The World T20: Manic England’s Best & Worst, India's D-Day

 

The World T20

Manic England’s Best & Worst, India's D-Day

 

March 18^th  2016

 

Lessons from a crazy match:

 

1.      England will chase any total that they are set with a good chance of making the runs.

2.      The seamers are essentially helpless in this tournament against aggressive batsmen.

3.      For the remaining group games either Liam Plunkett (high pace) or a third spinner (Dawson) has to replace one of the seamers.

When the opposition are 96-0 after 7 overs, despite David Willey’s first over going for just two runs, you know that you have a real issue. Fans were thinking that England would be  chasing 250 at least, possibly more than 300. Certainly, any hope of a meaningful contest seemed misplaced and black humour suggested that South Africa would declare after ten overs and have enough to win (125-2) because England would surely collapse to a massive defeat.

The scenarios for qualification were clear: win and a win against Afghanistan would put England very close; lose and everything would hang on beating Afghanistan and Sri Lanka and other results falling in place; lose badly and it would be all but over mathematically.

What happened? The first thing was that in overs 11, 12 & 13, Adil Rashid and Moeen Ali imposed some control for the first time. Despite Adil Rashid’s first two overs going for 13 and 14, he had also got rid of AB de Villiers and Eoin Morgan, this time, allowed him to continue. The result was a period of three overs that went for just 14, with the bonus of Hashim Amla’s wicket. In the context of the match it was like bowling three straight maidens: they were by far the cheapest three overs of the match (the next best was the 20 that South Africa’s bowlers conceded in overs 7-9). It meant that thoughts of chasing 270-280 were forgotten: the chase would be huge, but not totally impossible with a team of attacking batsmen on a flat pitch. The last five overs added 63, but even that was far fewer than had seemed probable at one point.

Second, England were liberated by what appeared to be a near-impossible chase and came out swinging. Jason Roy hit 21 from the first over and Hales and Roy 23 from the second. Even though Hales fell to the fifteenth ball of the innings, after 3 overs England were 56-1 and the back of the chase was broken.

Third, South Africa’s bowling fell apart even worse than England’s had: 5 wides in the first over adding to Roy’s four boundaries; England gave away 2 wides (and 2 byes), South Africa offered 10 wides that gave away 20 runs. With the extra runs and balls keeping the score ticking over. England were never behind the run rate and could afford some quiet overs and even a mini-collapse at the end and still win with some comfort.

Over the next few days the qualifying scenario will unfold. In Group 2 – the group of death – it looks as if India’s game against Australia has become a virtual eliminator: two defeats for either side, both having lost their first game, would leave qualifying very difficult. However, India have an even bigger must-win game first. India play Pakistan before playing Australia and with the stakes high, a Pakistan win would leave the Australia v India game even more highly charged as India would have to win and even then would face elimination. With tensions so high between the regional rivals, things could get nasty, particularly if India look like losing the match. For India, home team and overwhelming pre-tournament favourites to start with two defeats, particularly if one of them is to their greatest rival, might be too much for some of their passionate fans to bear. Similarly, with two wins from two, like New Zealand, Pakistan would be almost through to the Semi-Finals. India will be under a lot of pressure and did not react well to it against New Zealand.

In Group 1, Sri Lanka v South Africa later in the week looks like a key game but, here, the qualifying scenario is less clear with only three games played: South Africa know that they have to win it.