5th Match - Australia v New Zealand (18th March)

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Woeful from OZ

WTF were they thinking?

Mc****** is a total ****-kicker and to be bowled out by him is an horrid reflection of where we are at in this form of the game

We are a terrible T20 team but that is a new low

Thank **** that it's footy season

 

[91Jmay]

People who find incessant slogging going for sixes entertaining probably have the attention span of a fruit fly.

Almost all sixes hit today were slogs though. That is what happens on a dead pitch.

 

[social]

Woeful from OZ

WTF were they thinking?

Mc****** is a total ****-kicker and to be bowled out by him is an horrid reflection of where we are at in this form of the game

We are a terrible T20 team but that is a new low

Thank **** that it's footy season

 

[kiwiviktor81]

Nice. Won a significant amount of money with that BCs victory. Thought at the innings break that it had "NZ vs. India 2.0" written all over it, and it did.

Didn't feel comfortable until the last ball though. One reason Aussie is so good is that they always have, in the one team of 11 players, about 10 guys that can bat to international level and about 8 that can bowl to international level.

The Aussie vs. India match might be a virtual death match. Could be awesome.

 

[Black_Warrior]

I had Santner, Khwaja, Sodhi and McClenaghan in my team

 

[Stace]

God I love NZ, first embarrass India then Santa embarrasses Smith while KW brilliantly captains a win over AUS.

 

[Loose Cannon]

Well played New Zealand. Their bowling exceeding their batting by a distance surprises me.

Smith's overconfidence against spin reminding me of Clarke.

 

[kiwiviktor81]

Woeful from OZ

WTF were they thinking?

Mc****** is a total ****-kicker and to be bowled out by him is an horrid reflection of where we are at in this form of the game

We are a terrible T20 team but that is a new low

Thank **** that it's footy season

Nah. Aussie didn't play badly. It was clear by the 10th over of the New Zealand innings that the pitch was going to be extremely difficult to time anything on after the new ball had lost its shine and hardness.

Very clever captaincy by KW. Let the quicks knock the shine off the ball in the powerplay overs and then go for the strangle. Mohammed Ali would have been proud of such a rope a dope.

 

[Scaly piscine]

Almost all sixes hit today were slogs though. That is what happens on a dead pitch.

Exactly. I remember Durham making it to T20 finals day a few years ago. Similar pitch to today.

I think it was Claude Henderson who kept slogging Harmison for 6s whilst all the county trundlers were going at barely a run a ball.

Consistent pace and bounce also doesn't mean you can smash boundaries for fun. Australian wickets have consistent pace and bounce - fast. You can have the ball nipping around, seam, swing, spin. And edges regularly carrying behind the stumps. That produces a good contest, even if it is skewed in favour of one or another.

Pitches like that are just ****.

 

[Flem274*]

im not looking forward to when nz eventually have to bat last tbh

 

[Zinzan]

New Zealand playing well, but good grief their kit is awful - that colour

You colour-blind bro.

 

[kiwiviktor81]

im not looking forward to when nz eventually have to bat last tbh

The way things have gone so far, I wouldn't be comfortable chasing anything over 65.

 

[Black_Warrior]

im not looking forward to when nz eventually have to bat last tbh

Depends on the conditions though.

Next two games are in Mohali and Kolkata (belter of a pitch, no deterioration or turn).

 

[Zinzan]

Nice. Won a significant amount of money with that BCs victory.

Me too on that one. Don't often bet, but Bet365 was majorly overrating Australia when the game was actually even.

 

[FaaipDeOiad]

Almost all sixes hit today were slogs though. That is what happens on a dead pitch.

Not having a go at you as I know this is a common view, but I really don't understand how people can categorise individual shots as slogs in this manner. If you hit a 6 it's always going to be a slog by some definition, you're hitting it really far in the air and running the risk of being caught. At the same time, Marsh, Agar and Nevill hit the only sixes in the Australian innings and all of them except maybe the Nevill one were clean hits straight down the ground off spinners, hit to an area with minimal field protection and comfortably clearing the fence. What's an example of a shot that goes for six which is not a "slog" if those are? I don't really get it.

Anyway, my view is that for test cricket, I like variation in pitches but I do think wickets with decent carry (so dismissals behind the stumps from seamers are in play) tend to make for better games. Not really a fan of anything where the ball is dying on the way to the keeper on the first day. But in limited overs cricket, anything which makes scoring quickly challenging tends to make for more even and unpredictable contests, since the pressure to score quickly is already there, so you don't end up with attritional cricket. You end up with a situation where players need to score quickly but doing so it challenging.

I will acknowledge that it brings different skillsets to the fore though, and can result in a situation where Michael Hussey is as good a bowler as Dale Steyn. But t20 was never really about skillful wicket taking bowling anyway, it's about economy and variation, so I don't think that's a huge downside in this particular format.

 

[Black_Warrior]

Not having a go at you as I know this is a common view, but I really don't understand how people can categorise individual shots as slogs in this manner. If you hit a 6 it's always going to be a slog by some definition, you're hitting it really far in the air and running the risk of being caught. At the same time, Marsh, Agar and Nevill hit the only sixes in the Australian innings and all of them except maybe the Nevill one were clean hits straight down the ground off spinners, hit to an area with minimal field protection and comfortably clearing the fence. What's an example of a shot that goes for six which is not a "slog" if those are? I don't really get it.

I think what people mean when they talk about a slog is when a batsman throws his bat at the ball, sort of heaves it with all the power, instead of timing a shot.

I will acknowledge that it brings different skillsets to the fore though, and can result in a situation where Michael Hussey is as good a bowler as Dale Steyn. But t20 was never really about skillful wicket taking bowling anyway, it's about economy and variation, so I don't think that's a huge downside in this particular format.

I think there's a lot of skillfull T20 wicket taking bowling. Different pitches produce different kind of cricket though. Most pitches for T20 cricket don't usually behave like the two pitches at Nagpur and Dharmshala respectively.

 

[Black_Warrior]

To everyone who's saying batting sides are winning everything, West Indies chased down 183 with relative ease and the only century so far was in the second innings. I know it was against minnows of LO cricket but still.

 

[91Jmay]

Yeah the sixes weren't 'slogs' I suppose in the Aus innings, just think the amount of bats plinking out on the boundary and playing god awful shots to normal balls is why I hate these pitches. Such ugly cricket with Shane Watson bowling 80 MPH and straight is difficult to get away and Colin Munro can hack his way to 20 odd.

 

[kiwiviktor81]

Me too on that one. Don't often bet, but Bet365 was majorly overrating Australia when the game was actually even.

I got a fair bit on at $5.30 and then a bit more at $11, which was after (I think) 5 overs of the Aussie innings. I knew KW was about to bring the spinners on and that even Mitchell Marsh was bowling some balls that spun so much they were unhittable. Easy money, in hindsight.

 

[Black_Warrior]

Yeah the sixes weren't 'slogs' I suppose in the Aus innings, just think the amount of bats plinking out on the boundary and playing god awful shots to normal balls is why I hate these pitches. Such ugly cricket with Shane Watson bowling 80 MPH and straight is difficult to get away and Colin Munro can hack his way to 20 odd.

But this is how a lot of LO cricket has been in the SC. The World T20 2014 saw plenty of games where medium pacers were more effective when taking the pace off the ball, and making it difficult to hit the ball as a result.