The Blind Cricket World Cup begins this week

The fourth Blind Cricket World Cup will take place later this week in South Africa. England has named a 17-man squad led by Matt Dean to travel to South Africa for the tournament. England will take on Sri Lanka in Cape Town on November 27th in their first match of the tournament which will also feature teams from Australia, Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, South Africa and West Indies.

Six uncapped players have been selected in the squad, who will be looking to build on their third-place finish at the T20 tournament.

Speaking to the ECB’s official website, Matt Dean said “It would be a dream to be a world champion. Yes we are looking to improve, you always are, but our goal is to win it,”

“We recently played some players who used to play in our team and the first thing they said was that this lot were talented.

"We’ve got a group of 17-20 year-olds that are far beyond any players that we have had before at that age.

“In three or four years' time if they are still playing, we’ll quite easily be the most experienced and talented side in the world and that’s an exciting prospect.”

Two-time defending champions Pakistan are the favourites while rivals India won the inaugural Blind World Twenty20 on home turf in 2012.

You can follow the events on the Blind Cricket World Cup closely on the Blind Cricket World Cup 2014 Facebook page here