Royal London One-Day Cup semi-final betting preview and tips

Recommended Bets: Royal London One-Day Cup semi-finals

2pts Essex to beat Nottinghamshire at 11/10 – prices look an overreaction to Notts’ run-laden quarter-final

1pt Ravi Rampaul top Surrey bowler v Worcestershire at 4/1 – taken out this market in four of his last five RL One-Day Cup appearances

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Worcestershire v Surrey – Saturday, 1100 BST

Another odds-against home semi-finalist, but there are more reasons to swerve the Pears. For one, they’ve lost their leading run-scorer in this competition so far, Tom Kohler-Cadmore, in an acrimonious transfer to Yorkshire. They also run into a Surrey side that is running at full capacity after a high-class victory over the Tykes in Tuesday’s quarter-final.

They welcome Jason Roy back into a supreme top four, and few would bet against the England man regaining his form for a drop down in class. Kumar Sangakkara is, ludicrously, in some of the best form of his stellar career, Ben Foakes is scoring runs for fun and the bowling attack has all bases covered.

In the absence of Kohler-Cadmore, Worcestershire’ batting looks heavily reliant on Daryl Mitchell and Moeen Ali. The latter is a tempting 7/2 top Worcestershire bat poke given the paucity of the competition, but a lack of time in the middle during the Champions Trophy and surprisingly poor returns in the five group-stage games he played earlier in the season are enough to put me off.

I do, though, like Ravi Rampaul at 4/1 to be top Surrey bowler. He may a bit of an innocuous odd-one-out in the Surrey pace attack alongside Jade Dernbach and the Curran brothers, but he’s outbowled them all this season. 

He took out this market with three wickets at Headingley to make it four top-bowler wins in his last five Royal London games; his figures for those games read (most recent first): 3/54, 4,61, 0/30, 3/59, 4/40.

In places he’s listed at the same mark as veteran spinner Gareth Batty, who has four white-ball wickets to his name all season. Rampaul is well worth your support at the price.

Essex v Nottinghamshire – Friday, 1330 BST

Always nice when these previews are straightforward to write. Here we have two sides. One of them is odds-on. The other is odds-against. One of them is at home, has won seven and lost once in this competition, and sits top of Division One of the County Championship. The other is away, has won five and lost three in this competition, and sits top of Division Two of the County Championship.

You see where this is going. But it makes no sense for Essex, the tournament’s standout side to date, to be outsiders in this one. 

I can only think that there’s a bit of the usual over-rating of the Test ground county mixed in with some overreaction to Notts’ admittedly eye-catching total of 429-9 in the quarter-final.

But it shouldn’t be forgotten that Somerset passed 400 themselves in reply. With the result in some doubt right up until the last few overs. And Essex are a better side than Somerset.

Their form in this tournament stands up to any scrutiny. Most importantly, they’ve won all four of their home games, against Hampshire, Gloucestershire, Sussex and Middlesex. They also won at Surrey, who showed their quality with a fine win over Yorkshire in the other quarter-final earlier in the week.

Essex’s sole defeat in this competition – indeed, in any competition this season - came at Glamorgan. By one run.

In great form and with home advantage, Essex are simply a no-brainer at any odds-against quotes.

Where to watch on TV: Sky Sports 2

 Posted at 1700 BST on 15/06/17.