Pune to host a Twenty20 match?
As the inaugural World Twenty20 gets to the business end of things, it’s starting to get more exciting!
England faces New Zealand Tuesday in the second Super Eight match for both teams. And the situation could not have been more extreme. New Zealand players are on a high after a close, but well earned win over India, while England was yielded ineffective by some fine South African bowling.
Not to mention the demoralising loss to Australia just a couple of days ago. England has a lot of work to do to get spirits back up in the dressing room for a loss Tuesday could go a long way in sealing their fate.
The biggest problem England has is their batting order. They are struggling with the opening pair and then keeping some of their big hitters until too late. Like with one-day cricket, it is imperative that your best batsmen get as much time as possible in the middle.
And to that effect, England must ensure that captain Paul Collingwood, Kevin Pietersen, Andrew Flintoff, Owais Shah and Dmitri Mascarenhas are given the maximum opportunity to build a solid innings. Perhaps England needs to think out of the box and bring one of their key batsmen to the opening slot with Matt Prior.
The other major problem England’s batsmen will have is that of piercing the New Zealand fielding. Although England’s fielding has improved dramatically in the last year or so, they still aren’t a patch on the Kiwis. And once under pressure, we’ve often seen that the English have a tendency to get run out. The New Zealand fielders would know all this and will try to capitalise on it.
England hasn’t had a particularly good time of it in the field. Against South Africa, they dropped a few catches and their ground fielding was a little patchy too. But one department they are equally matched with New Zealand in is the bowling department.
England has a wealth of resources from pace to the lack of and even a couple of handy spinners. Collingwood will need to know what the Kiwis did against India and plan accordingly. But spinners would feature low down on his list of priorities after the display Oram and McMillan gave!
New Zealand’s win against India was an important one and one the Kiwis can be proud of, but they almost lost a game defending 190. Which only tells us that the bowling is not working like it should. Shane Bond was too easy to hit at his pace and with the pitch not doing much in Johannesburg.
At Durban, though, he could prove to be the match-winner. As we saw in the India-Pakistan match where Mohammed Asif was virtually unplayable, New Zealand will hope that Bond can do something similar.
The make-up of both the teams is fairly similar with a large number of all-rounders and ‘dibbly-dobbly’ bowlers. There’s a few power-hitters and some quick bowlers.
So who has the upper hand? New Zealand will want to win to ensure they aren’t struggling in their last match against South Africa to make the semi-final. England needs to win to keep their hopes alive or hope India beats South Africa and loses to them.
But hope never got a cricket team too far! It could well be a question of who holds their nerve better on the day. And there is a lot at stake as well.
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