Group B - Sri Lanka, New Zealand, Zimbabwe

[Zinzan]

Sri Lanka lost it. They screwed up simple run outs. Bowled length balls at the death. Malinga bowled a garbage last over. They managed to get hit by fresh batsmen on a pitch like that.

That's apart from the generally sloppy batting display that let NZ off the hook.

Almost sounds as if you wanted Sri Lanka to win

 

[tooextracool]

Thats pretty obvious me thinks.

Anyhow both teams are serious contenders for the trophy IMO.

 

[Hurricane]

Well done NZ.

Exciting finish.

 

[TT Boy]

Poor decision in playing Mendis. The Black Caps have faced him a few times. Sri Lanka should keep the novelty act for England, South Africa and Aus.

Gayle being rested as a precaution. England did that with KP against the Netherlands...

 

[Howsie]

Sri Lanka lost it. They screwed up simple run outs. Bowled length balls at the death. Malinga bowled a garbage last over. They managed to get hit by fresh batsmen on a pitch like that.

That's apart from the generally sloppy batting display that let NZ off the hook.

Whats this, batting, bowling and fielding deciding a cricket game, surely not. At the end of the day New Zealand's death bowling was better as was there fielding, so they came away with the victory, hardly rocket science Scaly my friend.

 

[DingDong]

nz
ryder

 

[Scaly piscine]

Ryder got himself out.
Guptill yorked himself to a 40 year old.
Taylor was a direct result of the pressure placed on himself by the two above getting themselves out.

Those three wickets were gifted by NZ - oh and don't forget McCullum #1 in the first over.

So in the clean up - BC's nearly thew it away but had the hitters to get them off the hook they'd placed themselves on.

Batsmen take risks in T20 so they tend to 'gift' wickets. On the other hand bowling length deliveries at the death is absolutely criminal. Making schoolboy errors to miss two run outs.

NZ were never in a position where they were overwhelming favourites, so they never really choked or messed things up particularly. They were mild favourites whilst Ryder was still in, but only mild because he's the only one who could forcibly take the game away from Sri Lanka. The rest weren't really good enough if Sri Lanka stuck to their task. Unfortunately Sri Lanka botched it with some awful cricket at the death, in the field and with the ball in their hand. They kept giving NZ chances.

 

[GGG]

Batsmen take risks in T20 so they tend to 'gift' wickets. On the other hand bowling length deliveries at the death is absolutely criminal. Making schoolboy errors to miss two run outs.

NZ were never in a position where they were overwhelming favourites, so they never really choked or messed things up particularly. They were mild favourites whilst Ryder was still in, but only mild because he's the only one who could forcibly take the game away from Sri Lanka. The rest weren't really good enough if Sri Lanka stuck to their task. Unfortunately Sri Lanka botched it with some awful cricket at the death, in the field and with the ball in their hand. They kept giving NZ chances.

Exactly, New Zealand were the better team.

 

[Athlai]

Awesome win, and feel pretty stoked that I predicted the right NZ team.

 

[Hurricane]

Pretty impressed with N Macs batting. Want him in the test team ahead of Patel.

 

[Athlai]

NcCullum bowls darts making him ideal for limited overs and a nothing first class bowler. Though considering how dire Patels been....

 

[Furball]

Poor decision in playing Mendis. The Black Caps have faced him a few times. Sri Lanka should keep the novelty act for England, South Africa and Aus.

Gayle being rested as a precaution. England did that with KP against the Netherlands...

Yeah, picking the best T20I bowler around was a shocking decision.

 

[DingDong]

NcCullum bowls darts making him ideal for limited overs and a nothing first class bowler.

agreed he did bat well though

 

[Hurricane]

NcCullum bowls darts making him ideal for limited overs and a nothing first class bowler. Though considering how dire Patels been....

NMcCullum's FC avg is roughly the same as Patel's.

That said Patel took 22 FC wickets this season compared to NMacs 4.

I think Patel is really average. He isn't good and he isn't bad.

How much worse can NMac be in a test. Also he does seem to mix up the flight of his deliveries in ODIs not all of them are flat.

2.3
NL McCullum to Dilshan, 1 run, tossing it up on middle, slog-sweeps it straight towards deep midwicket for a single


15.2
NL McCullum to Chandimal, 1 run, slower through the air, short on the off turning in, almost falls away as he cuts that through point

15.4
NL McCullum to Chandimal, OUT, Ross Taylor takes a beauty at long-on! Didn't quite get to the pitch but gave it a thwack, it appeared as though it would clear Taylor. He was right at the edge, timed his jump perfectly, stuck his right hand out, tapped the ball back in and took it stretching to his right, It ends an excellent stand after the dismissals of two batsmen who failed to get going
LD Chandimal c Taylor b NL McCullum 29 (23b 1x4 1x6) SR: 126.08
15.5
NL McCullum to Jayawardene, 2 runs, flighted on the off,paddles it towards fine leg for a couple

 

[Athlai]

Na NcCullum isn't currently the next spinning option for Tests IMO. Even Todd (I only became a spinner yesterday) Astle got more wickets than him.

 

[Howsie]

Batsmen take risks in T20 so they tend to 'gift' wickets. On the other hand bowling length deliveries at the death is absolutely criminal. Making schoolboy errors to miss two run outs.

NZ were never in a position where they were overwhelming favourites, so they never really choked or messed things up particularly. They were mild favourites whilst Ryder was still in, but only mild because he's the only one who could forcibly take the game away from Sri Lanka. The rest weren't really good enough if Sri Lanka stuck to their task. Unfortunately Sri Lanka botched it with some awful cricket at the death, in the field and with the ball in their hand. They kept giving NZ chances.

I guess you missed the part where New Zealand at one point needed 74 runs of 68 balls with nine wickets in hand?

 

[thierry henry]

Genus from Vettori here, I think it was fairly obvious that McCullum was the one who was going to win this. Looked most likely to score runs against Malinga.

lol, I think it's awesome that Vettori has realised after all these years that he is a dire batsman in the crucial overs of ODI matches, so he basically sacrificed himself

 

[thierry henry]

NcCullum bowls darts making him ideal for limited overs and a nothing first class bowler. Though considering how dire Patels been....

tbh McCullum seems to bowl quite slowly for a modern limited overs finger-spinner. I daresay he bowls slower on average than Patel. People talk about Patel as some sort of old fashioned spinner but he bowls his regulation off-break as fast as anyone I've ever seen, usually around 90kph.

 

[Athlai]

tbh McCullum seems to bowl quite slowly for a modern limited overs finger-spinner. I daresay he bowls slower on average than Patel. People talk about Patel as some sort of old fashioned spinner but he bowls his regulation off-break as fast as anyone I've ever seen, usually around 90kph.

Patel doesn't get as much as loop and turn as he used to but NcCullum doesn't get much of anything.

 

[social]

With Ryder in the team, NZ can definitely win this tourney

As we saw last night, SL need big guns to fire in oder to go anywhere as they have 5-6 players who are downright ordinary