When Your Luck Is Out...

 

 

Cricket 2014

 

When Your Luck Is Out…

 

March 22^nd 2014

 

When a side’s luck is out you expect the Apocalypse. Sadly for England, it arrived two balls too late. Against a permanently underrated New Zealand side, England scored a more than passable 172, after a good powerplay and a small middle-over wobble. Everything look set for a great finish because, even if the critics moaned that it was 20 short of what it should have been, it was a good total – more than Sri Lanka or South Africa had managed in the first match of the day and a lot more than India and Pakistan had managed the previous night. Lumb, Ali, Buttler, Bopara and Bresnan all scored useful runs. In fact, apart from the luckless Hales, who got a first-baller, Morgan was the only batsman who could not manage a run-a-ball.

New Zealand made a decent start, but no better than England’s had been. Twenty-eight balls into the innings, lightning rent the sky and Brendon McCullum, not unnaturally, pulled out of his stance. With two balls needed to make a game and New Zealand behind on Duckworth-Lewis, the umpires chose, not unreasonably, to allow the game to go on to complete the two balls necessary to get the game in. With thunder crashing and rain just moments away, Brendon McCullum dug out a Yorker and then, as Broad reached for another and over-pitched, hammered the ball for what turned out to be the winning six.

Broad was not impressed, but then, with New Zealand comfortably behind on D-L, the 16 runs off his first and only over were the deciding factor in the match. The fact that Broad has made a habit of extremely expensive first overs recently is though distinctly alarming. What was less impressive was that with the South Africa v Sri Lanka match finishing late, the England game started late and New Zealand were slow in bowling their overs, meaning that the cut-off time was absurdly close; once the players came off the chances of getting back on again were minimal. It is no good bitching. T20 is often down to pot luck and, today, the cards fell in New Zealand’s favour. Had the circumstances been reversed, England would have taken the win, however achieved. The fact that, when the rain arrived New Zealand were 52-1 and England had been 51-1 shows how close the two sides were.

That all this followed another match that could have been a script from the 1970s series “Tales of the Unexpected” made it all more disappointing. With South Africa apparently cruising to an easy win, they somehow contrived to collapse horribly and lose by 5 runs. It will add another cipher to the legend of South Africa’s inability to perform under pressure in big tournaments and do nothing for their fragile confidence. Sri Lanka’s performance was good, their bowling solid, but nothing special when the opponent is so willing to commit suicide.

Tomorrow, Pakistan, who were distinctly underwhelming against India, will play the first match of the day against Australia. If Pakistan lose, they will be all but out of the competition after just three of the twenty group matches, needing to beat West Indies and Ireland by good margins and hope that other results go their way to have any chance of progressing. In such a strong group their chances of getting lucky are going to be pretty slim.

England will not play again until Thursday, when their match against Sri Lanka becomes a “must win”. By then South Africa will have played three matches and New Zealand and Sri Lanka two, so England will have the advantage (or not) of knowing how the group is panning-out and what exactly they have to do to qualify.