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Post by riverpanthera on Mar 17, 2015 21:23:40 GMT -8
Hope South Africa wins, I really want them to get over their choker tag (though I don't want them to beat NZ lol if we both meet in semis). They're off to a great start so far. gangsta, I think NZ should win provided we don't let the pressure get to us and barring any magic from Gayle. But I think WI could definitely give a tough fight, they are not a bad team but just been very inconsistent this world cup.
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Post by karan on Mar 18, 2015 3:33:10 GMT -8
Brilliant performance from South Africa. I know they are/were seen as chokers but never knew they'd never won even a single WC knockout game prior to today. Though it's yet to be seen if they can chase down a big total (but that might not be necessary if they bat first or bowl as well as they did today). Also Sangakarra's last ODI game . He's in great form so he could have continued playing.
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Post by gangsta on Mar 18, 2015 5:47:49 GMT -8
What an amazing performance from RSA. ABD's words before the game do not sound that hollow anymore. SL lost 7 wickets to spin! Wow.
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Post by abhijacko on Mar 18, 2015 6:19:41 GMT -8
SAF rocked it. They came out all guns firing and never really relented. One of my fellow South African supporter said before the tournament that if South Africa defeat their knockout issues and win the QF they will win the cup. I would actually agree with him.
South Africa will gladly take on either of WI and NZ for the semifinals clash. They are the better team and I think they will only be thwarted if they run up against a rampaging Gayle or McCullum
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Post by riverpanthera on Mar 18, 2015 22:39:02 GMT -8
I think South Africa will for sure beat West Indies if that is the semi, because would be very strange if WI won against two great teams in a row. However if NZ does get to semis, I think its tough to say who will win cause NZ have been playing much better than SA recently even if overall SA is the better team. Though SA will be desperate for a win, but so will NZ as neither have been to the final before. But anyway, lets not get ahead of ourselves, NZ still has to get past WI.
Also I don't really see SA beating Australia at this stage even if they did go to final.And I think that is the most likely opponent right now for the final.
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Post by karan on Mar 18, 2015 23:02:49 GMT -8
Bangladesh got unlucky with the lbw and no-ball calls going against them. Both looked out. Expect Bangladesh fans to blame the umpire if they lose.
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Post by gangsta on Mar 20, 2015 5:41:00 GMT -8
What a clinical performance from Australia. Maxwell's run has been making all the difference for them in this tournament. To have Warner up at the top, Smith and Clarke in the middle, then Watson and Maxwell to provide the firepower and the finisher in Faulkner to polish things off - what an amazing lineup that is. Their bowling has been solid, if not spectacular. Excellent performance last night. Don't mind having missed sleep to watch that match. Will be doing the same tonight. Can't wait for this match. I hope WI win, but that would be nothing short of a miracle. But NZ going through is pretty good too. It would mean that the 4 best teams in the competition would be in the quarterfinals, which is perfect.
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Post by abhijacko on Mar 20, 2015 6:02:17 GMT -8
Fairly one sided quarter finals so far one would say. Maybe NZ v WI will throw up a good game
I think India will finally be registering their first loss. I just dont see them beating this Australian side in Australia. Only slight advantage would be that its being played in Sydney, one of the most spin friendly wickets in Australia
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Post by riverpanthera on Mar 21, 2015 11:27:26 GMT -8
What an innings by Martin Guptill, truly unforgettable.
thats what I love about this NZ time, they are not at all reliant on Mccullum or any one person.
overall a great game for us. Though West indies actually did very well even if margin of victory looks big cause they were constantly scoring at really high rate..for all of their 250 runsbut they just lost too many wickets consistently.
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Post by abhijacko on Mar 22, 2015 12:26:29 GMT -8
3 out of 3 of my favorite teams have made it to the knockouts Couldnt be happier. India vs Australia - it will be a miracle if India pulls off a win SAF vs NZ - Hoping for a SAF win even though I wouldnt mind if NZ went to the finals either. Although I think SAF might give Aus a tougher fight since NZ have not played a single game in Australia. Playing against Aus at MCG after having played 8 games in NZ might be too overwhelming
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Post by riverpanthera on Mar 22, 2015 20:53:41 GMT -8
Well I got at least 3/4 teams right from my prediction lol. It's probably same for me abhi actually, while I never expected India to make it this far, they are in my top 3 preferred to win the world cup. And it's great to see that top 4 teams from the group stage actually are the top 4 remaining.
the best thing for me as things stand now would be an India vs NZ final, that would really be amazing, I remember wanting that for 2011 world cup but unfortunately didn't happen then, hopefully will this time.
But other than that, I hope that whoever wins the NZ vs SAF semi goes on to win the world cup. I think NZ really deserve to go through, they have been playing much more consistent cricket than SAF. But SAF is perhaps the only team that can beat them right now and the only team I wouldn't be too sad to see them lose to.
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Post by abhijacko on Mar 23, 2015 6:01:55 GMT -8
You don't think Aus will have a definite advantage playing SAF/NZ at the MCG? I think Aus are the favorite amongst the favorites in current form. Every single aspect of their lineup is clicking.
Although I too would personally prefer the winner of NZ v SAF to win the world cup against Australia
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Post by gangsta on Mar 23, 2015 6:19:41 GMT -8
I am rooting for RSA to win the World Cup, but will take Australia too. The 2 most eye-catching teams for me in this World Cup. NZ have been good too, but they have not been tested outside home conditions yet and I think that will be their biggest hurdle from winning the whole thing.
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Post by riverpanthera on Mar 23, 2015 13:55:03 GMT -8
You don't think Aus will have a definite advantage playing SAF/NZ at the MCG? I think Aus are the favorite amongst the favorites in current form. Every single aspect of their lineup is clicking. Although I too would personally prefer the winner of NZ v SAF to win the world cup against Australia I definitely agree that Aus are favourites but as things stand now I think nz actually have better chance to beat themthan SAF cause we have already done it once this world cup. though nz does have drawback of not having played at all in aussie. anyway in the end all the speculation doesn't really matter. .anything can happen on the day. the excitement here in nz right now is incredible. Win or lose the way this current team has gripped the nation. .ive never seen anything like it. Its how it is with rugby.
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Post by abhijacko on Mar 23, 2015 14:25:31 GMT -8
riverpanthera: that's actually really great to hear that cricket fever is on in NZ. Would love to see a strong NZ team ruling the performance charts. For too long they have been unable to deliver on the promise their players have shown. They have always had some of the most likable cricketers - guys like Fleming, Astle, Cairns, Vettori had lots of Indian fans back in the days. McCullum is a superstar already. A world cup win at this point could be a game changer for NZC.
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Post by karan on Mar 24, 2015 2:30:18 GMT -8
One of the best ODIs ever. So tense. Really gutted for South Africa but congrats to NZ. Could have been a different outcome if it didn't rain though.
On another note, the boundaries in some NZ grounds are ridiculously small. There's already enough other advantages for the batsmen.
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Post by gangsta on Mar 24, 2015 5:59:45 GMT -8
^ I absolutely agree. One of these days, someone is going to score 300 all on their own on grounds like these. Just ridiculous. You could put a man on the damn boundary and still claim it as one of the mandatory "catching positions". But hey, we are told time and again that this is what crowds love. I say, who cares about illiterate "crowds" like these anyway.
But yeah, what a match. Rain played its part, but not as crazy as 1992. South Africa were positioned perfectly for the final assault and could have taken this game completely away from NZ with a 400+ total. But they also messed up by not going for the aggressive option in Abbott and played the much safer Philander instead. What a time to be a NZ cricket fan. They are playing excellent ODI cricket, but they owe all of this to just one man - Brendon McCullum at the top. What innovation, what aggressive cricket, both in the field and while batting, what an amazing drive to look for wickets all the time. I really hope Australia win the other semifinal because these two teams really deserve to be in the final. They really are the best two teams in the competition. But the final will be a big challenge for NZ, because it will be their first match in Australia this whole summer.
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Post by riverpanthera on Mar 24, 2015 13:41:47 GMT -8
I am beyond thrilled we won. Got some luck go our way with the rain but i don't think that's he only reason we won.. we played amazing crixket too and in the end we held our nerve just a bit more than south africa. Both teams had moments of nervous ness though with all the dropped catches and missed run out s. I think that cost saf more than the rain actually.
Also I do think saf made some poor choices considering they knew it was gonna rain because of the forecast and despite winning the toss. I was very surprised when AB decided ti bat first and then proceeded to play so slow in first 20 overs
Though having to chase 300 almost in 43 overs was still a tough ask but that complete onslaught from Mccullum made it much easier. He's such a fearless guy.
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Post by agantuk on Mar 24, 2015 17:58:56 GMT -8
This semi final was a bulls*** match. D/L on the first day of the semi final with a FULL reserve day to go? This was Day/Light robbery of South Africa. New Zealand truly got lucky - uninterrupted play, only 17 runs more for South Africa's loss of 7 overs and momentum. Criminal conspiracy.
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Post by gangsta on Mar 25, 2015 5:39:58 GMT -8
^ I agree to an extent agantuk. With all the fielding restriction changes and the powerplays that have been brought in to aid the batsmen more, changes need to be made to the D/L system. South Africa should have received WAY more than just 17 more runs. What a ridiculously outdated system D/L is. RSA should have received at least 50 more runs. But having said that, though, they bowled horribly. Despite only 17 more runs added, I reckon they had a winning total. It was a terrible terrible effort in the field though. That appalling bowling effort is what cost them the game, more than D/L.
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Post by abhijacko on Mar 27, 2015 5:56:41 GMT -8
I would rather have them change the fielding restriction rules instead it. The bowlers hardly have any protection these days. Even the best of the lot will get smacked for a billion runs if they come against a rampaging batsman. And they really need to control the bat sizes - the thickness of the blade on some of these bats is ridiculous. For instance the ones that Warner uses. Its almost a cuboid with the thickness almost the same as the width. A thick edge is like a shot off the middle of the bat. Anyways, to the important things: GO Kiwis
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Post by gangsta on Mar 27, 2015 7:19:00 GMT -8
^ There is not much they can do about that though. Sachin's bat was crazy thick for the 90s era and no one ever said anything about it. If anything, Sachin's bat was thicker than Warner's is.
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Post by riverpanthera on Mar 27, 2015 13:59:37 GMT -8
The reason many NZ stadiums are so small is that they are built for rugby, and we are too small a nation to build big capacity stadiums specifically for cricket as cricket has never had the same popularity as rugby and being a country with such a small population, it would be a waste of money. I mean most cities will only get maybe one or two cricket matches per year and the crowd attendance wouldn't fill up a large stadium, so it wouldn't be a good look.
That's not to say we don't have proper cricket grounds- we do, but they tend not to have high seating capacity, so are not used for big matches.
Now, I do agree that cricket rules have become too batsmen friendly, and that should be changed.
South African fans (specifially not saying team as they haven't whined at allj, and only referring to those who are whining) have no right to whine about losing because of D/L, it was known from the start of the match that rain is likely to play a part because of the forecast, you have to plan for that. De Villiers was asked at toss what he though about rain and he said "he's not thinking about it all". Well I"m sorry AB, but yes actually you do have to think about it especially in Auckland which is notorious for that. Did he forget that he just had a rain affected match against Pakistan at the very same ground.
Plus it was also known from the start that the reserve day would ONLY be used if there is a total wash out, because otherwise you risk rain being there for next day too (and in fact rain was forecast in Auckland all the way till friday)
Also it's not like the match was reduced to something like 20 overs, 43 overs is plenty of time for a fair match. And there were still 16 overs to go from SAs innings, so you can't even say for sure that they would have posted a huge score- yes at that point it looked like they could get anywhere from 350-380 but had NZ got a few quick wickets, everything could have changed. This is proved just by the second semi between Aus/India. At one stage, looked like Aus would score 380-400 but only got 330 or something.
So I think a score of 298 to chase from 43 overs was pretty fair considering you have no idea what SAF ending score would really have been from 50 overs. I would say 298 from 43 is equivalent to about 350 from 50 overs. Maybe SAF were slightly disadvantaged as they potentially could have scored 380 though for that they would have had to score at a crazy high run rate for last 7 overs. But then they also may have had a slight collapse and ended up at 320-330, NZ bowling is very good so they could have come back easily.
Was NZ lucky that it rained, sure they were but to say it was a conspiracy is taking it way too far. WE didn't make it rain, we didn't even have benefit of winning the toss, and the rules regarding reserve day etc were also very clear from before.
And lets not forget that SAF missed two extremely simple run outs at very crucial moments, I mean even school boys won't miss them. They also missed a simple catch. The nerves lost them the match not the rain. While NZ did also miss run out/drop catches, at least theirs were somewhat difficult ones, not so straightforward and weren't at such crucial stages.
Though having said that, I have nothing but admiration for SAF and I could see they were giving it their all as some of their fielding was exceptional, they easily stopped several boundaries. And I felt very sad that for them when they lost. But I would have also felt very sad for NZ. Truth is both teams deserved to be in the final.
My office mate who's actually South African and supporting them, went to see the match and she also said the same thing, it was the best match she had ever seen and both teams deserved a win. I didn't hear even one word from her about unfairness.
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Post by riverpanthera on Mar 27, 2015 14:16:37 GMT -8
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Post by abhijacko on Mar 28, 2015 8:33:39 GMT -8
Nice videos - right in the cow corner from the other end did you have any sixes come your way ?
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Post by 5xpressionsftw on Mar 28, 2015 13:47:42 GMT -8
All the best to NZ for the match later today, rooting for them cuz they deserve it more but afraid Australia will probably win anyway since NZ haven't played in the Big Aussie grounds yet but hoping the underdogs win it against the odds this time. Brendon McCullum's invitations to the Indian people to cheer for them was also very sweet.
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Post by riverpanthera on Mar 28, 2015 13:51:50 GMT -8
abhijacko Yeah we did get a few from what I remember during the WI match. One that Martin guptil hit against West Indies I think was pretty much right in front of us though a few rows below. And a few came around us, one was right in front of the commentators box, which was just a little to our right. I'm not sure if we got any sixes our way for Aussie match, but we did get some fours I think. And got to see some incredible fielding close up by Brendon. It was an incredible atmosphere for both matches.
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Post by riverpanthera on Mar 28, 2015 23:10:39 GMT -8
A very disappointing batting performance by nz barring elliot and taylor.
hopefully our bowlers can try and still give us a.bit of a chance..hoping for another low scoring thriller.
mainly im annoyed with the liwer middle order. They wasted what was a great comeback after being 30-3 to 150- 3. Only adding 30 runs after that is just pathetic.
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Post by karan on Mar 29, 2015 3:39:58 GMT -8
Easy win for Australia. Happy they won. Boring match though. With this, Australia have won 4 of the last 5 world cups.
They've got a young team as well (5 of their playing XI today are around 25 years old or under and Watson & Finch only 28) so they're also looking strong for the next world cup.
Was a decent tournament. But they've really got to look at making changes so there's a better contest between bat and ball.
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Post by agantuk on Mar 29, 2015 11:48:09 GMT -8
A decision like that taken by Clarke would be hailed as 'bold' in India. Dhoni is a few days younger but didn't mention anything about retirement - though in his case retirement from Tests may be a sensible thing to do. Both Australian and Indian star performers usually retire on their own terms, the only difference being in the former case, people usually react with a "why?" and in the latter, "when?"
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