Warm up matches

[sohum]

Ravindra Jadeja has not impressed me one bit from what I saw of him in the IPL and especially this game. 41 from 41 is pretty bad considering the way the rest of the batsmen played. He has no ability to go over the top once the required run rate goes up and ends up killing the finish with his 1's and 2's. I hope he is nowhere near the side in this tournament once we're at full strength.

 

[Leggie]

I'm sorry, but 41 of 41 is not good enough at T20 level. He cost us the match.

 

[King Pietersen]

It does matter because OMFGZ T20 > Test Cricket faw shizzle.

Was a pretty rank innings from Jadeja, and although Vettori did bowl well during the middle overs and Oram bowled well at the end, he should still have accelerated abit more. India just kept losing wickets, and that was the problem. Raina and Sharma batted well, but not for long enough, and Yusuf never got going and as soon as he failed it looked like a formality.

 

[manee]

Hmmm, losing to New Zealand, nothing major to worry about tbh, considering we were missing Yuvraj, Sehwag and Zaheer. Interesting that Praveen only got the one over and that RP Singh bowled so poorly. Ishant has skyrocketed in the pecking order with a four wicket haul which I honestly did not expect having seen him in the 2008 and 2009 IPL - he might relish English conditions, who knows. As things are going, we'll probably go in to the Group Stages with Zaheer, Ishant, Pragyan, Harbhajan and Yusuf which is a solid attack, tbh. Ojha suffered a bit at the hands of Taylor, but he has shown himself a class act in the IPL and I'm sure he'll do well.

It is worrying that Gambhir still hasn't found form after his disasterous IPL. I have faith that Sehwag, Rohit, Dhoni, Raina and Yusuf (who all had solid IPLs) will take us through the 20 overs each time though. A promising warm up, tbh. Jadeja's slow paced innings appeared to cost us, but may have been right given the circumstances. Either way, he better not play in any of the real World T20 games - as he really shouldn't be in the squad to begin with, imo.

 

[Master Khan]

I just payed ?20 pounds to watch Pakistan vs South Africa and it sucked:!!!...Well A.Morkel hit a six right to me so that was great!!!

 

[stefan]

Decent performance for a first game from my boys. Bowled a few too many full tosses and smith and kallis getting bogged down by the spinners but else than that it was a good performance.

 

[aussie1st]

Looks like Warner will miss out now after a successful opening stand between Watson and Haddin. Nice knock by Clarke as well. Clarke was the best of our bowling all rounders which isn't the best sign for our 5th bowling option.

 

[ZexyZahid]

Warner should be given a chance in the next warm-up match against New Zealand. Australia scored about 100 runs within 8 overs, so that's actually good. But Haddin shouldn't keep opening the innings all the time, because he has some workload with his wicketkeeping.

Bangladesh might cause some more upsets in this tournament.

 

[angryangy]

Not a very good warm up by either of the 2007 finalists.

Pakistan might have been mildly pleased with their bowling after the demolition shown to Bangladesh a couple of hours earlier, but if it was a batsman's day in Nottingham, someone should have told the batsmen, who were bowled out 59 runs short of South Africa's 186. I'm not sure that either of the Pakistan openers have the credentials for Twenty20, but I was observing much the same of this team as they came within a hair of the trophy in 2007. On paper at least, Fawad Alam and the new rookie Shahzaib Hasan would seem to be two of their best in the short game and they really owe it to themselves to try to field their best XI.

South Africa on the other hand seem like they could be the team to beat right now. Their fast bowlers are dangerous, their slow bowlers are tight and their batsmen strike lusty blows. Plus, they can field.

India also managed a curious performance, but in a somewhat more respectable 9 run loss. What is curious is that it seems that they snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. NZ were 3/71 at the half-way mark and 4/115 with 5 overs left, but they accelerated in the death to make a substantial 7/170. India on the other hand were 3/90 at half-way, then 4/128 at 3-quarter time, but they dropped right off the pace to continue NZ's hoodoo.

While India will scratch their heads just a little, NZ will be very pleased with their players and how they performed, with good contributions from several batsmen and the bowlers doing their job well when the pressure mounted. Although they may be lacking in exceptional players, they can make up for it with consistency and flexibility. However, they have benefited from practice match rules and will have to cull some of those ever so flexible players in order to name a proper XI. Still, it looks like a classic Kiwi team is in the making.

 

[Ari]

However, they have benefited from practice match rules and will have to cull some of those ever so flexible players in order to name a proper XI.

Not at all, those flexible players you speak of were McGlashan and Broom and neither of them did anything in the game. The rest of the players that played will probably be in the starting XI come the real thing. The only change might be someone like O'Brien going out for Mills who is currently injured.

I think some of you guys are being a little hard on Jadeja as well, his innings wasn't great but the difference could have easily been RP Singh bowling pies in the last over or maybe Gambhir taking time to get in then getting out.

 

[naresh091]

I have always felt Jadeja as a bits and pieces player.Even yesterday he came with a run a ball knock.He coudnt even clear the circle when the team needs 9 runs per over.He isnt fit to be representing a national team.He might be okay for a side like Rajathan though.
Raina was his usual class.I dont like Rohit Sharma much.But he played a gem of an innings yesterday.Im not worried by this defeat.We dint play Sehwag,Yuvraj and Zaheer(hope he'll be fit soon).RP was disastrous.

 

[sohum]

I think some of you guys are being a little hard on Jadeja as well, his innings wasn't great but the difference could have easily been RP Singh bowling pies in the last over or maybe Gambhir taking time to get in then getting out.

You can't really defend Jadeja if you're going to be criticizing Gambhir. First of all, getting a base for a high run chase is a pretty good idea. Secondly, Rohit Sharma was going great guns and there was no need for Gambhir to play silly cricket. In contrast, Jadeja was batting primarily at a time when they needed quick runs and he still knocked it around at a run a ball. Not only that, he scored just 3 boundaries in 41 balls!

RP's bowling was horrible, though.

 

[King Cricket]

Don't know how many of you guys are aware of this fact, but our success rate against Kiwiland in intl T-20 is 0!! We have lost all the four matches we have played against Vetty and Co.

King Cricket added 11 Minutes and 49 Seconds later...

BTW, you guys are being too harsh on Jadeja. Give him some time, man. Don't forget that this is his first time England tour. First allow him to get adjust with the pitches, playing conditions etc. He's got a lot of talent and can be a pretty handy lower middle order batsman, not to forget his bowling. I agree 41 from 41 is not a T-20 innings. But this is his first ever match in the English soil -don't forget this.

And anyway, warm up matches don't count much, the main thing will start from the 6th, and taking into acoount that we didn't play UV! KING OF SIXERS! KING OF T-20! KING OF HATTRICKS! KING OF STYLE! KING OF HAIRCUTS!! (Can somebody tell me who invented this phrase? ), Zak and Veeru, we didn't do that bad though I agree we should have won this match if not for RP Singh's bowling in the slog overs and RJ's slow batting. (I will not slam RJ as this is his first match)

 

[Howsie]

You can't really defend Jadeja if you're going to be criticizing Gambhir. First of all, getting a base for a high run chase is a pretty good idea. Secondly, Rohit Sharma was going great guns and there was no need for Gambhir to play silly cricket. In contrast, Jadeja was batting primarily at a time when they needed quick runs and he still knocked it around at a run a ball. Not only that, he scored just 3 boundaries in 41 balls!

RP's bowling was horrible, though.

Jadeja played a very good innings, I don't know what everyone is going on about. If someone had managed to stay in India would have won, but they kept losing wickets. Gambhir is to blame as much as Jadeja is because he wasted 15 odd balls for 14 runs at the top of the order.

 

[sohum]

BTW, you guys are being too harsh on Jadeja. Give him some time, man. Don't forget that this is his first time England tour. First allow him to get adjust with the pitches, playing conditions etc. He's got a lot of talent and can be a pretty handy lower middle order batsman, not to forget his bowling. I agree 41 from 41 is not a T-20 innings. But this is his first ever match in the English soil -don't forget this.

It was many people's first matches on English soil. I don't think Rohit Sharma or Yusuf Pathan have played in England earlier, but I may be mistaken. Also, I'm fairly sure Jadeja has toured with the U-21 side and they may have come to England.

sohum added 2 Minutes and 11 Seconds later...

Jadeja played a very good innings, I don't know what everyone is going on about. If someone had managed to stay in India would have won, but they kept losing wickets. Gambhir is to blame as much as Jadeja is because he wasted 15 odd balls for 14 runs at the top of the order.

I already told you why what Gambhir did was perfectly okay. Besides, Gambhir made 14 from 15. Jadeja made 41 from 41. Once you make more than 30-odd in a Twenty20 game, if you're not striking at above 100 you're not really helping your side out very much, especially when the conditions are so good for batting. I daresay if we had sent Yusuf in instead of Jadeja we may even have won the match.

Anyways, thankfully Jadeja won't be a part of the final XI. We have plenty of players who can graft when necessary (Gambhir, Rohit, Dhoni) and who also have the ability to go over the top.