Sporting An Opinion

 
Day 4 of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2007 was the first to be affected by rain and England paid the price for an up-and-down pitch. More than the pitch, though, it’s the facilities in the Caribbean that have left much to be desired. Sure the grounds and the stadia are outstanding, but the groundstaff have normally taken more time than they should when responding to urgent needs.
 
A wet outfield left the teams waiting for the start in the England v New Zealand match and an unnecessary half hour was lost. Thankfully, that did not translate into lost overs.
 
Earlier in the week, there were reports that the practice facilities at the Sabina Park ground were not ready for the Pakistan v West Indies match and players had to go elsewhere. These are the bare minimum requirements that most would have thought are ready.
 
The pitches on display in the first few matches have been even-paced and offered something for batsmen who want to play their shots and bowlers ready to bend their backs. But as time goes on, these may dry out and the later games may throw up some low-scoring matches.
 
India takes on Bangladesh today and kicks off their campaign. One of the favourites to win the Cup, India will be followed well through the Caribbean and is expected to walk all over Bangladesh. Being one of the Test playing nations, much is expected of Bangladesh but one doubts how much they will deliver. After their shock win over Pakistan in the 1999 World Cup, they have struggled to make an impact on this stage.
 
With Herschelle Gibbs setting the bar (and a very high one at that) with the bat, there is a new buzz whether indeed a total of 500 is possible in this tournament. All signs point to a possibility in the first round for after that, no matter what the size of the ground, the quality of the bowling will also be consistently better. The run feasts will continue for a couple of weeks more before the standard of scoring is brought back to normal levels!

South Africa does have a good reason to panic. And their histrionics on the pitch are only going to make things worse for them. They came to the Caribbean having just been ranked No. 1 in the world and beaten India and Pakistan convincingly in the preceding series. But the first warm-up game exposed some of the chinks in the batting when away from the comfort of home. Although SA did manage to win that game, there was no such respite in the second match. Pakistan was not going to make a meal of a target of 200 and they won by seven wickets. But that’s not important, is it?

It’s the SA attitude. They are starting to blame everything and everyone but themselves. In fact, they even went to the extent of stopping play to complain about the pitch. Well, they can’t do that once the tournament starts. They can’t continue to whine and cry like this. If it’s a bad pitch, it’s bad for both teams (mostly!). To make matter worse, the Pakistan batsmen handled the pitch rather well. So it’s safe to say that SA need to hit the panic button!

India, on the other hand, gave the West Indies quite a thrashing. Munaf Patel showed why he is so highly regarded with his measly figures of 4 for 10 in 6 overs. Irfan Patan got three wickets, but he never looked like the threatening Pathan who would curve the ball uncomfortably for batsmen. The only time he did show some control and skill was when he had Marlon Samuels leg before wicket. To be fair, he did fox Lara with a well-disguised slower one, but he still doesn’t look convincing. Virender Sehwag continued along his merry ways and one can’t help but feel that he thinks he won’t be dropped from the team. Ever. On current form, he should not be in the playing XI next week.

Australia was adequately dominating over England who has to think rather hard as to what exactly they were doing out there. From 2/112, they collapsed to 197 all out. The good news is Michael Vaughan is back in form and Ian Bell looks like he can bat again. The bad news is none of the others thought much of making the most of this opportunity and threw away their wickets. Shaun Tait did the damage for Australia picking up 4/33, but he still conceded far too many in the context of the game. Australia’s final margin of victory was five wickets, but it should have been much bigger. Another irresponsible batting display from the middle order cost them valuable practice before the big match.

Sri Lanka must be wondering what in god’s name has gone wrong with their team. Sure they lost by just 18 runs and Upul Tharanga scored a fine 106, but the bowling conceded far too many to a team that had just been beaten by Bangladesh! Sri Lanka has serious problems in the batting department too especially with captain Mahela Jayawardene. Maybe he should drop himself down the order… and though Sanath Jayasuriya was missing, Sri Lanka did not look like a side that could have won.

The practice matches are now out of the way and the real action starts in just three days. South Africa, New Zealand, Sri Lanka and the West Indies would be in turmoil. Not sure if England cares; after all, this is not the Ashes! Australia, India and Pakistan look the most sorted and settled of all the teams… is there a title winner in the three?

It’s quite baffling to note how many teams have picked players that are unfit or doubtful for whatever reasons to make it to the World Cup. And now, all these players are being given warnings and small time periods to prove their fitness or match-worthiness. The strangest selection of this has to be Irfan Pathan.

He was sent back from South Africa because he was woefully out of form and he needed to spend some time in domestic cricket. Then he got injured. And he carried his injury through the Sri Lanka series. Now the Indian team was announced before the last match against Sri Lanka and Pathan had neither proved his fitness nor his return to form. Yet he was picked for the squad going to the Caribbean. This doesn’t say much about the selection process to be honest!

Why would you pick a player who is still out of form (until proven otherwise) and is unfit? And all this at the expense of Ramesh Powar. Assuming Pathan was fit but not in form, would he play in the West Indies? I doubt it. And most people doubted it. India does have some depth in their pace bowling and Pathan would have in fact been a burden. He may have scored a few, but then India is well served in that department too. So where does Mr Pathan fit in? Out of the team, really!

India is not the only team doing these acrobatics. Shoaib Akhtar is yanking the PCB’s chain rather bad these days! First the PCB announced that Akhtar and fellow paceman Mohammed Asif had tested positive in a drugs test. Thereafter they got acquitted and have since refused to undergo any more tests. The PCB has been rather clear in its “no test, no tour” stand and one hopes they can stick to it. Akhtar toured South Africa also recently but could not manage to make any impact.

Finally, the Brett Lee issue had been put to rest. Stuart Clark gets the nod for the World Cup and the Australians must be devastated! Mind you Clark is a steady bowler but he is of the same style as McGrath and to some extent, Bracken. Line-and-length is his forte and he doesn’t have any real pace to frighten the batsmen. And that’s what Lee offered for his sudden bursts of pace could change the course of a match. But Australia, who had initially postponed Lee’s fitness test from Friday (Feb 23) to Tuesday (Feb 27), decided not to delay and give Clark enough time to be mentally prepared. Doubts over Andrew Symonds still linger and having been operated upon just three days ago, his confidence about making it to the tournament is amusing!

So at final count, only one confirmed drop and if you ask us, we see at least two more—Pathan and Akhtar—getting added to that list.