Super 8's preview and predictions

India's out and it just got a bit more boring

Though, we all agree, they deserved to go, while Bangladesh thoroughly deserve it!

But still, one can be sad that the clash between India and Pakistan is not going to happen anymore. That was going to be one fun match. But there are still some epic games left. I am looking forward to Eng-Aus, NZ-Aus, and especially SL playing anyone. More on this in a few paragraphs.

Is the criticism on this World Cup's format justified?

I read some dude talking about how just 2 bad games in the first round was more than enough to kick a good side out of the World Cup. He concluded that such a format was not the right one for ensuring that the best teams play each other in the super 8's.

Well, that's retarded! This is the World Cup after all, teams should be playing their best and their hardest, and yes, 2 bad days SHOULD be enough to boot a good team. If they're good, then they should under-perform. Pakistan and India obviously didn't play well and were beaten by better sides on that day. So, I think the fellow's argument is a bit skewed and he is probably just hurt.

Bangladesh and Ireland's chances

Pretty much zilch to be honest, but Bangladesh have a shot for the semis. They have the capability of beating England, West Indies and New Zealand on their day. I hate predicting stuff, plus I am nowhere as good as this chap, so I'll just discuss match-ups and leave the predictions up to you.

My final four

No sooner than I said I don't do predictions, here I am telling you who I think the semi-finalists will be. I lie.

Australia, South Africa, New Zealand, Sri Lanka.

Yes Sir. That's it. No England. No Ireland. No Bangladesh, and no West Indies. Well, maybe West Indies. It's either West Indies or New Zealand, I believe. But I'll probably change my prediction anyway by the time the semi-finals come around and I find out I was wrong. I'll subsequently edit this entry, announce that I was right in my predictions all along, and that I am the best.

Yeah. That's right. It's not so difficult to edit this blog entry. I have the password.

Who do I want as the WC champion?

Sri Lanka! Yup. I really like these guys. Been a big Lanka supporter for years now. I know you couldn't tell. But lets hope these plucky buggers can bring us the World Cup.

Michael Mason and Mohd. Akram - brothers from a different mother?

While watching Davison spank Mason around the park this afternoon, I thought to myself, "My goodness, this Mason fellow is pretty ugly!"

I also thought (credit to billu.net for pointing it out) the female New Zealanders in the audience were bloody gorgeous! So the next time my dorky circle of friends ask me to go to accompany them to New Zealand, so we can kiss the earth where Frodo and Gandalf walked, I think I'll oblige.

Anyway, back to the point at hand. Mason reminds me of Mohammad Akram, who plays for Surrey I believe, and commentates once in a while in a strange manner, and is clearly someone who one would look at and say, "EW"!

On another tangent, speaking of Akram's commentary skills, I remember some TV host asking Akram about his preferred Pakistani starting XI, before some Eng-Pak test match last year, and Akram named 13 players. The host was quite confused, as was I, but thankfully Robin Smith (the other 'expert') was seated next to Akram, and clarified on his behalf. Point being, Akram and Mason are ugly while Robin Smith is a nice chap.

Anyway, judge the striking resemblance for yourself.

Back from California: omarlovescricket returns to cricket blogging

Ah - I'm back from sunny San Francisco. It was a welcome break away from the bitter cold. Though, upon my return, I learned that the weather this past weekend at home was actually pretty warm. Balls! Such is my luck.

What you missed
Fans and haters of omarlovescricket must visit the Bay area at some point. There is no cricket there, unfortunately, but there are plenty of wineries, even more wineries, spectacular views and great food! It's a beautiful city. Very picturesque.

Cricket stuff I missed
Upon my return, I was excited to learn that Australia have been white-washed in New Zealand. Well that's spectacular news! Always refreshing to see the great Aussies getting whipped. Naturally, Gilchrist followed up their embarrassing series loss with the expected, "We didn't really want to tour New Zealand in the first place" argument. Well, Mr. Gilchrist, boo fucking hoo!

Mathew Hayden smashed 181 runs! Bloody hell. King can't be too pleased about this. Apparently Hayden also poked fun at Inzi after his feat, which doesn't make me too happy either.

I was gone for a week, which is adequate time for a Pakistani controversy. Apparently Woolmer called Shoaib Akhtar "blacky". Sigh....

Ahmer sums it up.

Pakistan is also in the midst of dope testing all its players. The whole world awaits the results...

Michael Holding, another omarhatescricket favorite, in an undiplomatic manner, slams the associate nations playing the World Cup. Zainub at Sundries sums it up. Though I agree with Holding, I also recognize that the ICC isn't perhaps doing enough to promote the quality of cricket in these nations. I am, however, confidant that these nations will improve with time.

And last but not least, another cricketing hate list spawns. Billu.net has recently just launched a blog series discussing (or rather cursing) various characters they don't want to ever invite for dinner.

England finally beat Australia

Australia's utter dominance down under in this Commonwealth Bank series against New Zealand and England made this series quite boring to follow. Though its good to see England finally beating Australia. No doubt, this victory will do them a world of good. I glanced at the points table and both New Zealand and Eng are tied with 9 points apiece. They both have a chance of making it to the final.

The batting finally came together, with Joyce providing the anchor and everyone batting around him. Its tough to score a century anyway, and for his maiden century to be against Australia in such trying times is an even bigger deal.

I'm also pleased to see Australia getting whipped in this game. Arguably, their loss shows their over-reliance on their skipper, Ricky Ponting, who was rested for this game. Now wouldn't it be amusing if England make it to the final and beat Australia? Well, unlikely as that may be, it would the dreamiest way to end this dreadful and demoralizing winter tour.

Malinga rocks!

I like this guy. He bowls full tosses and gets people bowled! He's quite the town of the town in New Zealand these days. He just wrecked their top order and got a 5 wicket haul in the first inning of the second test. They're definitely finding him too hard to read and have no clue what hit them.

That's awesome.

What I don't like is all the excuses the New Zealanders are making. Apparently the umpires black trousers are distracting their vision when he bowls! I heard the commentators say something about how the umpire gets in the way.

You know what? Stop making excuses. If you're getting bowled on full tosses, there is something wrong with your technique and footwork. As soon as anyone comes up with a unique action, people start complaining about how its not cricket and all that nonsense. I even read a couple of forums where these fools were accusing Malinga of chucking!

What rubbish! Malinga is cool, has a fun haircut and is aggressive (bowls either at the batsman's head or their feet!). His action is slingy, and not a chuck and all this make him an exciting player to watch.

Muralitharan's runout

Charlie Austin's bulletin from CricInfo...

...Sangakkara glanced a single to bring up his century.

But as Sangakkara started to raise his hands aloft in celebration, Muralitharan had a brainstorm, tapping his bat into the crease and then leaving it again to congratulate Sangakkara while the ball was still live. Brian Jerling, the square leg umpire, motioned to Muralitharan that over had not been called, but it was too late and Brendon McCullum whipped off the bails. Muralitharan may justifiably claim that the dismissal was not within the spirit of the game, but it was within the letter of the law and, for a cricketer of his immense experience, it was a moment of unpardonable madness.

Now lets be honest here. It was unsportsman-like of New Zealand. Screw the letter of the law. In situations like these, the entire world is willing to shove the 'letter'. Murali was clearly not running the second run and had already made his ground. I was shocked to see it unfold on tv. And after you make your ground, you're bloody safe. Its common sense, after all. It was the end of the over and the leg umpire was already walking towards to the crease. Sangakarra had just made such an important century, shuffling around with the tail and it was plain to see the New Zealanders were desperate to get the last wicket.

The umpire had no choice but to give it out. He has to follow the rules. There is no fault there but if he had let it pass, it wouldn't be such an issue either.

New Zealand should not have appealed. McCullum is a bastard.

Parore accuses Pakistani pacemen of dabbling in dope since the 90's

Adam Parore in the New Zealand Herald wrote a very interesting article about how this drug controversy just served to compound his already-held beliefs that Pakistani bowlers have been taking performance enhancing drugs for a while. Here are the relevant pieces of his column.

The only thing surprising about the two Pakistan players failing drugs tests is that it hasn't happened sooner. Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif failed tests for the steroid nandrolone and are out of the Champions Trophy. They have a hearing coming up this week and B samples to confirm the findings. If the results are confirmed they should have the book thrown at them, which means a two-year ban, although they might escape with a far shorter suspension, given that the Pakistan board is acting as the judicial panel.

I'm certain this has been going on for years with Pakistan's fast bowlers. We often looked sideways at what some of them were able to achieve. It's not normal to bowl 25 overs on a searing hot day and seem to get faster as the day wears on. I remember thinking more than once in the subcontinent, "somethings not right here". I prided myself on being pretty fit during my career. I'd look at some of these guys and think "you can't do that".

Well, naturally I was startled by his accusation. So I decided to see if atleast the games he played in showed something interesting or maybe alluded to the fact that the Pakistani fast bowlers might be doping. ....

Adam Parore has played only 2 tests in Pakistan, in the 1996/97 season.

New Zealand won the first one by 44 runs. Here are Pakistan's bowling figures for the first innings....

Bowling O M R W
Waqar Younis 15 3 48 4
Shahid Nazir 8 3 15 1
Mushtaq Ahmed 22.1 4 59 4
Saqlain Mushtaq 12 3 24 1

and the second innings....

Bowling O M R W
Waqar Younis 15 6 26 1
Shahid Nazir 16 1 84 1
Mushtaq Ahmed 32 8 84 6
Saqlain Mushtaq 22.2 4 95 2 (1nb)

Hmm...Nothing untoward here. Spinners routinely bowl large chunks of overs. But as Parore was talking about 25+ overs bowled in a day AND the bowler getting faster and faster, I assume he was talking about Waqar and Shahid, who bowled..well..you can read it yourself....less than 20 overs each.

It's possible that Shahid and Waqar bowled them at a stretch....did they? I read the match report as well. Nothing stood out here. Apparently NZ well and truly beat us on the 3rd day. Simon Doull doing most of the damage.

# Day 1: New Zealand 155, Pakistan 52/5 (Saleem Malik 11*, Moin Khan 5*)
# Day 2: Pakistan 191, New Zealand 88/3 (Fleming 12*, Astle 3*)
# Day 3: New Zealand 311, Pakistan 46/5 (Saleem Malik 15*, Mohammad Wasim 0*)

The kiwis only batted 57 overs on the first day. Got Pakistan all out by the middle of the 2nd. And batted till the 3rd. Which means Pakistan bowled at the kiwis in their 2nd innings on the 2nd and 3rd day. So, there is no way, anyone bowled a bunch of overs continously.

The tall and bearded paceman Simon Doull had destroyed the Pakistani batting by claiming five wickets for 46 runs in the first innings. He took three wickets for 39 runs in the second innings, despite having cramps in his thigh, to have a match haul of eight for 85. Simon Doull was declared the "Man-of-the-Match".

There is not much here about the Pakistani pace bowlers, except on the first day, when Waqar took 4 on a seaming track. But by then NZ was all out pretty soon after tea, and Waqar had bowled only 15 overs.
--------------------------------

Maybe the 2nd test had something funny occurrence happen? Maybe a fast bowler went crazy and bowled a 100 overs. Lets see.

Bowling O M R W
Mohammad Zahid 21 5 64 4 (9nb)
Shahid Nazir 9 3 23 0
Mohammad Akram 12 1 48 0
Mushtaq Ahmed 30 3 87 6
Saleem Malik 2 0 9 0 (1nb)

and...

Bowling O M R W
Mohammad Zahid 20 3 66 7 (12nb, 1w)
Mohammad Akram 7 2 11 0
Mushtaq Ahmed 22 7 52 2 (1nb)
Shahid Nazir 7 1 19 1
Saleem Malik 2 0 13 0

No need to write down the boring details, but one can infer from the match analysis, the number of overs....etc...that no fast bowler bowled more than 25 in a day. In fact, never more than 15.

# Day 1: New Zealand 215/8 (Germon 45*, Patel 6*)
# Day 2: New Zealand 249, Pakistan 269/2 (Saeed Anwar 130*, Mushtaq Ahmed 1*)
# Day 3: Pakistan 430, New Zealand 69/0 (Young 38*, Vaughan 26*)

This was Mohammad Zahid's debut. He got 7 wickets in the 2nd innings. But did he bowl his 20 overs at a stretch? I looked at the match report...

PAKISTAN completed an emphatic victory by an innings and 13 runs against New Zealand in the second and final Test at the Rawalpindi Cricket Stadium to draw the Wills Series.

The match was over a mere 53 minutes after lunch on the fourth day, when New Zealand, who were facing a first-innings deficit of 181, were shattered by 20-year-old medium-pacer Mohammad Zahid to be all out for 168 after having resumed at 69 without loss.

Zahid, from Gaggu Mandi in the Punjab, near the village where Waqar Younis hails from, pulverised the Kiwis' batting by taking seven wickets for 66 to finish with match figures of 11 for 130 to secure the man of the match award and also become the first Pakistan bowler to capture 10 wickets or more on his debut.

Of medium height but with a strong shoulder, Zahid started his rout with the first five of the six wickets that fell before lunch to reduce New Zealand to 137 for six. Moving the ball both ways and extracting a great deal of swing off the pitch, he was too hot to handle once Justin Vaughan was lbw for 27 after sharing an opening stand of 82 with Bryan Young.

Adam Parore, dropped by Inzamam-ul-Haq in the slips off leg-spinner Mushtaq Ahmed when one, was Zahid's next victim, rapped on the pad in front of the wicket as the ball cut back. Young, the only player to bat with authority, hit 61, with six fours in 174 minutes, before slashing a catch to gully. When captain Lee Germon was deceived off a swinging yorker and Nathan Astle fell lbw, Zahid had taken five for 47 in 11 overs, his first five-wicket Test haul.

I still don't know how many overs were bowled in the 3rd day when New Zealand were batting. But I can make some assumptions...

They ended that day at 69 runs. If they went at 3 runs an over, 23 overs were bowled. If 5 runs an over, then 14 overs were bowled. Since its the new ball, we can assume all the bowlers were pacemen. Since Zahid bowled 20 overs in that innings total, he could have bowled up to 12 of those overs, or 7 at a minimum.

Point being....Parore is has no basis for his accusations....