[U19 World Cup] Zimbabwe vs England

[sixes fan]

ives does look a good prospect, sly too ... the ball
that got him out was a cracker even our national
players would have been beaten by that 1. murray of
coz top class , mashinge batting too low. should open with mashinge
& sly, keefe one drop, ives 4 , murray 5 imo.. not so bad
considering the pathetic bowlers these guys meet in xul
cricket here esp ives great application vs swing
against curran & mahmood esp facing few if non here locally
lets wait & see vs the windies

[Googly]

I got much pleasure from South Africa's defeat. They've copied us in every respect and yet have expected a different outcome? There's a name for people like that, many many names actually. I don't know if anyone watched their Varsity Challenge T20 tournament? There used to be some top cricketers playing uni cricket in SA, the standard is now woeful. They will continue to be a breeding ground for fantastic individual sportsmen but...

[Googly]

Not too many of these boys turn out for club games, where the standard is a bit better, so they have only themselves to blame. That Mahmood guy I don't think will go on, he's just matured early. Curran again didn't bowl that well, but look how promising he is with the bat! I would open with him and Lawrence. Their captain is very quick to take him off if he's not in the groove, I see. 4 overs of fast, skiddy, inswing would be deadly but he's not getting it quite right...yet!

[sloandog]

Not too many of these boys turn out for club games, where the standard is a bit better, so they have only themselves to blame. That Mahmood guy I don't think will go on, he's just matured early. Curran again didn't bowl that well, but look how promising he is with the bat! I would open with him and Lawrence. Their captain is very quick to take him off if he's not in the groove, I see. 4 overs of fast, skiddy, inswing would be deadly but he's not getting it quite right...yet!

Mahmood I have to disagree with; I reckon he's going to just get better and better. Not being biased in the sense that I know the guy from club cricket, played with and against him. Genuinely nice bloke and very highly thought of at Lancashire as well. I reckon he could be very very fast in a couple of years. 84-86Mph at just 18 is something to shout about

[sloandog]

He rates Zimbabwe by the way; spoke to him earlier. Said 'yea they're a good side, have some very good bowlers'

[Kriterion_BD]

Not too many of these boys turn out for club games, where the standard is a bit better, so they have only themselves to blame. That Mahmood guy I don't think will go on, he's just matured early. Curran again didn't bowl that well, but look how promising he is with the bat! I would open with him and Lawrence. Their captain is very quick to take him off if he's not in the groove, I see. 4 overs of fast, skiddy, inswing would be deadly but he's not getting it quite right...yet!

Mahmood I have to disagree with; I reckon he's going to just get better and better. Not being biased in the sense that I know the guy from club cricket, played with and against him. Genuinely nice bloke and very highly thought of at Lancashire as well. I reckon he could be very very fast in a couple of years. 84-86Mph at just 18 is something to shout about

Mahmood looks just like BD's opnening bowler Abdul Halim...both tall and lanky with similar actions. Only Halim is an 80 mph trundler.

[Kriterion_BD]

Certainly batting second allows greater potential for manipulation of the NRR, but only if you're prepared to modify your game place your innings aggressively as you say which didn't really suit us as we weren't prepared to take risk in the first game. Had we batted first I still think we would have achieved a better NRR in this particular case.

Besides, the whole NRR system is flawed; just look at the Aus vs NZ group stage World Cup game; NZ chased down the total in around 25 overs which makes it look like a complete drubbing according to NRR but with only one wicket in it, it was definitely a lot closer than that. I would much rather they use the difference to the D/L par as means of determining how big wins are.

Well Zim were 3 down in 18 overs with no pressure (target of just 80). Thats not a guarantee that they'd score 280 plus had they batted first. Is the middle and lower order strong? Then there is a shot, but even then unlikely if the top order folds for 70 for 3 without even stepping on the gas. Scoring 250 in 50 overs would have helped the NRR slightly more than scoring 80 in 18. But the issue is that the option of chasing 80 in 10 overs was there, even if meant losing 6 or 7 wickets instead of 3. At the end of the day the NRR is a decent index regardless of whether a team bats first or second. Just recall how Guptill smashed SL a few weeks ago chasing 130 in like 10 overs or whatever it was. That would have been an NRR of 10, without batting first and scoring 500, which NZ would not have been able to do.

Yeah, NRR is not perfect. They need to include overs and wickets as you've noted.

[jaybro]

Young Ives may have just scored himself a scholarship in the UK .....

[Googly]

He's either left school already or does so at the end of the year.