Snatching an unlikely victory

There are a few things that have become clear from watching England in the Cricket World Cup.

First, there is still some life left in the 50-Over format of the game. As much fun as the Twenty-20 slugfest can be to watch, the longer one-day game can produce drama and intrigue not present in the shortest version. Also looking at the runs being scored in this world cup, the shorter games influence is clear to see.

Secondly, the most interesting team in this tournament is England. They are not playing the best cricket and seem to be missing some flair and depth. This was especially evident in the very poor showings against Holland and Ireland (still possibly the biggest shock in the history of this tournament). But England provides drama and compelling cricket by the bucket load.

Following the tradition of England teams in big tournaments the game against South Africa was a “must win”.

Coming off the loss to Ireland (there is no excuse, England were just woeful) they had to win against about a very good South Africa, nothing less would keep them in the tournament and get them out of the group stage into the knock out.

In the game against India on Wednesday we saw a couple of truly great individual performances. The story against South Africa was that of a team effort.

England batted first and after a run of 300+ scores in this tournament the England score of 171 all out (45.4 overs) looked very beatable, but the deteriorating wicket was making it difficult for the batsmen.

Strauss, Bell, KP and Michael Yardy were all out for single figures. The captain Strauss described some of the English batting as “criminal”, he was not wrong. But somehow this was enough. Ravi Bopara was in for he slightly out of form Paul Collingwood, had the best performance, hit a very controlled 60 and won the man of the match award.

There were times that the game seemed to be all but over for England, after 32 overs South Africa seems to be cruising along nicely at 124 for 3, then the tide turned and they fell to 127 for 7 and England saw the chance to take this one. The English bowlers found something else in the pitch and took the games to South Africa, Stuart Broad had a devastating spell and ended up with a very impressive 4 wickets for only 15 runs in 6.4 overs.

South Africa made 165 all out and handed England an unlikely victory. The next game is against Bangladesh in Chittagong on Friday, a win there guarantees a place in the last 8.

There is nothing better for morale than snatching an unlikely victory, especially coming off the humiliation against Ireland mid week. England did enough and there were times their bowling was really good, but I think they know that 171 should not have been enough to win this.

On the bright side, Strauss and his team have shown they can raise their game to the level of the good teams after a victory over South Africa and the thrilling draw with India. They needed a little luck and found it this morning. I’m not sure they deserve to be, but they are still in this thing.

There is something surreal about watching cricket being played 14 time zones away from Seattle, but it’s been drama filled, and that is one of things I want from my sport.