*Official* South Africa in India

[jeevan]

Didnt even know Sreesanth was in the squad, so imagine seeing him in the lineup.
He's OK, but now India has 3 bowlers who can completely lose the plot (him, Praveen & Nehra) And no Harbhajan either and bowling with the dew.

So, what's a safe score? 500?

 

[Jono]

Get ****ed Sachin

Piss poor running.

 

[Woodster]

Sehwag and Karthik come back really well after the early loss of Tendulkar. Think they'll be eyeing in the region of 300 here, but plenty of responsibility will fall on Sehwag and Dhoni to make the majority.

 

[Jono]

Didnt even know Sreesanth was in the squad, so imagine seeing him in the lineup.
He's OK, but now India has 3 bowlers who can completely lose the plot (him, Praveen & Nehra) And no Harbhajan either and bowling with the dew.

So, what's a safe score? 500?

Haha we're batting well but 300 feels like 220 with this bowling attack, and with dew likely to be an issue.

Need Sehwag to go huge here.

 

[Jono]

If you mixed Karthik's attitude and enthusiasm with Yuvraj's talent and you'd have a superstar.

To bad that means nothing though

 

[Jono]

If Sehwag has any back issues or soreness he shouldn't be playing.

That being said, he's batting quite well.

 

[Jono]

FFS! So unlucky.

 

[Woodster]

What an unfortunate way for Sehwag to go. Big break for SA.

 

[Woodster]

Tame dismissal for Karthik, surprised by a very good Langeveldt bouncer. Shame for him, he was going along nicely there. Kohli next in, who averages 54.21 in ODI's so far.

 

[Woodster]

An other soft dismissal for India, Dhoni through his shot too soon against a Kallis slower ball and lobbed it to mid-off. 300 now beginning to look a long way off, with Raina and Kohli in and Pathan and Jadeja to come, it may be a struggle to post anything like a competitive score on this pitch.

Looking forward, and hoping, to see Yusuf Pathan put on a bit of a show.

 

[Jono]

This is pretty frustrating.

SA good at clawing themselves back when we look like taking the initiative.

 

[Woodster]

Good to see SA bring Steyn back on to try and nip a couple out and really put India under the pump. It would be easy for Kallis to continue bowling the lesser bowlers so they can get a few cheap overs out of the way. Raina started pretty well though, trying not to let Kallis the bowler do just that.

 

[Jono]

Raina been working on the short ball? Looks much better, pulling and playing the uppercut.

 

[Woodster]

Raina been working on the short ball? Looks much better, pulling and playing the uppercut.

Yes played those two shots off Kallis very well. A couple of short ones off Steyn may be the acid test.

Lovely extra cover drive from Kohli as Parnell comes back into the attack.

 

[Woodster]

Re-grouped really well here Raina and Kohli. A 66-run partnership accumulated at over 5 an over is excellent progress.

As I write this Gibbs takes an outstanding diving catch to take out Kohli.

 

[Jono]

So many soft dismissals.

Really disappointing stuff. Yusuf Pathan threatened to take India to 320 before that dismissal.

Argh.

 

[Woodster]

Disappointing end to Yusuf Pathan's innings, again tamely chipped to Kallis at extra cover the ball after slapping Parnell for a big 6, perhaps another deceived by a slightly slower delivery that registered just under 80mph. Need to make the most of this powerplay if they want to get near 300, but wickets continue to fall, over to you Raina.

 

[Uppercut]

Uppercut and Prince, give me a situation where a player scoring at a lower strike rate is actually better in test cricket. Not that it's not worse, give me a situation where it is better.

Again, I stress, strike rate is not the same as deliveries faced. Sehwag and other batsmen that score quickly also face a lot of deliveries. Just because they are scoring more runs off those deliveries does not mean that they are giving their team a higher chance of losing by leaving more time for the other team to win. There is the same amount of time taken up (more actually considering the boundary balls) and yet their team has no runs.

With all due respect, can't see how your argument has any merit, and IMO is just an overreaction to counter people who put too much emphasis on SR when judging a batsman. Yes its far from everything, but don't try and pretend that a good strike rate can be a negative.

You're not taking runs scored as a constant. If you don't do that your argument just amounts to "scoring more runs>scoring less runs". Sehwag faces significantly less balls than Dravid does, giving his opponent more time to win the game. Keeping total runs scored as a constant, a low strike rate would have been preferable for all of South Africa's batsmen in the match just past.

 

[Woodster]

Didn't realise there was still 10 overs left, so 300 is still very much achievable in terms of run rate, it's just the wickets they've lost that's proving a big issue.

 

[R_D]

Don't know why they took Power play so early... usually results in at least wicket.... if India had more wickets in hand... It would've made more sense.
Now If Raina goes out... they are in real danger of being bowled out.