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NEW DELHI: New Zealand’s spin heavy attack, marshalled by their crafty skipper Mitchell Santner, is set to test an England batting unit powered by the aggressive Harry Brook when the two sides meet in a Super Eight clash of the ICC Men's T20 World Cup on Friday.

The contest carries greater weight for New Zealand as they look to lock in a semifinal berth, while England have already secured passage to the last four with two successive victories.

New Zealand’s commanding 61 run win over Sri Lanka has lifted their net run rate to +3.050 and they now need only to avoid a heavy defeat to move ahead.

Pakistan, after losing to England, sit on a net run rate of -0.461 and would require New Zealand to suffer a significant loss while also beating Sri Lanka convincingly to overtake the Black Caps.

Spin battle at Premadasa

New Zealand have demonstrated their comfort in spin friendly conditions, even fielding as many as six slow bowling options against Sri Lanka. In doing so, they beat the co hosts at their own game.

While Brook and Will Jacks handled the spin of Saim Ayub, Mohammed Nawaz and Shadab Khan with confidence, the quartet of Santner, Rachin Ravindra, Glenn Phillips and Cole McConchie could prove more effective on the slightly tacky Premadasa surface compared to Pallekele.

Brook’s sparkling century against Pakistan underlined his form, and England will also look to Jos Buttler to raise his tempo after a relatively quiet tournament. A strong start from Buttler would put England in command.

In response, the off spin of Jacks and the left arm spin of Liam Dawson could present their own challenges for the Kiwi batters.

At Premadasa, a total in the region of 165 to 175 could prove competitive if the spinners dominate proceedings.

Confident but cautious

"You're always confident going into these fixtures, especially when we know what the surface is going to be like, but I think it'd be silly to underestimate England at any point," Black Caps all-rounder Rachin Ravindra said after his match-winning performance against Sri Lanka on Wednesday.

"They're obviously such a quality unit, and they've shown this in bowling, and how well they've been bowling. I mean, they've got world class batters throughout their order.So it's nothing necessarily like that," he added.

But he was well aware that Friday is a new day and it will be a new challenge for the New Zealand team.

"Obviously, we'll take confidence from today and move on, but realize in two days' time it's a different challenge and hopefully we can be up for it," Rachin said.

Squads:

England: Harry Brook (captain), Jos Buttler (wk), Tom Banton, Jacob Bethell, Phil Salt (wk), Ben Duckett, Sam Curran, Will Jacks, Jamie Overton, Rehan Ahmed, Liam Dawson, Jofra Archer, Adil Rashid, Josh Tongue, Like Wood

New Zealand: Mitchell Santner (captain), Finn Allen, Tim Seifert, Devon Conway, Mark Chapman, Cole McConchie, Daryl Mitchell, James Neesham, Rachin Ravindra, Jacob Duffy, Lockie Ferguson, Matt Henry, Kyle Jamieson, Ish Sodhi

Match Starts: 7 pm

(With PTI Inputs)