Yeah, it’s shaping up to be a great final week of group play. Today’s games; Pakistan v South Africa and Ireland v Zimbabwe look pretty crucial.
**AK84 **Assuming South Africa finishes second in group B, they’ll almost certainly be playing the loser of tomorrow’s Australia v Sri Lanka game.
Pakistan now defending a low total on a rainy night, and looking very sharp about it with South Africa on 74 for 4 chasing 232. It’s like a different team. Good game to watch.
It is impossible to predict (RSA versus Pakistan). RSA were absolutely cruising and Pakistan were bowling rubbish. Now it has turned all around.
South Africa now 98 for 5, with overs not an issue (unless it rains).
Meanwhile Ireland have set Zimbabwe 331, very much keeping them in the running to get to the quarters.
Duminy and AB. Should win it.
Bye bye Duminy
And AB is making it look not difficult. It does seem as though the RSA team is a little fragile though.
Into the tail now, and de Villiers takes an easy single off the first ball of the over. WTF?
Bit of a mystery why guys were getting out playing shots when they wanted less than a run a ball with AB scoring at will.
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It does seem as though the RSA team is a little fragile though.
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I have not been impressed with RSA this tournament. Their batting is Amla, AB and sweet fuck all besides. Its brittle and has had the advantage of playing poor attacks. The time they have faced decent attacks (India) and a good one (today) they have been shown up.
No bloody way they will do well against either Aus or SL attacks in the KO stages.
Saturday nights at Eden park seems to do that to sides at the moment…
Great win for Pakistan, another superb game of cricket at Eden park. According to this Duckworth Lewis Calculator Pakistan still would have won if the rain arrived before they took the last wicket, but would have lost had South Africa only been 8 down at the time.
It started raining as soon as the last wicket fell.
Pakistan quicks have shown good venom and fire thus far this tournament. I wonder how Teuton’s assessment reads?
Totally agree. RSA I think have shown to be bullies against poor bowling. Anything with discipline- and as soon as you get rid of AB and Amla- will find them out.
Also, I think their bowling, while very good, is not what it has been. Although it is difficult to blame the bowlers for their losses.
I’m going to try and work out who is likely to play who in the finals. Wish me luck.
Whilst I agree that SA are not necessarily all they’re cracked up to be, this is still a very good result for Pakistan. It’s stuff like this that is exactly why I had them as a better chance for the semis than England back at he start of the thread. They’re by no means certain to go through yet, but underestimating them if they get to the quarters is a perilous exercise.
Well, I tried to work through it and have had to make several guesses as to who wins- such as Aus beating SL, and England winning their remaining matches.
My guess is ythat the pools will end up as:
A1 New Zealand
A2 Australia
A3 Sri Lanka
A4 England
B1 India
B2 RSA
B3 Pakistan
B4 WI
Be interesting to see how close that is.
With Pakistan beating SA today in a low scoring thriller, I think B2,B3,B4 will be the same teams but the order may change. Bit of a doubt w.r.t West Indies, though ! I wish they hang on to B4 atleast. India is now assured of topping pool-B.
I agree. The fact Zimbabwe got so close to Ireland tonight almost wrecked my calculations entirely- within a few hours!
I think NZ is assured of topping pool A- Australia and Sri Lanka may change positions.
Pakistan and Ireland have both won games. This actually puts a lot of pressure on the WI, who now have the worst record of the three, having played 5 and won 2.
South Africa, as I said in the last post, now have to play UAE, and a win there give them 8 points. If they choke it, though, it leaves them on 6 points, and likely fighting it out with other teams on 6 points for NRR.
Ireland have Pakistan and India to play - it’s going to be tough for them to win one of those, but they have 6 points as it stands. If Ireland can beat one of those, it will see them through.
The West Indies have a problem. They have a game against UAE which they should bleedin’ win, and if they do they get 6 points, which will pull them level against an Ireland that loses its two remaining games.
Pakistan are in a similar position to Ireland, except they only have one game to get points from. But if they can turn over the Irish, they will go through. If not, they will go against the WI for NRR.
Of the three teams, Pakistan has the best current NRR, followed by WI, followed by Ireland. Given that, in this situation, Ireland will have lost another two games - one of which against India, who are strong - their NRR will only have gotten worse if they need it. The WI, to get 6 points, need to get a win, so their NRR will be better if they need it.
Given all this, I think the final game (Ire vs Pak) will decide the group, but Pak are almost certain to go through after their win against SA. If Ireland can take another victory, they will win, but it’s a mountain to climb. Somehow, it looks like WI have done enough if they can get a win against UAE. They might want to make it a big one, though, to make sure of the NRR.
Given all that above, I’d Cicero has it right for group B, even though Ireland are currently in a better position than WI, they seem mostly likely to lose out. But they have shown themselves before to be perfectly capable of beating top opposition on their day, and Pak have been known to fall over if it’s not necessary for them to win. Pak can lose to Ireland and still qualify.
I’m not commenting on the England group, because the required assumption that England are going to beat Bangladesh seems optimistic. But surely…?
((looking back at my previous post, it seems I was assuming Pak would lose to SA. Seems I owe them an apology))
I’m with Teuton here - Group B looks like it’s coming down to the last game, with Ireland needing to beat Pakistan to avoid losing out on run rate. Of course Ireland could beat India, or WI lose to UAE, but neither looks terribly likely.
Group A is even simpler - Aus vs SL is a play-off for 2nd/3rd and England/Bangladesh is a play-off for the last qualifying spot (not that it matters, either team will get massacred in the QF).
But back to the cricket! Kudos to Pakistan for a great bowling performance and for giving the Cup a game it needed after too many one-sided thrashings.
SA have a serious split-personality problem - batting first their lowest score is 339, batting second they’ve been bowled out cheaply twice.
And once again the Associates give us a barn-burner - heartbreaker for Zimbabwe who went into the last over favourites to pull off the WC’s highest-ever chase.
Just popped in to say Jeeway Pakistan for AK84’s benefit. I went to bed last night thinking they were dead and buried, woke up to a nice surprise.