Perfect Sri Lanka bowling sweeps Windies away in World T20 semi
June 19, 2009 by SPIN
Filed under Featured Content, ICC World Twenty20, News
Sri Lanka crushed the West Indies by 57 runs in the ICC World T20 semi-final – and now face Pakistan in the final on Sunday.
The victory came on the back of another mighty innings from Tillekeratne Dilshan – tonight he batted through the 20 overs for 96 off 57 balls – and a sensational first over from the apparently innocuous medium-pacer Angelo Mathews (3/16).
With the Sirils defending a total of just 158/5, skipper Kumar Sangakkara’s throwing the ball to Mathews to kick-off the West Indies innings proved to be an inspired hunch.
Mathews’ first over saw three wickets fall – all bowled, all played on – to leave West Indies 1/3, with Xavier Marshall, Lendl Simmons and Dwayne Bravo all back on the bench without scoring. The dismissals suggested that the pitch, unusually for the Oval, lacked pace and left batsmen confused about the best way to attack the ball, which was not coming onto the bat.
Chris Gayle (63 off 50) batted through to the end, unbeaten, but received no support at all. No-one else hit more than Denesh Ramdin’s nine runs and though Shiv Chanderpaul stuck around for half an hour, his 7 from 15 balls – filled with pre-meditated (and generally failed) trick shots – did little to advance the cause.
With the innings already in disarray, Ajantha Mendis (2/9 off four overs) and Murali (3/29) applied the killer blows, mid-innings. The Sri Lankan attack is the most varied in the tournament, but the West Indies did not help themselves with their shot selection; their inability to get Gayle, their No 1 danger man, on strike was a major failing. Instead, he waited at the non-strikers end while a procession of batsmen came and went, going for glory trying to hit sixes themselves.
Dilshan had also fought a lone battle in the Sirils’ innings, though he had help early on from Sanath Jayasuriya. Jayasuriya’s 24 off 37 balls was, though, a very a typical innings from the Sirils’ veteran, who is 40 next week. Visibly frustrated with his inability to time the ball, he changed his bat several times before holing out in the 11th over and leaving Dilshan to carry the innings.
No-one else scored more than Angelo Mathews’ 12 runs, hit off four balls at the death.
Dilshan’s innings included 12 fours and two sixes and left him just short of completing the second-ever international T20 century. It was another versatile display from the tournament’s leading run-scorer, full of sweet timing, clever placement and ever-adaptable stroke play including his now trademark flip over the keeper’s head, this time off a Jerome Taylor slower ball.
Dilshan’s innings earned him the man of the match award – though the killer blows really came from Sri Lanka’s bowlers, and that remarkable first over from Mathews, in particular.
West Indies knock England out of ICC World Twenty20
June 15, 2009 by SPIN
Filed under Featured Content, ICC World Twenty20, News
England are out of the ICC World Twenty20 after losing to West Indies by five wickets in a game shortened by rain.
England hit 161/6 off their 20 overs, with Ravi Bopara top-scoring with 55 from 47 balls.
But after an hour had been lost to rain, West Indies were set a target revised by Duckworth-Lewis to just 80 from nine overs.
Though England took regular wickets and had the Windies at 45/5, Shiv Chanderpaul (17*) and Ronnie Sarwan (19*), surely the most experienced sixth-wicket partnership going, saw them home.
England, omitting Dimi Mascarenhas and again refusing to include Graham Napier, again laid a solid foundation but lacked any firepower in the final overs of their innings. Remarkably, they did not hit a boundary between the 11th and the 20th overs. Stuart Broad came in at No 8 for the last two balls of the innings and hit a four and a six, but it was much too little much too late.
At the top Luke Wright (6) fell again top edging a hook from a ball that got large on him. Today, it came from Kieron Pollard.
KP hit 31, before top-edging a sweep from medium pacer Simmons. After that Shah (18), Collingwood (11) and Foster (13) all managed to score at a run a ball but there was no sense of the innings taking flight, despite a massive hooked six from Shah.
In fact, it was after that Shah six in the 11th over – he fell in the next over to a brilliant catch from Fletcher on the square leg rope – that the boundary drought began, lasting until the penultimate ball of the innings.
The first rain break, midway through the 17th over, came at a bad time for England, as they were already struggling to rebuild momentum after the dismissal of Bopara. England failed to hit a single boundary between the 11th and 20th overs and, though the Duckworth-Lewis calculations appeared to favour the chasing side, it was this lack of adventure that ultimately cost them the game.
Defending the meagre, rain-adjusted total, England bowled well and fielded tenaciously. Ryan Sidebottom yorked Chris Gayle in the second over and James Foster pulled off another brilliant stumping, of Bravo off Swann, leaving the West Indies 45/5.
With Windies needing 30 off 18 balls, a James Anderson over went for 13, thanks to some clever batting from Sarwan that brought him two successive fours – the first saw him sweeping a ball from wide of off-stump for four .
After that, the Windies were in the box seat, and soon they were though to the semi-finals. Ryan Sidebottom came to the last over trying to defend three runs; England spent an age shuffling their fielders around but it was all too late; Sarwan smashed him for a four over extra cover and England were out.
Friday: India face first real test of ICC World Twenty20
June 11, 2009 by Nick Sadleir
Filed under News
At Lord’s on Friday, the defending World T20 champions do battle with the most unpredictable side in world cricket. It should be a corker.
The group stages have not given us any conclusive proof of what to expect from either side. While India have cruised to wins over the inferior opposition of Bangladesh and Ireland, West Indies have a) thrashed Australia before b) looking back to their usual haphazardness against Sri Lanka.
On Wednesday, in a dead rubber, Sri Lanka named their best side and played to win and maintain momentum, while the West Indies rested key players and showed that they couldn’t give two hoots whether they won or lost.
Sri Lanka scored 192 runs and in reply the West Indies fell 15 runs short, far fewer than the number of runs they gifted to Sri Lanka through over ten counts of appalling outfielding from, some of whom wore neon pink, yellow and orange sunglasses. Chris Gayle’s pair looked like the kind you get in a one pound store – fortunately he only used them to watch from the sidelines as he was sitting out to rest his various injuries.
You never know which West Indies will turn up on the day.
Maybe it will be the West Indies that thrashed Australia through Gayle’s onslaught of 88 runs off 50 balls looked dangerous with the ball and didn’t field too badly, which is saying a lot.
By contrast, India found themselves in the easiest pool of the opening round. Bangladesh and Ireland might have given India an effortless route through to the next round, but they offered precious little by way of match practise.
Virender Sehwag, the most explosive batsman in world cricket, has pulled out of the tournament, thanks to his shoulder injury. Luckily India have a more than able replacement in Rohit Sharma, the Under-23 player of the IPL. Sharma grafted a graceful 36 off 23 balls against Bangladesh, which he bettered with an unforced and unbeaten 52 off 48 balls against Ireland. He is a batsman in form who offers a handy bowling option too. Sharma took one of the three hat-tricks in the IPL and is just one of a team of potential match-winners.
Dinesh Kartik, who was excellent with the bat and the gloves during Delhi’s IPL campaign, has been added to the India squad in replace of Sehwag.
Zaheer Khan showed he has recovered from his own shoulder injury when he claimed the figures of 4/19 that helped his side reduce Ireland to 112/8 in and 18-over match on Wednesday.
“It will be good if we can get early wickets against the West Indies,” Zaheer said after India’s eight-wicket victory. “Removing Gayle will be a great advantage for us. I am hopeful because we are clicking as a bowling unit and each bowler understands his role.
“We are chipping in with wickets at the right time.”
“The shoulder is coming along well. I feel better day by day and I am improving, I feel 100-percent now” added Zaheer.
Captain M.S. Dhoni admitted that his team was yet to peak when he said, “Every game you start from scratch.”
“The bowlers did very well and it’s a real positive that they are doing their jobs. But we can do better in the field. It was not our best day. I am talking about 85-90 percent efficiency, but we can do it.”
The match is certainly India’s first real test of the tournament and after South Africa’s comprehensive win over England, it will no doubt tell us a lot about who is likely to go through to the semi-finals from that group – and what England have to do in the next three days to stay on at their own party.
West Indies (possible): Gayle, Fletcher, Marshall, Chanderpaul, Sarwan, Bravo, Pollard, Ramdin, Taylor, Benn, Edwards.
Lendl Simmons – who came in for Gayle – batted, bowled and fielded well against Sri Lanka – and may retain his place, possibly at the expense of Pollard.
India (possible): Gambhir, R. Sharma, Dhoni, Yuvraj, Raina, Y Pathan, I Pathan, Harbhajan, Zaheer, I Sharma, Ojha.
West Indies shock Aussies at World T20; Yuvraj blasts Banglas
June 6, 2009 by SPIN
Filed under Featured Content, News
West Indies blasted their way past an apparently shell-shocked Australia to produce the second upset of the ICC World Twenty20.
Having restricted the Aussies – who won the toss – to 169/7, the Windies, fired by skipper Chris Gayle on top form, chased down the runs within 16 overs. Brett Lee’s first three overs went for 51, as Gayle (88 off 50) and Andre Fletcher (53 off 32) put on 133 for the first wicket – a record for international T20s.
Gayle’s innings included six sixes, one of them possibly the largest ever seen at the ground. He left the park to a standing ovation when he was finally out with the Windies just 12 runs short of victory.
Australia were on the back foot from the off, thanks to an extraordinary first over from Jerome Taylor.
The nine-ball over included three wides, two wickets and no runs off the bat: first, Shane Watson was caught at mid-off by Sarwan trying to hit over the top; then Ricky Ponting – having faced two consecutive wides – was trapped lbw by the first legitimate ball he faced.
When vice-skip Pup Clarke went, the Aussies were 15/3 – but then David Warner (63 off 53) led a fightback that brought them to apparent repectability.
But they were blown away by Gayle and Fletcher’s onslaught, with Ponting using seven different bowlers in the 15.5 over innings.
“We spoke about getting the first over of each innings right and as it turned out we lost two wickets in our first batting innings and they took a lot off our first bowling over as well,” said Aussie skip Ricky Ponting afterwards.
“With the game being as short as it is, you can’t afford to give momentum like that away in either innings and we did it in both.
“I thought 169 was going to be a competitive total if we could take wickets up front with the new ball but they took us on, hit some early boundaries and got the momentum going their way. They outplayed us for sure.
Australia must now beat Sri Lanka on Monday to have a chance of staying in the competition.
• At Trent Bridge, India beat Bangladesh by 25 runs. Having won the toss and batted, they looked in danger of being bogged down as Gautam Gambhir took 46 balls over his half-century. But a majestic display of big-hitting from man of the match Yuvraj Singh (41 off 18 balls) changed the momentum of the game.
India finished with 180/5 off their 20 overs. Banglas opener Junaid Siddique hit 41 off 22 including three sixes to give Indian fans something to worry about: but when Siddique fell to Ojha in the ninth over, Bangladesh were 77/4. They lacked the firepower down the order to pursue the chase and the game fizzled out as a contest, with Ojha finishing with 4/21 off his four overs.
In the first game of the day, New Zealand (90/3) beat Scotland (89/4) in a seven-over shoot-out with an over to spare. With the Black Caps still needing 22 runs off the last two overs, another upset, after England’s debacle on Friday night, had seemed on the cards. But Scott Styris and Ross Taylor blasted the penultimate over from Jan Stander for 22 to finish the rain-delayed game in no-nonsense fashion.
