Saturday, June 6, 2009

Gayle Rocks, Leaves Aussies to think about the Ashes along with the English

Three matches into the ICC World Twenty20 and two upsets.

It very well could have been 3 in 3 had the Scottish been a little bit more calm in the field.

Many may not consider the West Indies win over Australia as an upset, but it sure is. No one expected Australia to lose.

Did you?

Even if you did, I'm sure you didn't expect Gayle and Co. to spread this kind of carnage and totally destroy the Aussies.

The Australians just had no idea what hit them.

From the word go, Gayle and Fletcher were at them.

Lee, Johnson, Bracken had no answer to the brute force of those two bats.

It was sheer carnage out there and a treat to watch.

I didn't think Gayle would come good given he had hit his straps in the warm-ups, but as we all know, he loves the T20 form of the game and he truly showed that today.

I reckon he's one of the best in the business, if not the best.

He alone had Lee reeling at 3-0-51-0 !!!

I hate to say this, but at least the English took the Dutch to the final delivery of the match.

Australia had lost the game by the 5th over.

Two days into a cricket world cup competition and we have a situation where the hosts, England, and one of the favorites (not for me, but others), Australia, are facing an exit.

It may be a blessing considering that both teams' thoughts were revolving around the Ashes anyway.

Look at this way - exits for both will give them 30 days to concentrate solely on the Ashes!

Maybe thats what they wanted. Good for them then I guess.

Where now for the rest?

Two upsets already. Will Bangladesh give us another?

Make your pitch on this post...



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17 Pitched:

  1. Tifosi Guy said...
     

    Q

    England sure took the game to the last ball - but it was the DUTCH :)

    The Aussies - yep were blown away and didn't know what hit them. Good win for WI

    But Aussies WILL beat Sri Lanka , and even if Sri Lanka beat West Indies, my striking feeling is that Aussies will do enough to get into the Super 8's.

    It's just that I have the confidence in the Aussies to get out of any tough situation :)

  2. Q said...
     

    Given Sri Lanka's current form, u r probably right about that TG.. plus Australia will look to play out of their skins to avoid an embarassing exit.

    On the other hand, Lanka will look to come hard at them and hit them when they're down.

    Anything can happen really.

    I agree it was the Dutch, hence the final ball.. but to lose a T20 game in the 15th over - that was BIG defeat for the Aussies..

  3. Indophile said...
     

    Well if Bangladesh will win from here we can thank Dhoni for promoting himself at 3 with special mention to Gambhir. Somebody should explain Dhoni that Raina is a better batsman than him so let him play.

  4. Q said...
     

    I agree with that Indophile. Dhoni has Yuvi to thank.. if it wsn't for Yuvi's innings, India would have been around 150 and staring down the barrel.

    I still don't get what Dhoni is doing at 3. Raina is such a waste at 5..

    What is Dhoni trying to prove?

  5. achettup said...
     

    It is an upset, you definitely expect it to be the Aussies who are clinical in these contests, but the way the Windies blew them away was quite something special. You know, I get the feeling thats there is a lot more tension and passion in these Aus-WI games than gets mentioned often enough, it certainly seems to me that with the exception of the 2005 Ashes, they have more intensity than the Eng-Aus clashes. The Windies, like a lot of other sides but perhaps more so considering how badly they've deteriorated, seem to have that little bit extra to prove when they take on Australia.
    TG, a nrr of -2.65 is going to be very hard for Australia to overcome, and even if they do get through to the super eights it might come back to haunt them, as will the points the windies should carry through.

  6. Tifosi Guy said...
     

    Achettup

    There are no points carried forward into the Super 8's

    As to the net run rate, this is how it would work. Aus to thump SL, who would then beat WI. So WI's NRR would come down of course.

    While it's all speculation, it's just that the Aussies are more than adept at getting out of jail :)

  7. Q said...
     

    Ach: I reckon all of Australia's series are more intense than the Ashes.

    Aus v SA, Aus v Ind, Aus v WI, Aus v SL in SL are much more fiercely contested than the Ashes.

    The Ashes only has historical value, nothing more imo.

    As for this 20-20 world cup.. no points are being carried forward so that won't make a difference to Australia..

    The NRR though is definitely a worry.. I don't think they will beat SL by a margin that will get that NRR in the +ve.

    TG might disagree though :-)

  8. Tifosi Guy said...
     

    Q

    Yes I disagree with you on the NRR bit :) It doesn't even have to get into +ve territory, just better than either WI or SL :) should it come down to that. Or maybe WI would beat SL, making the whole thing moot ( as far as qualification is considered).

    Remember or recollect Aus in the 1999 WC - I predict exactly the same thing this time :) Then the Aussies went into the Super 8's needing to win all the matches to qualify for the semi's. The rest is history.

    Also, most teams raise their level against Aus simply because if you are not 100 % or even beyond your ability, more often that not you would lose to them!

  9. Q said...
     

    TG: Full marks to ur confidence in the Aussies.. but recovering from -2.65 would be difficult..

    And to be honest, I don't think it would really come down to that.. the Lankans will probably lose to both Aus and WI :-)

    It was the Super 6s in 1999. And they not only had to win all 3 of those matches, they had to win their last 2 games of round 1 to get to the 6s, then 3 in 6s for the semis.. they won 7 on a trot after losing to Pak and NZ to win the cup.

    One of the best turnarounds after Pak in 1992.

    BUT, there's a difference between AUS of 1999 and now.

  10. Tifosi Guy said...
     

    Q

    True - This Aussie team isn't like the Aussie team of 99. Just that having blindly ( even against India in WC's) supported them since the magic of 1987, have this unshaken belief in them that they would always come out of tough situations.

    Oh yeah - thanks for the correction about WC 99. Super sixes indeed.

    Anyways, let's see what happens when Aus play SL on Monday.

    Lastly, good stuff by Bang, but like I had mentioned before this Indian team is a touch smarter to avoid banana skins :)

  11. Q said...
     

    TG,

    For your sake, I hope Aus pulls through.

    Yuvi saved India today.. otherwise Dhoni might have had to answer a lot of questions regarding wat he was doing at 3.

  12. Tifosi Guy said...
     

    Q

    Yep - Yuvraj saved Dhoni tonight. Was a bit mystifying watching MSD come one down.

    He's right to come one down, if an early wicket falls, but with a start like this, and how MSD plays lately, it would have made sense to send either one of Raina/Yuvraj or Yusuf to break the game open.

    Probably he's taking other teams into a false sense of complacency and would pull a trick or two, come the Super 8's.

  13. Gaurav Sethi said...
     

    Like MSD, you too were hoping Bangla would pull it off.

  14. Q said...
     

    TG: false sense of complacency at the risk of losing a game?

    At the end if Yuvi had not fired, India would have lost.. Yuvi's knock made all the difference..

  15. Q said...
     

    NC: secretly, yes ;-).. nothing like watching so many upsets..

    As long as they're not against your own team..

    The Deshis are way too exciting though.. sad not good enough.

  16. Jonathan said...
     

    I thought WI would win... Aus just aren't in the T20 zone as a team (or selection panel).

    This shows in several ways. Apart form anything, even when they batted well, it was traditional attacking running. They didn't at all adjust to the possibilities of T20 in a small English ground.

  17. Q said...
     

    Jonathan,

    Welcome to Well Pitched.

    You might be correct abt Aus not getting used to T20 yet, but I think they did a great job getting to 170 after being 15-3.. not many teams would have gotten that far.

    After that it was all a Gayle show.. the result would have been quite different had they got Gayle early.

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