Yuvraj Singh - again! Not sure if he can replicate his buckle & swash in proper cricket, but he's certainly on a roll in Sorth Efrica. So is Sreesanth. Serious question: Is he the worst behaved cricketer? The consensus around here is that he's a fuckenidiot! Just imagine the rumpus if he was an Aussie.
Still, it seems to me there's way too much in-depth analysis expended on T20.
Are Australia soft in the middle?
India's achievement in winning the cracker of a semi-final - and ensuring that there will be one world trophy without Australia's name on it - can hardly be overstated. Or can it? Were there signs of weakness in the Australian team from the start?
Losing to Zimbabwe was a shock of Krakatoan proportions. Ultimately, of course, it didn't matter: England suffered the backlash and the Aussie vehicle rolled on in to the Super Eights, the dent to the bodywork revealed to be no more than a scratch.
One pattern to emerge from the tournament is that successful teams can take the loss of three or four top-order wickets in their stride. Yes, a bit of careful rebuilding is required - take the singles and ensure no more wickets fall - but keep some big-hitters at the crease and hope remains. Pakistan came back from three early wickets against Sri Lanka and four against Australia. New Zealand almost seemed to base their approach around a rescue act from Craig McMillan.
It also seems to me Straya need to get Errol Alcott back.
India knock out Aussies as toll mounts
AUSTRALIA has been knocked out of the Twenty20 World Cup in the semi-finals by India, with the tournament taking a terrible injury toll on the world champions.
India will now play Pakistan in the final at Johannesburg tomorrow.
Mike Hussey became the third Australian to suffer a hamstring strain in a week as Australia went down to India by 15 runs in an entertaining, high scoring clash here early this morning AEST.
He will have scans today when the team returns to Johannesburg to determine the extent of the injury and is in doubt for Australia’s one-day tour of India. The team leaves on Tuesday for the seven match series, which also includes a Twenty20 match.
If we had taken this tournament seriously, we would have won it. But we didn't and we haven't. That said, other teams have raised their games (for a change). Sreesanth bowled and played with venom, India's fielding has been better, Yuvraj batted powerfully, Tanvir Sohail played well, Shahid Afridi improved, Pakistan's fielding improved out of sight...etc
Australia will settle down, experience the pain of losing, and get back to winning. Paper Cut will get an extended domestic run - and we'll see him in a year or two if he pulls up. Hussey, Symonds and Clarke will improve with a run, and Ponting will be back to full fitness for the ODIs against India. The bowling has been generally good - Clark, Johnson and Lee in particular, and the fielding will improve over the summer.
India and Pakistan will enjoy playing for the Twenty20 cup - good luck to them.
ps Port will win next week at a canter
Posted by: nick | 23 September 2007 at 14:50
I hope India and Pakistan have another bowl-off. They are like penalty shoot-outs and thus massively entertaining. Perhaps the natural progression is from Tests to 50/50 to 20/20 to bowl-offs. No point wasting twenty overs carting cannon fodder when you can head straight to the good stuff.
Posted by: Tony T. | 23 September 2007 at 16:38
They should have a sledge-off. Far more entertaining, more skill involved, and more relevant to the skills used in a real match.
Posted by: nick | 23 September 2007 at 17:51
"If we had taken this tournament seriously, we would have won it. But we didn't and we haven't."
Sorry Nick, that's bullshit...
In my experience Australians take ALL competitive sport seriously - knock about cricket on the beach, touch rugby in Corfu, a darts match down at the Bulls Head in Chislehurst - even a piggy-back race carrying our respective younger children with my (Australian) brother-in-law in Melbourne on New Years Eve...
Posted by: Mark | 23 September 2007 at 20:25
Was there some cricket on recently? Did we lose?
Posted by: CB | 23 September 2007 at 21:09
CB has summed up my response to Mark.
Posted by: nick | 23 September 2007 at 22:43
Papering over the issues.
Theories abound about Watson's problems. The most common is that even though he's refined his training, he's still too muscular and his gymnasium-sculpted body isn't right for a cricketer. Australia's former fitness adviser Jock Campbell has worked extensively with Watson, and disagrees. He says the Queenslander's latest breakdown is beyond cruel and just plain unlucky.
"He's bowled with stress fractures in his back, he can play when he's hurting - there's no doubt about that," Campbell said. "He'll fight back, he always does. He has to believe he's unlucky and that next time, he'll be right.
"You can't start thinking you're injury prone. Imagine if Watto didn't work as hard as he did. Imagine how many more injuries he'd have.
"You can have someone with George Gregan's physique playing Test rugby for decade and hardly getting hurt, and you can have someone as strong as Shane Watson breaking down. It's impossible to explain."
Posted by: nick | 23 September 2007 at 22:56
logically, the australian team should ban the use of hamstrings in T20
Posted by: Saltation | 25 September 2007 at 05:17
As I've mentioned before, its an absolute batslotto that can't be taken seriously. Sure the good sides will be up there but it follows a logical progression downwards. Zimbabwe can't take a trick in the long form of the game, are shite at the 50 over version but somehow come out and outplay the Aussies here.
Anyone of 5 or 6 sides could have won this tournament quite comfortably (India/Paki's/NZ/Aus/Safa's/SL) whereas realistically it goes down to 3 or 4 in the 50 over version and really only one or two in the main game.
Still even considering its a joke as far as a World Cup goes, its still value for two or three games a summer to change up the sameness of the 50 over game. But test cricket is still where its at as far as I'm concerned.
Grats to India too. On Sreesanth, fair enough if you do it once while taking an important wicket to fire up your side, but would he do the same to Brett Lee if they had to bat second? Hopefully he does in the upcoming series.
Posted by: Adsy | 25 September 2007 at 14:31
I think that whole Aussies-Always-Try-Like-Buggery thing is overstated. It's more, man-for-man we have a lot of good sportspersons.
But I do think we tried in the T20 matches the last couple of weeks, it's just that we were under-prepared and less keen on the idea than other teams who see T20 as a good chance to pinch a match off the world champs.
I'm going to post about the article 13th Man linked to in the footy post.
And it's not the Twenty20 World Cup, it's the ICC World Twenty20 Championships. The first Twenty20 World Cup is not until 2009. This present fandango is, not surprisingly, just another ICC money spinner.
Posted by: Tony T. | 25 September 2007 at 17:32
A search: cop this.
Posted by: Tony T. | 25 September 2007 at 17:40