England comprehensively defeated South Africa in the first of three T20s, winning by 9 wickets, as they did in the semi-final of the T20 World Cup in April.
South Africa were restricted to just 89/4 in their 20 overs, which was sacrilegious - only four wickets down, but with a total that was never going to be enough against any decent side, let alone England. Opener Dane van Niekerk (36 off 54 balls) and skipper Mignon du Preez (28 off 41 balls) added 51 for the second wicket, after the early loss of Chetty to Brunt. That would have been acceptable apart from the fact that it took 70 balls, and they hit only five boundaries between them. True the England bowlers bowled well, but South Africa were timid and they will be angry with themselves that they did not post at least 30 more runs.
For England their fielding was sharp with another memorable catch diving forward from Lydia Greenway at cow corner to remove du Preez, and a sharp run out from Sciver to get rid of Lee, who had been stitched up by her skipper. All the bowlers were on the button, but South Africa kept finding the fielders.
Once again England skipper Charlotte Edwards lead the way with the bat, punishing the short ball and anything with width, hitting more fours on her own than South Africa hit in their entire innings. It was a masterclass from Edwards, more akin to a knock at the Super Threes than an international game. She never looked like she was in trouble and finished 62* off 54 balls. Sarah Taylor finished on 21* from 22 balls and looked equally at home as England romped home in the 14th over with just one wicket down.
South Africa will have to go away, lick their wounds and come out fighting on Wednesday. There is no point them playing the same way again in the next two games. They will be demolished again. They are a young side and they will have learned a lot from this game. They may not be experienced enough to turn it round, but they need to adopt a much more positive approach in the next game.
England will have learned little from this game. Brunt and Shrubsole looked more on song than they have so far this season and Knight's bowling was tight. New Zealand in February next year will be a much tougher challenge. Winfield was unluckily run out when she was accidently obstructed by bowler Moseline Daniels as she tried to take a single. It may pay to drop Edwards further down the order in the next match and perhaps get a look at Wyatt, Sciver and Knight. But with Lottie in such good form she will be loath to step aside.
MD
01/IX/14
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Frankly England should try new players against such timid teams so that some big hitter like Dottin would come along and give that boost which England needs to beat Aussies.
ReplyDeleteMagic, get in 3500 people and then South Africa put in such a dreadful and painful batting display. It certainly didn't help promote the women's game. Credit to England for just getting on with it (when they could have just prodded and plodded along) and giving the large crowd something worth watching.
ReplyDeleteI guess we are all hoping England bat first in the next 2 matches to see whether they can post a 150+ score.
One real downer was Winfield's run out. What the heck is the spirit of cricket supposed to mean if a player is run out when clearly obstructed, whether accidentally or not, by the bowler. If this type of run out is allowed to stand then batsmen might as well just plough bat first into the bowler regardless of the consequences. Is that what the game really wants to see ? Pretty crap captaincy not to withdraw the appeal.
One more record for Lottie. Her 62* of the 91 was the highest proportion of an innings runs scored by an England batsmen in a T20. (Sarah) Taylor has twice exceeded this proportion in an ODI - albeit one was the one-sider against WI when England only needed 42 and Taylor scored 30* of them. The best is 72.8% when Taylor scored 75* out of 103-0 against India (102-10) in 2008.
I won't mention the continued lack of 6s - it just wasn't the sort of match when England needed any.
Let's hope for more from SA on Wed.
Withdraw the appeal! You must be joking. There was really nothing out of the ordinary in Winfield's run out.
ReplyDeleteWhat the heck does the spirit of cricket mean? Nothing. It's a made up concept applied with no consistency usually by players or their supporters who feel they may have been on the wrong end of a decision.
As for the match. England did what they needed to in good time and SA were pretty dismal. Chalk it up as a learning experience.
As a matter of fact the spirit of cricket is not a made up concept - its quite real and there in the preamble to the Laws. Clearly my mistake in using lower case letters when I should have stated "Spirit of Cricket".
ReplyDeleteThat preamble was introduced or to put it another way "made up" in 2000.
DeleteWhat about Broad hitting the edge of Edgar and not walking out last year? Where was the spirit of cricket then?
DeleteI agree there are loads of cases of players violating the Spirit of Cricket - but that doesn't make such cases either acceptable or for the betterment of cricket.
ReplyDeleteIf golfers can behave impeccably even when a hell of lot more money is at stake than in cricket, including declaring fouls on themselves (also as in snooker) then cricket players merely demean themselves and undermines the sport they claim to love.
Old fashioned view, well maybe.
good updates
ReplyDelete