The Cricket Thread

[happybaboon]

Predictions for todays game?
I think Bangladesh will bat first. Get 180ish. 8 wicket win by NZ. Big hit out by McCullum and Taylor.

Not bad - you got the half time score (considering they were 25/5)... now let's see how acurate you are on NZ's reply

[wondering if NZ bowlers feed them at the end to make sure we had half a decent target to chase...]

So, I'd give myself about a 7.5/10 for that. 5 wickets down rather than 2, but part of that was Taylor wanting to finish it with one massive smash - if he played conservatively it would have probably been 2 wickets down. Also McCullum didn't smash it... but Taylor's epic smashez kind of make up for that.

[fatwombat]

Now needing 133 off 12 overs

How many overs in a one-dayer again?

Silly wombat had me worried for a second. I had no idea how requiring 133 off 12 could have possibly come about.
People who dunno whats going on should get outta the cricket thread

. . . Yeah, I felt really silly when it got to 18 overs and they were 80 runs short but the commentators didn't seem to care, then I saw they still had 32 overs to go

Anyway I was right that losing McCullum didn't matter and that getting Taylor in would make the difference, for an aussie that shows very advanced cricket awareness!! With a bit of effort I might even get up to your level . . .

[BrokenKonaRider]

Powerplay called by Taylor!

...four overs ago

Hey, I'm working off cricinfo here. Have we won yet?

[happybaboon]

Anyway I was right that losing McCullum didn't matter and that getting Taylor in would make the difference, for an aussie that shows very advanced cricket awareness!! With a bit of effort I might even get up to your level . . .

Mate, you can't even sledge properly. What kind of Aussie are you?
Go give one of your mates a loving pat on the arse mate.

[fatwombat]

Sorry, that wasn't meant to be a sledge, did it really sound like one? I enjoy 20-20 and I love test cricket, but I find the 50 over game too boring to follow.

I tend to agree with Shane Warne that it's not worth fiddling around with to make it more interesting, the format should just be dropped, but in the other hand I sort of like Tendulkar's suggestion that they should make it a 2-innings game. His point is that if a bowler does a crap over and goes for 20, he can make up for it in subsequent overs (like Johnson against the Windies last night) but a great batsmen who plays one bad shot early is out of the game with no chance to make up for his error - so the game doesn't offer a fair battle between bowler and batsman Being a batsman himself, you can understand why Tendulkar's concerned about it! The other issue with the length of a 50-over game is that the significance of changing ground conditions and weather conditions is huge, and lopsided, having 2 innings would at least even this out a bit.

In today's context, how much more interesting would it be if the top batsmen - Iqram, Asraful, McCullum - could have gone in for a second go... and for the bowlers to have a second go at them!

PS - Jeez mate, it took your lazy buggers nearly 30 overs to get up to 185 - and even for that they needed the Bangers to score 14 of the runs!

[happybaboon]

Rubbish. I find a ODI between two of the good teams to be great fun. Especially now the power plays allow for periods of epic smashing to occur. Almost all of my favourite cricket-watching moments are from ODIs, and I hope they keep them going.

[pb]

Perhaps it should be about 7 innings each. Oh wait, thats Baseball.

50 over cricket is still awesome. Three versions of the same game with totally different stylez. Keep them all I say.

[mundi]

20/20 is just a spectacle and an exhibition to drum up interest in cricketand cater to the ADD affected people of today with attention spans like goldfish. Whilst it is very exciting and entertaining, 50 over and test cricket are the truer forms of the game, whislt 20/20 is closer to backyard cricket than the real thing ( though no where near as bad as Cricket MAX was!)
Keep 20/20 as an exhibition showcase at the start and/or finish of a series.
Long live test cricket.

[fatwombat]

Hey: did you see today (Tuesday)'s game - Aus versus Windies? I think the Aussies must have been so impressed by the kiwis yesterday that they decided to stage a re-enactment! Look how similar the figures were:
Kiwis held visitors to 183/8 off 50 overs
Aussies held visitors to 170/10 off 39.4

Kiwis chased down total 185/5 in 27.3 overs
Aussies chased down total 171/2 in 26.3 overs

The Aussies even brought in a bowler called McKay to emulate Andy:
Kiwi McKay - 2/17 off 10
Aussie McKay 2/33 off 7.4

Assuming the Windies and Bangers are equal, this means the Aussie visit should be a close-fought battle.

[AarowNZ]

Pretty crap batting effort apart from Guptill, looks like we are gonna get home but will have to improve a lot before Aussie come.

[E Dogg Capizzle]

Pretty crap batting effort apart from Guptill, looks like we are gonna get home but will have to improve a lot before Aussie come.

The Bangladesh bowling was rubbish, I had the impression they were having trouble taking the opposition seriously.

[AarowNZ]

The seamers were pretty crap but the spinners bowled well especially Shakib.

[E Dogg Capizzle]

Nah, the batting was just lazy.

[happybaboon]

I can understand the lazyness on account of the piss poor opposition in the two prior games. There's still some good signs in the batting though - Guptill coming back into some form, and Franklin remaining solid-looking.

[happybaboon]

Go Afghanistan! They're kicking ass
http://www.cricinfo.com/2010iccwt20/con ... 47879.html