The 2009 T20 World Cup - quite eventful

Yesterday, England and Pakistan won the women's and men's T20 World Cup titles.

Both teams played excellently throughout the tournament, and really peaked when it mattered - in the semi and the final. The England women's team was unbeaten in the tournament (and in fact set a record for the highest successful chase in Women's T20 internationals) while Pakistan's men lost 2 games (against England [men] & Sri Lanka). While Sri Lanka seemed to have run short of motivation yesterday, Pakistan's short-pitched bowling ploy early on was wonderfully executed.

It is so ironic that players from the current World T20 championship winning team will not be part of the Champions Twenty20 League. Oh, have you ever seen a more 'broken' official site?

Aside from Australia's early journey to Leicester, the other stories that captured everyone's attention were (in no specific order):

• India's exit at the Super Eight stage following losses to England (!!!) and West Indies. As is usual, multiple theories started doing the rounds, such as player fatigue, infighting, lack of skills and overly focussed on ad-shoots, to name a few. The truth, as usual, probably lies in-between everything else.
  
  Fatigue is an ever-present reality in modern sport, especially when new forms of the game keep getting invented and commercialized. Players are supposed to know when their minds and bodies can't take it any longer. If India's players want a break, they always have the option of opting out, preferably an entire series/tournament so that there's some stability in the squad. If they believed that the IPL was far too lucrative to miss out on, then they could have opted out from the ODIs in Sri Lanka or the games in New Zealand. They could have also opted out of the upcoming [pointless] ODIs in West Indies.
  
  The fact that they chose to not do any of the above indicates one of three things:
  1. They are not fatigued
     
  2. They are fatigued but fear that they'll lose their place to someone who steps in while they're away
     
  3. They are fatigued but are in a 'will play for money' mode
  
  Last May, when Pieter$en revealed that he was almost certainly signing up for an IPL team a few months after complaining about burnout, I wrote

  My take on there being too much cricket is that players always have the option of opting out of series. Typically the only players you'll see complaining about too much cricket are those that play the most often, and hence are the 'star' players. Surely they've performed well enough to risk skipping a game or a series and not face a piquant situation where they won't be included next time around. Also, if a sufficiently large number of players keep opting out of tournaments, cricket administrators will realize that they may be doing a lot of damage to the golden geese.

  Gary Kirsten, India's coach, had already voiced his excuse warning prior to the tournament that fatigue would be India's biggest challenge.
  
  He was only partly right. I don't think India failed to make it to the semi-finals because of fatigue. They failed to make it to the semis because they couldn't cope with West Indies and England using the short ball to great effect. They had no plan-B. They failed to make it to the semis because the batting order bizarrely got revamped. In 'easy' games against Bangladesh and Ireland, Dhoni came in at #3. But when it was time to face the music, Raina was sent in. Where's the leadership?
  
  
• If its Pakistan in England, there must be some dark arts involved. Vettori's "informal approach" to the match officials (the umpires and the match referee, presumably) and his post-match interview comments after New Zealand got their arse whipped by Pakistan were totally unwarranted. Umpires, especially those standing in Pakistan games, will undoubtedly be examining the ball far more closely after the events at The Oval in August 2006.
  
  
• Messrs. Duckworth & Lewis made an entry during this tournament after West Indies were set a ridiculously easy target of 80 from 9 overs, with the luxury of all 11 batsmen available to have a hit, against England. Frank Duckworth, who along with Tony Lewis, devised the system, has revealed plans to rework the numbers by incorporating Twenty20's duration and far more frenetic pace.
  
  I'd really love the rules to be changed to allow only 6 players to bat and allow a maximum of 6 overs per bowler. I really don't see the possibility of this happening (because of the stupid sanctity around 11 players making up a cricket team). So I'll probably settle for the D/L method tweak restricting the [additional] number of wickets that can be lost by the chasing team. Just compare a team knowing at the start of the innings that it has 10 wickets in hand to chase down 80 in 9 overs with the team knowing it only has [say] 6 wickets to play with.

Labels: ball tampering, burnout, duckworth-lewis method, england, fatigue, india, pakistan, sri lanka, twenty20, twenty20 world cup, vettori, women

Thus spake Jagadish @ 1:17 pm | Sledge/Read 2 sledge(s)
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Andrew Symonds can start fishing again, Ponting plays preacher

Australian cricket fans and followers would have heaved a sigh of relief (certainly the coach and captain did!) as Andrew Symonds was named in the squad for the Gabba test against New Zealand.

Is it an indicator of how uncertain Australia's selectors are that they've announced a squad for only the first test of a two test series?

In any case, my main concern is about whether the commentator (on television, radio or the internet) will say 'fishes outside off-stump' if and when Symonds does so.

Will Symo go and beat up the commentator, or will he hire MacGill, Hayden or even Harbhajan to do that job?

Somehow the Australians seem to be in 'The Nile' denial about the fact that they got the over rate calculations horribly wrong and the resulting decisions went a long way in determining the series outcome. Hayden first said that the problem also lay with batsmen, officials, spectators in third world countries, etc.

I know there's a huge furore in India about his remarks. I'm not really bothered about it. When Australia's players make stupid excuses, it is an indicator of how much they're actually worried about their game & the team.

Ponting now acts as the elder statesman of the game by preaching about how it is everyone's responsibility. This, despite Ponting (& by implication, Australia) already having been hauled up a whopping five times in the year (Perth test, Sydney ODI, St. Kitts ODI, Jamaica test ,Nagpur test) for a slow over rate. Surprisingly, or perhaps not so surprisingly, enough, none of those instances are found in the ICC's penalties list for 2008, but I did find them on the media releases list.

The next worst teams in terms of being penalized for over rates are Sri Lanka & South Africa (3 each). After that England (2) and then a whole set of teams with 1 each - India, Hong Kong, Pakistan, West Indies & Bangladesh.

So exactly what's Ricky Ponting talking about when he says it isn't a problem restricted to Australia alone? He really needs to set his house in order first before preaching to others!

Update: I just found out to my dismay that Daniel Vettori, the New Zealand captain and skilful spinner, will turn 30 in a couple of months! How ridiculous is that? I thought he'd remain the 23-25 year old forever. At any rate, that's how he's been all these years!

Labels: australia, over rates, symonds, vettori

Thus spake Jagadish @ 6:11 am | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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Baffling field placement

Yesterday, as Daniel Vettori ran in to bowl the 5th ball of the 44th over against West Indies, he was on a hat-trick. Skipper Stephen Fleming had placed a silly-point for Collymore, the number 11. Strangely, there was no short-leg or backward short-leg.

If I were the skipper and the opposition was 176/9 with 6 more overs to go and no half-decent batsman at either end, I'd pressurize the batsman with a lot of fielders around the bat.

After Collymore kept out the hat-trick ball, Fleming moved the silly point out. I found that baffling. I've seen that happen so often. Is the ball after a potential hat-trick ball any less important? Why do captains do it? Yes, the bowler didn't get 3 in 3, but by moving the fielder out, you're probably reducing the chances of getting 3 in 4.

If I were the skipper (and I've never skippered anything higher than teams representing my college and workplace), I'd keep the fielders in even after the hat-trick has been averted!

Labels: captaincy, field placement, fleming, new zealand, stephen fleming, vettori, west indies

Thus spake Jagadish @ 10:07 am | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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Vettori - The Kiwi Spin Wizard

Peter English esteems Vettori who has been a lone warrior for New Zealand all these years and even goes to the extent of hinting to the World XI selectors about including him in the team for the Super Series.

In the meanwhile, the NZ selectors have rested Vettori for the first Test against Sri Lanka starting on April 4 and now guess the replacement for him. Kyle David Mills !

Labels: vettori

Thus spake Ganesh @ 11:57 am | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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