Australia became the first team to qualify for the semifinals of the Champions Trophy with a facile victory over their Trans-Tasman neighbors New Zealand. A contest between New Zealand and Australia in any sport is one that’s got plenty of needle, as the Kiwis resent being treated like the little brother by the Aussies and so are always spoiling for a fight.
Any fight however was snuffed out within the first 15 overs by the remarkable Glenn McGrath, who showed that he is far from being a spent force and has a few tricks left up his sleeve.
He may not be a role model as far as behavior is concerned with his ability to shoot from the lip, but he is an ideal role model for bowlers wanting to know how to bowl in the channel.
One can’t think of a better exponent of bowling in the ‘don’t know’ zone as in ‘don’t know whether to play it or leave it’ as the Australian pacer who also showed a healthy speed in the game. Perhaps Curtly Ambrose was as good at making the batsman play just about every ball and give him no respite at all and, like the retired West Indian great, McGrath hardly ever needs to bowl the bouncer though he can bowl a very accurate one if he wants to or a batsman upsets him.
He was well supported by the others and the Kiwis had a busy time trying to get a total on board that would challenge the world champs. The other plus for Australia has been the terrific comeback by Michael Kasprowicz to international cricket. After the 2001 tour of India, it looked as if ‘Kaspers’ was confined to the history of Australian cricket, but it was ironically McGrath’s absence that got him another opportunity on the tour of Sri Lanka earlier in the year, and the paceman has grabbed his chances well and is now a permanent member of the team. His arm may be coming rounder than ever before and his pace dropped significantly, but he is picking wickets and that’s the important thing.
He doesn’t have the speed of Brett lee nor the movement of Gillespie nor the accuracy of McGrath, but the last column in the bowling analysis always shows a good number and no captain will complain about that.
The day before the clash of the Trans-Tasman rivals saw another couple of one-sided matches as Pakistan thrashed Kenya and West Indies toyed with Bangladesh. Kenya’s resistance was broken when spin was introduced by Inzamam-ul-Haq and they had no answer to Afridi and Shoaib Malik. The Kenyans may well complain about not getting games after reaching the semifinals of the World Cup last year, but their performances here will not encourage teams from inviting them either.
Another good performance here and the world would have had to sit up and take notice of them, but their cricket left a lot to be desired and now a lot of people will talk about how the withdrawal of teams to play in Kenya in the World Cup helped them get to the semis there.
Their cricket has hardly changed and if anything, it seems to have gone down a notch or two, which does not reflect well on the new coach who was imposed on the KCA. There is a lot of good will for the Kenyans, but if they don’t perform on the field, it will evaporate quickly.
If Bangladesh were on trial for Test reckoning as the Kenyans are, then they would have to wait a long, long time indeed. Their fielding against the West Indies would have shamed a school team and their batting was no better. If there was one team that could have been put under pressure, it was the West Indies, for they too are going through a rough time, but Bangladesh didn’t seem to be aware of that as they kept dropping catches, giving overthrows and generally showing that they did not belong in this company.
That their bowling is not sharp is well known, but there’s potential in their batting and that’s why it was a sad sight to see batsman after batsman departing to ungainly shots and making Merv Dillon’s comeback to the West Indies team such a successful one.
The matches ahead should be more competitive than the ones witnessed so far as the tournament enters its second week. The weather also is holding up and if it stays that way then we could see an exciting finish to a tournament that has not quite caught the imagination of the public in England.
