Cricket......

[Shebeen]

I have never got the feeling that Parnell is up to international standard. His batting technique is limited and his bowling is ill disciplined (that is putting it lightly).

That's nothing to do with talent, what I'm really saying is that he hasn't delivered on the promise shown - the rider here is that he could get better with time (even if he has been given enough chances). Any comparison to kallis is always going to be tenuous, we'll never see another jacques henry - maybe i could have gone further back into the drawer and said klusener or big mac.

 

it's actually quite concerning how the side could switch during the tournament...there's probably 6/7 guys who are definites and the other 4/5 slots could move around depending on conditions, form, opponents. I think dumping maclaren at this late stage was a mistake.

 

BUT...this world cup format is ridiculous, from what i can see. you just need to finish in the top four of your group, and then it's seeding in the 1/4 according to your world rankings....essentially the groups is still a time to experiment(and therefore no issue waiting on de kock)

[Shebeen]

32nd Match: India v South Africa at Adelaide - Mar 15, 1992

India 180/6 (30/30 ov); South Africa 181/4 (29.1/30 ov)

 

 

South Africa won by 6 wickets (with 5 balls remaining)

Scorecard

http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/65149.html

another match, another rain affected match. This one was fair to both teams really as it happened before a ball was bowled – 30 overs each, huzzah! We got smacked all over the park. 6 an over was unheard of – even the worst was that Kapil Dev who was a bowling allrounder really got 42 off 29 backing up Azzrahuddin’s 79 off 77. Richard Snell got a lot of tap, 46 off 6 overs, which was criminal in those days.

 

Very wisely with only 30 overs, and a run a ball they chose not to open with oh so slow Kepler, and instead hot form Kirsy took the slot with hudders(who got his 3^rd fifty in 4 games). They put on 128 for the opening wicket, and the middle order finished it off chop chop. MotM was again peter noel Kirsten for his 84 at almost a run a ball.

 

Victory assured South Africa of a semi-final appearance, unless politics intervened; Geoff Dakin, president of the United Cricket Board of South Africa, said he would feel obliged to withdraw if the all-white referendum two days later rejected constitutional reform. Pakistan and West Indies, however, urged them to remain, and a decisive vote for reform made the matter academic.

 

 

 

And this was the end of the round robin for us. Some real surprises - kiwis topped the log, aussies didn't even make the playoffs. Interestingly the kiwis only lost one game - the final one against pakistan. they were guaranteed to be top of the log, but losing this one meant that australia were out...and therefore they got a home semi final. You can imagine the grumbling from across the tasman!

 

pakistan sneaked through themselves, needing aus to lose their final game against the windies...which is what happened.

TeamPtsPldWLNRTRDRR

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3e/Flag_of_New_Zealand.svg/23px-Flag_of_New_Zealand.svg.png New Zealand14871000.594.76

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/b/be/Flag_of_England.svg/23px-Flag_of_England.svg.png England11852100.474.36

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/67/Flag_of_South_Africa_1928-1994.svg/23px-Flag_of_South_Africa_1928-1994.svg.png South Africa10853000.144.36

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/32/Flag_of_Pakistan.svg/23px-Flag_of_Pakistan.svg.png Pakistan9843100.174.33

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/b/b9/Flag_of_Australia.svg/23px-Flag_of_Australia.svg.png Australia8844000.204.22

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/18/WestIndiesCricketFlagPre1999.svg/23px-WestIndiesCricketFlagPre1999.svg.png West Indies8844000.074.14

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/41/Flag_of_India.svg/23px-Flag_of_India.svg.png India5825100.144.95

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/11/Flag_of_Sri_Lanka.svg/23px-Flag_of_Sri_Lanka.svg.png Sri Lanka582510−0.684.21

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6a/Flag_of_Zimbabwe.svg/23px-Flag_of_Zimbabwe.svg.png Zimbabwe281700−1.144.03

Edited January 26, 2015 by Shebeen

['Dale]

World Cup Prep:

 

5th ODI:

 

Quinton de Kock will make his comeback just five weeks after tearing ankle ligaments at the same ground and will open the batting with his regular partner Hashim Amla, who also leads the side in AB de Villiers' absence

[Shebeen]

World Cup Prep:

 

5th ODI:

 

Quinton de Kock will make his comeback just five weeks after tearing ankle ligaments at the same ground and will open the batting with his regular partner Hashim Amla, who also leads the side in AB de Villiers' absence

Well I f@#$ well hope he is ready....if he's 90% match fit then they are seriously gambling here.

 

We got a quick glimpse of AB the fielder the other day, don't really need him with the gloves.

 

[also of interest, AB the captain. in the 4th game he used something like 24 bowling changes. I'm not convinced that's a good thing at all]

[Shebeen]

2nd SF: England v South Africa at Sydney - Mar 22, 1992

England 252/6 (45/45 ov); South Africa 232/6 (43/43 ov, target: 252)

England won by 19 runs (revised target)

Scorecard | Article index (3) | Photo index (3)

http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/match/65155.html

 

Ok. This is the ONE that got away. The 22 off one ball match. Where we got ROBBED due to a stupid rule.

Some much better people than me have written about it here - http://www.espncricinfo.com/wctimeline/content/story/280142.html

And here - http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/content/story/508066.html

 

http://www.espncricinfo.com/db/PICTURES/CMS/120100/120126.jpg

 

With a bit of perspective, we can see how harsh it really was. Firstly, we got lucky in the pool match against Pakistan with the rain rule, we almost beat England in the pool game due to the rain rule. It was so loaded towards the team batting first. We won the toss, and put England in. JISLAAIKIT Kepler, wasn’t that a *** idea? When the rain came, oh crap.

 

Secondly – England tonked us all over the place. They were going great guns at 252/6 after 45 overs with Lewis and Reeve both going run a ball when the innings stopped. This was because of our slow over rate. Now how silly is that rule? Basically bowl slowly and you just wipe off the death overs? We were always slow, and this time Donald and Pringle bowling 7 wides and 7 no balls between them was clearly a factor. Remember back then, wides were real flippen wides, not this inch down the legside and it’s arms out like today.

 

Where we fell short in our chase was that Kirsy failed. His 11 off 26 was way below the rest of his tournament. He had a runner from the start, maybe using Kepler as the runner was a mistake…jonty Rhodes instead, maybe? Everyone got into double figures, but no one pushed on.

When the rain came (it was just 12 minutes of rain/lost play) we needed 23 off 13. The fact that Big Mac and Dave Richardson had scored just a single boundary off the 31 balls they faced would point to it maybe being a bit out of reach. 

 

 

As it is, we can Duckworth/Lewis the game, retrospectively. The 45 over England total becomes a target of 273..and then down to 257 off the 43. So the margin of loss would have gone from the original 19 runs to a larger 25 runs under Duckworth Lewis. We didn’t deserve to win, simple as that. We got a moral victory, as we had a (rain assisted) win over eventual Champions, pakistan. The same pakistan who only really got to the semis due to a point from their pool game against england..where they got bowled our for 74....and then it rained (check the england target!)- http://www.espncricinfo.com/wisdenalmanack/content/story/150877.html

 

 

 

In the Independent, Martin Johnson was typically forthright. "Had Martians landed at the SCG they would have concluded there was no intelligent life on earth and gone home." But he also laid the blame for their loss firmly at the feet of the defeated side. "The tears shed by non-South Africans last night would barely have filled an eggcup. Not only did they choose to bat second after winning the toss on a day that had blown in straight from Manchester but they also resorted to tactics that reassured us that the cynical side of South African sport has not disappeared after 22 years in isolation."

http://www.espncricinfo.com/db/PICTURES/CMS/71700/71787.2.jpg

Big Mac was my actual schoolteacher at the time. Were *** scared of him, but still asked him why he stuffed up the run chase (Sir, why didn't you hit a six off the last ball?)

[Shebeen]

there's some youtube magic from this VHS age

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v9XKmLve7vc

 

and here's the toss where Kepler goes for the bowl...gooch is a little bit surprised!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBOaMJmcVi0

[RFC311]

Faf not good enough needs to be dropped

['Dale]

Amla just gathers those runs

What a batsman

Wow

[GLuvsMtb]

Faf not good enough needs to be dropped

With an average of just under 35 and a strike rate of around 85 he'll find a spot in any other team bar perhaps Aus and India.

Its good to see Rossouw hitting some form. It will give him a huge boost. Like Faf he's been up and down the order making it difficult to settle.

[RFC311]

Personally I think QDK AMLA RR AB MILLER JPD FBE VERNON DALE MORNE TAAHIR should be our 1st choice team

 

I think the cricket team is the only South African major national team tht the players are ther on merit and not just quota players

Edited January 28, 2015 by RFC311

[dev null]

Abbot is just not good enough.  We should be looking at a bowler that actually thinks before he lets the ball rip.  He was just plain lucky to get Gayle's wicket.

[DJ84]

Personally I think QDK AMLA RR AB MILLER JPD FBE VERNON DALE MORNE TAAHIR should be our 1st choice team

 

I think the cricket team is the only South African major national team tht the players are ther on merit and not just quota players

 

I still think that we should have 5 bowlers and a part timer (JP),

that leaves no place for Berhardien.

my fifth would probably be Abbot even though he has bowled poorly in this series with Parnell as my backup. Both would only need to bowl 5-7 overs.

 

Riley has played well this series kind of, he is very hit and miss.

Go look how many games he has played and how many times he has scored less than 10.

This series was also very poor for SA before the WCup.

It was shown if you just hung around a bit you will get terrible balls and could really capitalize.

 

I would still have Faf as number 3 in other words.

[Shebeen]

got the backing of some top pundits already, martin crowe in this instance.

http://www.espncricinfo.com/magazine/content/story/824591.html

 

At a rough guess, assuming that both hosts get to play at home no matter where they finish in pool play, the quarters may read: New Zealand (A1) to beat West Indies (B4) in Wellington, Australia (A2) to beat Pakistan (B3) in Melbourne, England (A3) to beat India (B2) in Adelaide, Sri Lanka (A4) to lose to South Africa (B1) in Sydney. Semis to be: New Zealand beating England in Auckland, Australia losing to South Africa in Sydney.

So I'm picking a new champion to be crowned. My heart says the Black Caps, my head suggests the Proteas.

[Mr Winter]

got the backing of some top pundits already, martin crowe in this instance.

http://www.espncricinfo.com/magazine/content/story/824591.html

 

At a rough guess, assuming that both hosts get to play at home no matter where they finish in pool play, the quarters may read: New Zealand (A1) to beat West Indies (B4) in Wellington, Australia (A2) to beat Pakistan (B3) in Melbourne, England (A3) to beat India (B2) in Adelaide, Sri Lanka (A4) to lose to South Africa (B1) in Sydney. Semis to be: New Zealand beating England in Auckland, Australia losing to South Africa in Sydney.

So I'm picking a new champion to be crowned. My heart says the Black Caps, my head suggests the Proteas.

Lets hope this is what actually happens

 

RR and the middle order has impressed me this season, we haven't panicked when we have lost early wickets and we also haven't allowed the run rate to dry up to next to nothing. Again I don't think West Indies have been at their best so I hope we can continue with this form and mental approach when facing tougher opponents.

 

I was expecting big things from Abbott but I didn't think it would be his runs conceded column.

 

Looking forward to the world cup to kick off 

[Shebeen]

Jarrod Kimber is probably* my favourite cricket scribe.

 

Here's his preview to the CWC

 

 

THINGS TO WATCH OUT FOR IN THE WORLD CUP

South Africa
There were World Cups before South Africa came back into cricket, and they matter, and all have their own appeal. But through sheer drama, hissy fits, counting errors, dropped sitters, 12th-man sledging, panic-running, Richie Benaud rain calculations and the c word, South Africa have owned the World Cup like no other team since 1992. 

http://cricketwithballs.com/2015/01/29/things-to-watch-out-for-in-the-world-cup/

 

 

would win hands down if he wasn't...an aussie

[Shebeen]

moving on to the next world cup.

 

 

2nd Match: South Africa v United Arab Emirates at Rawalpindi - Feb 16, 1996

South Africa 321/2 (50/50 ov); United Arab Emirates 152/8 (50/50 ov)

South Africa won by 169 runs

Scorecard | Photo index (1)

 

A lot had changed since that fateful Sydney night in 1992. For starters, we were no longer under the radar – and were now one of the favourites for the title. Under Hansie and Bob Woolmer we were flippen good at one day cricket. You can treat this first game as a tame warm up really, the UAE probably just held an internal tournament at their migrant worker compounds with the promise of a return ticket home.

 

Once again it was kirsy as MoTM, just this time it wasn’t peter, but his younger half brother Gazza. 188 not out, I’m sure the bowling was ***. Their batting wasn’t much better – 8/70 they must have been ready for the Castle. An unbroken 9^th wicket partnership of 80+ was probably just agreed on just for the sake of run rates not looking too stupid.

 

http://www.espncricinfo.com/db/PICTURES/CMS/72300/72311.jpg

i think this oke facing Allan Donald with just a wide brimmed hat pretty much sums up the UAE effort. more balls than experience. (he was the Captain nogal!)

Edited January 29, 2015 by Shebeen