Powerplays continue to muddle England
Will
25-Feb-2013
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After Pakistan’s comprehensive win over England in the second one-dayer at Lord’s yesterday, the papers have a clutch of articles on the outcome. Andrew Strauss talks to Scyld Berry, Steve James and Michael Atherton in the Sunday Telegraph and believes the key to winning the World Cup is the use of Powerplays:
The side that wins the World Cup will be the one that uses the power-plays best [power-plays are the 20 overs out of the 50 where fielding restrictions apply]. You have to score a lot of runs in the power-plays but, if you lose wickets, you hamstring yourself. As Sri Lanka showed, if you can go at the opposition and it comes off, the game is as good as won.
And Atherton continues the theme in the same paper
The new rules put more pressure on captains who, with fielding restrictions and bowling permutations, have enough to think about in one-day cricket. It was no surprise to see Inzamam-ul-Haq forget about the second power play in the first one-day international at Cardiff. Yet generally, it is England, not their rivals, who have struggled to come to terms with the power plays and have yet to grasp the opportunities they offer.
Click here to read Cricinfo's explanation of Powerplays.
Though no one is denying Stuart Broad’s potential, Stephen Fay tempers the excitement in his column at The Independent on Sunday
When Broad came back on, this trio treated him with scant respect. Yousuf drove him for four to mid-off to score the winning runs. His bowling lacked penetration on the day and his figures of 6.3 overs for 44 runs reflected this. Put yesterday down on the learning curve. It is still steep. Broad has some way to go.
In the same paper Stephen Brenkley questions the “misguided” decision to recall Darren Gough to the one-day squad:
None of the other England bowlers remotely looked like taking a wicket, though Rikki Clarke had Younis caught on the mid-wicket boundary, somewhat lazily chipping. Gough was disappointing.
He talked as well as bowled himself into this squad at Essex and he turned up looking overweight, which hardly gave him the best chance. He took nought for 44 in his eight overs and apart from his first over was unthreatening. The selectors must begin to ask themselves what the point of continuing is but then they should have put the question long ago. Pakistan won with 20 balls to spare in match reduced to 40 overs because of rain.