Semi Finals

[dinu23]

wow! amazing match. great comeback by sri lanka after the loss of sanath and sanga early. i thought it would be like the england game, but what a knock from mahela. was he awsome or what! the way he paced his innings was just beautiful. I can't comment abt the murali catch yet since i didnt see it. after the highlights i can give an opinion.

very poor umpiring in this game. we can do without them in the final. maharoof or anyone else from the squad should replace dilhara IMO. he seem to have lost it after the england game.

 

[Dissector]

Tharanga has hit one hundred and 3 50's against New Zealand; I assume they are one of the "decent" attacks. Anyway this is a pointless discussion: just repeating again and again that Fulton is far better doesn't prove much of anything.

 

[JASON]

Well obviously Styris and McCullum have been playing well recently. But then so has someone like Silva who averages more than Styris in 2007. You have to look at long-turn performance to judge the overall class of players.

As for Tharanga he has just hit a classy 50 in a huge pressure game when his team was in trouble. He hit two classy hundreds in England. You could argue about whether he is better or worse than Fulton but there is no reason to believe that Fulton is far better than him.

Have to agree with you completely ...Tharanga has delivered where it mattered in winning matches by contributing big scores singlehandedly and helping build the innings around him where others around him have failed...something I have so far yet to see Fulton do ... (when others failed)

 

[JASON]

Tharanga has hit one hundred and 3 50's against New Zealand; I assume they are one of the "decent" attacks. Anyway this is a pointless discussion: just repeating again and again that Fulton is far better doesn't prove much of anything.

Agree with that as well.

 

[JASON]

I would pick Maharoof every time TBH.

Anyone remember that Prera bloke who bowled against us in NZ and ran from like square leg to the bowlers crease?

He certainly made things fun. McCullum took a lking to him. Wonder where that bloke is now.

What was Macullum's average at this World cup ?

 

[social]

I'm pretty ****ing nervous about tonight itbt. Also excitied, but more nervous. I'm a mess.

I've a feeling that Oz wont win the WC - no justification (they've clearly been the best side to date) but I think both SA and SL have cause to be reasonably confident against them

 

[JASON]

.

The bottom line is that the bottom five SL players are at least as good as their Kiwi counterparts and their top 6 are certainly better than the Kiwi top 6.

The 10-12 ODIs played in the last 2 years will confirm your statement....

 

[JASON]

Sanath Jayasuriya = Scott Styris
Mahela Jayawardene (C) = Stephen Fleming (C)
Kumar Sangakarra (W) Brendon McCullum (W) (But for how much longer!)

Geez three New Zealand bowlers?

Chaminda Vaas Shane Bond
M Muralitharan Daniel Vettori + Jeetan Patel
Lasith Malinga Shane Bond

You would be really kidding yourself to think Mahela = Fleming
or Sangakkara = Maccullum
or Murali = Vettori + Patel
As for Malinga and Bond , its a question of wickets against quality opposition v economy rates and cheap wickets against not the same quality opposition... at least from this World Cup performances Malinga >>> Bond.

 

[JASON]

I hope that too (provided South Africa do not reach the final). I think it will be a steep task for Lanka and they might just fall short a bit given the final is in Barbados.

This Sri Lankan side seems to relish in those steep tasks.

 

[JASON]

I think the fact that Bond was off his game supports the excuse for him not playing, actually. He didn't look well out there - I reckon he was still sick which really justifies him missing the previous game for that reason...

Please don't come out with excuses for the loss... he looked fine out there...They lost to a better Team.Full Stop. ...Don't go digging around for excuses for the loss that are not there..

 

[Francis]

You would be really kidding yourself to think Mahela = Fleming

Jayawardene is the best captain in the world right now if you ask me. He doesn't command spotlight or stand out, but he makes strong solid decisions and the Sri Lankan's come off as a very tight unit. As batsmen they're about the same, both can hit good innings from time to time. I'd give the slight nod to Jayawardene, since he's been in better World Cup form.

Sangakkara = Maccullum

I agree with this as well. Sangakara is a fine batsman and while his keeping isn't always the best, he's very servicable.

Murali = Vettori + Patel

Well Murali is better than Vettori, few would dispute that. Dunno if he's worth two players though.

And Malinga > Bond for me... only for this world cup though. But yeah, I'd take Malinga over Bond. Seriously did anybody notice and juxtaposition between the two last night. Bond got killed at the death and only took one wicket, Malinga was bowling so well the batsmen couldn't come close to hitting the ball when they tried. Ross Taylor was laughing at how impossible it was. There is such a thing as bowling too well... Malinga couldn't find an edge because he was too bamboozling.

Sri Lanka might have a few lameduck players but their impact players are better than New Zealand's IMO.

 

[pasag]

Please don't come out with excuses for the loss... he looked fine out there...They lost to a better Team.Full Stop. ...Don't go digging around for excuses for the loss that are not there..

He's a neutral so why would he try and find an excuse for NZ?

 

[Prince EWS]

Tharanga has hit one hundred and 3 50's against New Zealand; I assume they are one of the "decent" attacks. Anyway this is a pointless discussion: just repeating again and again that Fulton is far better doesn't prove much of anything.

Neither does flounderously mentioning certain performances without looking at the bigger picture.

Four decent innings proves little. If you remove completely substandard attacks such as Bangladesh, Zimbabwe and the England bowling attack he faced, his record is horrible - he averages 25.13.

And before you have a go at me for taking his performances against England out, it was against an attack consisting of Harmison, Plunkett, Bresnan, Mahmood, Collingwood and Dalrymple. So horribly dire that I'm almost tempted to say the hundred against Zimbabwe he scored had more value.

Quite plainly, he's a very poor player at this stage. His domestic one day record is even worse.

 

[JASON]

Yeah, that was only because in the last game the two played, one met Ireland and the other met Australia. If it was the other way around, things would be different imo. It was 50-50 for me going into the match and SL just played better on the day.

On a side note, as I mentioned last night, if Bond was rested from the Australia game and he didn't really have a stomach bug, then some serious action would need to be taken in NZ circles because quite clearly that would have come back to bite them and could have cost them the match with Bond clearly abit iffy on the field, which also had a flow on effect to his teammates, I reckon. It is an 'if', a big if infact, but if he was rested against Australia it cost NZ the game and the World Cup, IMO.

The majority of last 10 ODIs the 2 teams played were in NZ and if you factor the home advantage SL were far ahead of NZ. A factor reflected in all the Odds and predictions by those with in depth cricketing knowledge as well as all betting agencies.

It had nothing to do with playing Ireland or Australia in their previous game.

 

[Francis]

There almost should be two semi final threads since it'll be difficult to get any discussion on the next semi. But anyway, here I go...

Australia are favourites and rightfully so, but if Shaun Tait has a bad night, I think SA can get on top of him and get a lot of runs. Currently I don't know if there's a more key player than Shauneth Taiteth. A good performance and OZ is through, a bad one and SA is through.

Frank - a phrophet.

 

[Prince EWS]

He's a neutral so why would he try and find an excuse for NZ?

Exactly. I have no reason to be biased either way. JASON, on the other hand...

Anyway, regardless of that, I never blamed the loss on the fact that Bond was sick. I simply put his performance forward as a possible justification for the fact that he didn't play the previous game.

 

[pasag]

The majority of last 10 ODIs the 2 teams played were in NZ and if you factor the home advantage SL were far ahead of NZ. A factor reflected in all the Odds and predictions by those with in depth cricketing knowledge as well as all betting agencies.

It had nothing to do with playing Ireland or Australia in their previous game.

No, betting agencies almost solely base things on form. NZ lost going into the match, SL won. Pretty simple really. If Sri Lanka would have had their loss to Australia as the last match in the Super Eights and New Zealand had their win against Ireland as their last match in the Super Eights, I'm 100% sure New Zealand would have gone in as favourites from a bookies view-point. I'm not saying that's the right thing to do or anything. I doubt a series in NZ a couple of months ago would factor for that much, especially in the up-down nature of one-day cricket.

 

[JASON]

Big Test tonight for the Aussie bowling attack , IMO. St.Lucia is supposedly a batting paradise as the Group stage matches seemed to suggest... the side winning the toss to post 300 plus and seize the initative ..IMO

 

[Prince EWS]

Big Test tonight for the Aussie bowling attack , IMO. St.Lucia is supposedly a batting paradise as the Group stage matches seemed to suggest... the side winning the toss to post 300 plus and seize the initative ..IMO

And the South African bowling attack, for that matter...

 

[JASON]

No, betting agencies almost solely base things on form. NZ lost going into the match, SL won. Pretty simple really. If Sri Lanka would have had their loss to Australia as the last match in the Super Eights and New Zealand had their win against Ireland as their last match in the Super Eights, I'm 100% sure New Zealand would have gone in as favourites from a bookies view-point. I'm not saying that's the right thing to do or anything. I doubt a series in NZ a couple of months ago would factor for that much, especially in the up-down nature of one-day cricket.

Betting agencies are not stupid to allow random odds based on the last game... they base the odds on performances between the Teams head to head ...and their assessment of the form guide between the 2 teams in the recent past .... say 6 months to 1 year ...because they will get burnt if they gave odds from the last game each team played.

Going by your method if Ireland beats Pakistan and plays England who lost to NZ ...then Ireland should be given favouritism over England ... In reality the odds are not given like that...