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It had to happen some day

By Emma 2 years ago, mid-September Leave a comment on this post

This game was hardly a thriller, but it was a win. England can take positives from this match on to Edgbaston, as well as a much-needed dose of confidence.

It seems fair to say that the game was won in the field. In fact, if it were not for the 47 runs scored in Pakistan’s last twelve balls, courtesy of some fantastic play from Abdul Razzaq, England would have wrapped up the game around about the 40th over of their reply. Pakistan’s bowling performance showed signs of the problems that have been hounding the hosts all summer – tiredness and inaccuracy. Whilst England batted well, Ian Bell in particular, only Asif and Hafeez really troubled in what was a comfortable run chase.

England bowled well for the majority of their 50 overs. Whilst I’m happy to give credit, especially to debutant Michael Yardy, I do hope Strauss starts to think his bowling changes at the death through a little more for Edgbaston. There seemed little sense in cutting Dalrymple off after 9 overs, or in taking off Broad after his over took a wicket for only a single. Nevertheless, for the moment, I’m going to celebrate a one-day game mostly memorable in its result – England’s first win in a series that wasn’t already dead since last year - and in the fact Trescothick was dropped for the first time in his England career.

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One Response to “It had to happen some day”

  • Smriti wrote:
    September 9th, 2006 at 1.44 pm

    Can’t agree with you more, the England-Pakistan game was far from exciting.It was great however to see Kevin Peterson getting back to form. The previous game saw him making a good start and then perishing with an awful short.
    I guess the best part of yesterday’s game was the brilliant innings of Abdul Razzaq. It was amazing to watch Razzaq play the role of the “Finisher” in English conditions, he has always done this to perfection in the Subcontinent conditions.
    Hopefully the match on Sunday holds more in store, I guess this series has been more dampening as far as the form of some key Pakistan batsmen are concerned, Kamran Akmal, Shoiab Mallik have not performed to perfection. Infact even Shahid Afridi looked out of sorts, as a ardent buff of the game I’d love to see the true Afridi innings in Boom Boom style.
    It was great to see the bowlers do their job well, especially Shoaib coming off an injury lay off, Asif is developing into a key bowler, the Shoaib-Asif opening combination reminds one of the famous duo of Akram and waqar, i guess their combo holds a lot of prospect in the coming Champions Trophy.
    As for the English, Lewis has been bowling well all through the series. Broad’s performance has been a mixed bag. The Spinners have done a fine job, it was inspiring to see yardly perform well on his debutant, he was the one who really broke the back of the Pakistani batting order.
    Well let’s hope that the game on Sunday is a cracker of a match. The perfect ending to this series would be to see a last ball finish, I guess that would be perfect!!!


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