still managed to beat comfortably in the Caribbean.

They went into the game with several minor concerns, not least the well-being of Broad – yet to play since tearing an abdominal muscle in the Adelaide Test more than two months ago and struck down by a different type of pain in the same part of his body.

Ian Bell, who batted at No 3 in that 51-run win over Canada at Gros Islet, is determined to help make this tournament appreciably more successful for England.

It was in that same winter of 2006-07 that England were whitewashed in the Ashes under Flintoff, before travelling to the World Cup.

At their next attempt in Australia, they retained the Ashes 3-1.

“I played in the World Cup last time, and it didn’t go to plan,” said Bell. “It was a little bit like going and playing in Australia and losing 5-0 – it was nice to go back and put that right. This is another opportunity for the guys who played in the last World Cup to do that same thing again.”

England need to rebuild any confidence lost in their 6-1 defeat against Australia in the post-Ashes one-day series.

With injury doubts also surrounding Yorkshire duo Tim Bresnan and Ajmal Shahzad and Paul Collingwood, and with Graeme Swann still in England awaiting the birth of his first baby, England asked the International Cricket Council for special dispensation to pick stand-by pace bowler Chris Tremlett against Canada.

Bell added: “When we go into these warm-up games we still have to have the same frame of mind as we did leading into the Ashes – to win them and to do so convincingly. If our mind-set is right about these warm-up games it will hold us in very good stead for this World Cup.”

South Africa beat Australia by seven wickets, reaching their target of 218 with 34 balls to spare, openers Graeme Smith (65) and Hashim Amla (60) opting to retire in their warm-up match in Bangalore to give others some practice.

Andre Botha’s 79 ensured a four-wicket win for Ireland with three balls to spare against Zimbabwe in their warm-up game in Nagpur. After a top-order collapse, Zimbabwe reached 244-8 with captain Elton Chigumbura’s fighting 103 not out off 81 balls leading the way.