South Africa can forget about valuable practice

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Sir Mupariwa
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South Africa can forget about valuable practice

Post by Sir Mupariwa »

The Proteas can forget about getting any meaningful preparation before their series against England.

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Zimbabwe, against whom South Africa are scheduled to play two games to prepare for the series, were on Tuesday dismissed for just 44 runs against an equally inept Bangladesh in the fourth clash between these two teams.
It was the fifth-lowest total in the history of one-day cricket and Bangladesh reached the winning total for the loss of only four wickets to take an unassailable 3-1 lead in the series.

Only Malcolm Waller (13) and Stuart Matsikenyeri (11) could reach double figures, with spinners Shakib-Al-Hasan (3/8) and Enamul Haque (3/16) in good bowling form.

Proteas coach Mickey Arthur put his team’s failure in the recent Champions Trophy series down to a lack of game time after South Africa played almost no cricket for more than two months ahead of the “mini World Cup”.

South Africa were already knocked out in the group phases after losses against Sri Lanka and England.

Arthur, who had to explain the Proteas’ struggles to the management of Cricket South Africa (CSA) last week, warned that they should not fall into the same trap before playing England in just over a week’s time.

CSA chief executive Gerald Majola then announced that the Proteas will play Zimbabwe twice -- on November 8 in Benoni and two days later in Centurion -- to warm up.

The batting performance was Zimbabwe’s third worst to date and the team also has the dubious honour of having posted three of the ten lowest scores in cricket.

A further concern for Arthur is that anything but convincing victories over South Africa’s neighbours will have the alarm bells ringing. That said, easy victories may deprive the players of valuable batting and bowling practice.

The Proteas’ bowling in the last ten overs requires sharpening up. That will not happen if Zimbabwe last for only about 25 overs as was the case in Chittagong on Tuesday.

http://www.supersport.com/cricket/artic ... &id=322016
12.4 Odhiambo to Vermeulen, FOUR, that's an appalling long hop, Vermulen had plenty of time to get into position, drink a cup of tea, and pull the ball towards the long leg boundary- his first boundary today

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maehara
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Re: South Africa can forget about valuable practice

Post by maehara »

In our defence, Zim batsmen have always been poor against spin, with one or two notable exceptions. SA aren't likely to use as much spin as Bangladesh do, thankfully. Still, the runes don't look good for Zimbabwe pulling off any upsets...

anusha gamage
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Re: South Africa can forget about valuable practice

Post by anusha gamage »

use chibaba and elton for opaning seame bawlin...cut marfu in javis then zim can beat south africa

sloandog
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Re: South Africa can forget about valuable practice

Post by sloandog »

Are you crazy !! Chibahba opening the bowling after that horror show ??!! :evil: Mpofu has done nothing wrong. If anything he's been the pick of the bowlers on 2days performance, and every time he comes into the team he performs exeptionally. Take the last match against Kenya for instance, 3 wickets. If anything he's even been the quickest bowler of the tornament series aswell, next to Jarvis notching up to 135 kph.
Speaking of Jarvis, he's one of zimbabwes great prospects, and only a fool would cut him from the squad for the south african series. Yes he can be expensive, but on the quick bouncy wickets in south africa his height, bounce and pace are essential. Can you think of anybody in the squad who can do what he does ?? No !! We saw in this series that when he's loose he can notch up to 137kph, including a fast short bouncer. Give him time man !

You need to rethink as to who will be in your squad, because taking to of our best, and fastest bowlers in the country isn't a recipe for success !!
:W:

Train Driver
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Re: South Africa can forget about valuable practice

Post by Train Driver »

Out of interest, are the players flying directly from Bangladesh to South Africa or will they be stopping off in Zim ?

I'd just assumed that the same squad would be the ones to play in the 2 SA games, the only options i can see are

Maruma for Utseya, assuming he's unfit, if it was likely that we would play SA with 3 spinners,

Rainsford and/or Mupariwa for Jarvis and/or Mpofu which i really can't see happening,

Sibanda for one of the batsmen, but although he's scored a bucket full of Logan runs he's scored next to no Faithwear runs,

My personal guess is that the same players will be the only ones considered for selection against SA, if Williams had been fit then i think he would have played, but i really can't think of anyone else that would be put in ahead of the Kenya/Bangladesh squad.

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maehara
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Re: South Africa can forget about valuable practice

Post by maehara »

Train Driver wrote:Out of interest, are the players flying directly from Bangladesh to South Africa or will they be stopping off in Zim ?
They would have had to go through SA to get back to Zim anyway, so I'd assume they'll just stay there. Nothing to stop them flying a replacement or two in from Harare, though.

zimfan1
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Re: South Africa can forget about valuable practice

Post by zimfan1 »

For all the UK viewers the matches will be live on Sky Sports

http://www.skysports.com/story/0,19528,12943,00.html

I have a sneeky feeling that we may casue a surprise or two over the short series :o

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eugene
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Re: South Africa can forget about valuable practice

Post by eugene »

We will need to cause alot of surprises to have any chance of beating South Africa.
Neil Johnson, Alistair Campbell, Murray Goodwin, Andy Flower (w), Grant Flower, Dave Houghton, Guy Whittall, Heath Streak (c), Andy Blignaut, Ray Price, Eddo Brandes

Detective RDS
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Re: South Africa can forget about valuable practice

Post by Detective RDS »

Looking forward to the South Africa challenge :)

To be honest, SA is one of the my favourite teams ;) I am a big fan of Steyn, Smith, De Villiers, Botha, Kallis and VD Merwe (for the RCB factor).

If Utseya and Taibu is unfit, then Zimbabwe must send replacements for them. I would prefer Sibanda and Maruma (Agree with Train Driver).

But CricInfo is showing the same squad in the series home which played against Bangladesh:
http://www.cricinfo.com/rsavzim2009/con ... 33049.html

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