England taking an absolute pounding here from SA. 114-2 off 9 overs. Could be a very large run chase.
33 off 1.3 overs in reply. :eek:
EDIT: Now 48 of 2.2
This ain’t your Dad’s LOI games.
OMG. What a start by England!
If they win it , that has to be a world record. Am I right?
No. But would be the second highest successful chase if they win -
70 off 42 needed, with 6 wickets left… on this pitch, I’d say it’s starting to swing England’s way here…
Joe Root has almost sealed it. well batted. This group is looking interesting
Out now. What was the review about? Looked like a clear out.
Full toss ball above waist height is an invalid delivery
But it was way below waist height as it turned out and was clear out as you said.
Didn’t know that. Thanks
England…win.
What a game.
Well, they made a bit of a meal of getting those last 2 runs, but a good win in the finish.
Still worried about the state of England’s bowling though. Yes, we may have batsmen capable of overcoming the weakness there, but there were too many poor balls.
Mind you, Steyn bowled 2 overs for 35.
As I said right at the top, England have decent firepower in the batting line up; the bowling is the weak spot. Cracking effort from Roy to get them off to a great start and the Joe Root for keeping it going.
Heart pounding near the end there though - convinced that they were in the process of throwing it away in that last over.
Failing to score 1 run from 6 balls with 4 wickets in hand would have been the choke of all chokes, credit to Ali as well for pulling himself together in the end. Amazing game of cricket. England bowled poorly, SA, were worse.
Cricket eh?..bloody hell.
There has been some chatter doing the rounds that Joe Root must be very close to the best ever English batsman across all versions of the game. I admit that if he isn’t yet…well I struggling to think of too many better.
As I’ve mentioned before he is a smart cricketer, he seems to know when to push and when to hold and that’s a rare quality indeed.
What should the theme song be to the “thoroughly amusing crapshoot”?
Benny Hill maybe?
Australia loses to New Zealand.
Watching Glen Maxwell’s plan to bat left handed against leg breaks and right handed against off breaks and some sort of hybrid when he couldn’t pick the spin would cause any 9yo batsman to get a royal bollocking from their coach.
Selected quotes from the linked article by Geoff Lemon might be in breach of the fair abuse rules, but they are a hoot.
ROFL.
Love it . 11-0 hahaha.
India over-dependent on Kohli. Bad thing. But that may mean others are due for a score. Bowling good, nothing extraordinary. Fielding pretty good.
Feel bad for Pak fans.
It was a spinners’ pitch. Both teams faltered in reading. Dhoni didn’t give enough overs to spin. Afridi played 1-2 spinner less.
Also, afridi batted up the order. Wasn’t suitable for this pitch.
And the West Indies win 2 from 2, and Sri Lanka looking a bit hopeless there. I’m hopeful now that England can turn over Sri Lanka and Afghanistan, and thus get through to the semis.
Next up is Australia v Bangladesh. For Australia to go through to the semis they’re probably going to have to do it via a superior run rate. That means they either need a big win here or for Pakistan to implode against them.
Alternatively, Bangladesh could give themselves a chance of making the finals with a win. They don’t appear to have been all that convincing against the associates but I’m seriously worried about Australia’s lack of effective spinners. It defies logic that Nathan Lyon was left at home.
Anyone following the Women’s event? There’s a weird level of concordance in the points tables between the two competitions, both currently topped by West Indies and New Zealand.
I’m hopeful, too, but doesn’t that rather rely on WI beating SA? If SA beat WI, it will come down to NRR, and England’s is worse than WI’s at the moment. If SA beat the other two by bigger margins than England manage, they could go through. Failure to hit a boundary of the first ball of the final over in Eng vs SA could yet prove costly!