The West Indies decline has come a full circle. There has not been a standout performer for them this World Cup in any of the departments. Although the crowd has been egging them on, the defeats against England and India did them no good
They came to the quarter final clash against Pakistan on the back of those defeats against England and India. So it was highly surprising that they dropped Andre Russel, who played well against England. Considering the batting strength of Pakistan, it was thought that a total in excess of 230 would be winning one
When Smith latched onto the first ball and cut it to point boundary, it seemed that West Indies were on course but he struggled with the next few balls as Gul consistently beat him with length and movement. As has become the norm from the time Botha snared Gayle in the first over, a spinner was bought into the attack with the new ball. After defending a few deliveries, Gayle flicked a ball over midwicket for a boundary
Gayle further displayed his intent when he came down the track to the first delivery he faced from Gul and lofted it over mid-off. Gul made a comeback off the very next ball by bowling a Yorker. Gayle’s patience snapped as he made room and lofted a full ball to the right of Afridi at mid-off
What was to follow was a disaster as Smith, who is a walking wicket for the off spinners was done in by Hafees. He added Bravo’s wicket in the same over when he had him playing down the wrong line. Although there were doubts about it drifting down leg, Hawk Eye found the ball to be hitting the leg stump
The old firm of Sarwan and Chanderpaul came together and constructed a painfully slow partnership. It was so excruciatingly slow that at one stage Chanderpaul had a strike-rate of 10 runs after he had faced 30 balls. The problem with Sarwan was that he was unable to find the gaps, which has been persisting all through this tournament
The introduction of Riaz into the attack gave some respite to the batsmen as he sprayed the ball. Sarwan capitalised by flicking and square-driving for a couple of boundaries. With Hafees bowling well at one end, Afridi replaced Riaz with himself and got Sarwan to chip an inside out shot to Gul at long-off. Instead of charging at the ball, Gul dived sideways and dropped the catch. At this stage it seemed that Pakistan was losing its grip on the match
Ajmal who replaced Hafees cleverly mixed his stock deliveries with Doosra and beat Chanderpaul with it. Sarwan was induced into making a mistake as Afridi bowled a low, wide delivery outside off that Sarwan slapped straight into the hands of Umar Akmal at point. Chanderpaul showed some aggression when he slog swept Ajmal into the stands at midwicket. Pollard who was trying to play against his natural game was caught while trying to cut. The ball found the bottom edge and he was followed by Thomas who was caught plumb in front
Sammy the captain surprisingly allowed the ball to thud on his pads and was plumb. Bishoo was taken out with a doosra that cannoned onto the stumps. He beat Roach with a doosra too. 93, the lowest total made by West Indies was in the danger of being overtaken. Roach played sensibly with Chanderpaul and rotated the strike. Chanderpaul initially shepherded the strike and as the confidence on Roach grew, he started giving him the strike
Razzaq came into the attack pretty late and Roach who was getting confident at this point decided to clear the infield and could not find the timing right as he flicked the delivery straight into the hands of Younis Khan at midwicket. Afridi then performed the final rites on the innings as he bowled Rampaul around his legs
With the target being a small one it afforded the openers to express themselves. They exactly did that as Kamran Akmal was pristine in driving through covers. Hafees covered the entire ground as he flicked, pulled, cut, drove and late-cut with glee. He raced to his half-century and there was only one false alarm when he was hurried into the pull stroke and the resultant top edge fell short of the fine-leg fielder
There were a whole lot of positives from the match for Pakistan and West Indies was left ruing its decisions on the team selection front. Pakistan is continuing its march and would be waiting for the winner of the marquee clash, India V Australia
Comments
Post a Comment