This is for cricket fans!

nz match was a good day out, but pakistan were far better to watch sadly. sunburn hurts. :c

good job aussie, but if you win the world cup i will cry. their batsmen are still a bit off, but not as badly as england's (which is odd after the ashes).

sl vs wi starting today; i never even knew it was going on. :/ edit: oh right it's the odi series that never happened earlier. i look forward to sarwan's return since he's amazing.
 

Hipmonlee

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What NZ needs to do to win the world cup:
  • Avoid teams from the subcontinent. They have the ideal group for this, they are guaranteed to advance, and guaranteed to not have to play SL or Pakistan in the Quarters. They only need to avoid India, and, really, despite their recent shitness in Bangladesh, they should beat them if they meet. How the semis are decided isnt clear to me, but at that point, there must be every chance they will meet one of Australia or South Africa. NZ has a very strong chance of beating either team (their main issue within the last 15 or however many games it has been has been their inability to score effectively against spin. Against Aus or SA this isnt a huge problem). From there they only have to win the one off final.
  • Practice hard. Fortunately the tournament format is accommodating of the time needed for this. There is a lot of criticism of the NZ team based on the fact that their decision making is poor, and the suggestion has been they need to stop making stupid mistakes. This is wrong. It isnt moments of stupidity that is the problem, it is the lack of good options available to the batsmen. Taylor practices leg side hoicks because he thinks they are a good idea (IE it isnt moments of idiocy, it is a poor overall strategy). Guptill hits in the air because he is very limited off the back foot through the off side, he has to take these risks to score effectively. McCullum's batting against spin has improved greatly. Franklin is the only one I cant see an obvious reason behind his dismissals, but on the other hand, he has been really good lately. How wont play, and the running between wickets is easily sorted out.
  • Stop rotating. Like the experiment with McCullum down the order, unfortunately failed to actually be an experiment. Lets say he had batted well - would we then say "Oh, he has proven that he should never have been moved down the order in the first place" or if he batted poorly, then what - would he be dropped, or would we say the experiment was a failure and put him back up the order. What this experiment lacks is any sort of indication as to what outcome would falsify or support the hypothesis.
  • Keep Jesse fit. As well as everyone else, I guess. But mostly just Jesse.
  • Take powerplays early. Our batting strength is at the top. Leaving powerplays til late is the conservative approach - IE it is for the good teams. We need to be brave!
  • Reverse swing? Wouldnt that be nice..

Have a nice day.
 
Are people interested in another cricinfo fantasy league? I can set it up tonight when I get back from lectures...
 
tbqh hip that's asking a fuckload of nz. although judging by the recent match we really need to just decide on an opening pair (i personally would like to see guptill open and probably ryder at 3 tbh), like you said stop rotating.

sl vs wi was pretty bleh, nothing interesting really. same could be said for aus vs england though. i also found that the two matches mirrored each other; there were times where there was a wicket at practically the same moment in both matches and the scores were pretty similar, etc. it was trippy.
 
The warm-up matches were, as expected, pretty much one-sided except for the NZ-Ireland match. Ireland actually played really well to get 279. Even though they lost, this shows that NZ have to work on their bowling a lot.

tbh, Hamish Bannett was pretty bad today. Even though he got the key wicket of Porterfield, he leaked a lot of runs. The spinners worked well.

Looking forward to Ind vs Aus tomorrow. I really, really do hope that it isn't one-sided.
 
really wanting bangladesh to do well just because. it's too tough to pick a winner so i'm just going to sick back and enjoy the show.
 
well that was a pretty one-sided opening match, more so than i would have liked. good knocks from sehwag and kohli (although i hear sehwag's was pretty ugly) and it was nice to see bangladesh's top order not roll over.
 
Man Sehwag was looking in murderous form. Can't believe he was actually serious about the battling 50 overs thing.

All we need now is the bowlers to be consistent and Yuvraj Singh to hit form. He'll be playing against his favourite team next match. So hopefully he comes good =D
 

Badal

Shit
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World Cup has begun! I'm really excited because I get to see India vs England live.
You're in Bangalore? or you meant live on TV? If you're here, then hit me up.





@The game: It was going good towards India, we could've easily won it, but then our fielding was so bad, bad fielding set up, it really is pissing off to see us loose a good lead. In regards to the batting, Dhoni could've stayed on longer, so could've Kohli and Munaf, they had to hit a bit less profusely
 
We got this! What a match.. awesomeness. Feel sorry for Strauss though. Played brilliantly

EDIT: Oh crap 2 sixes damn

EDIT2: It's a tie!!!! Haha what a match. Epic. Best of the tourney so far.
 

Badal

Shit
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Wow that was brilliant. The 6 in the last over gave it away. Well Good Game anyways. Sloppy fielding from India though.
 
Definitely, they should consider holding all the matches at Bangalore. If Sunday was awesome, this was fantastic! Superb innings from Kevin O'Brien, along with a great cameo at the end by Mooney. A historic win for the Irish!

As far as England are concerned, they keep going from mediocrity to excellence. They really should be more consistent, especially on the field. They dropped so many today.....
 

elDino

Deal With It.
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I got so much shit from my Irish friend after that match, it was so embarrasing. England do really need to be a hell of a lot more consistent after that horrible performance. The runs from O'Brien just kept coming and coming... *Sigh*
 

Bartman101

Banned deucer.
We lost to the Irish, but that's ok, if we had to lose to any team in our group I'd chose them. Why, you may ask? Because they have the best accents going, of course.

The tie with India was also cool.
 

Hipmonlee

Have a nice day
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Noticeable reverse swing from Southee and Wright banning the team from playing aerially in the nets. If they stick with this team (IE dont pick How again, jesus christ). Then it sounds like all NZ needs to do to achieve all my WC winning formula is avoid india in the quarters (england may have helped in that regard a lot).

I like where the team is at at this exact moment in time. Watch out for them, I am serious.

Have a nice day.
 

McGrrr

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The world has gone mad.

Following England during this tournament has been incredible value. Cricket is the winner every time.
 

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