Live Cricket goes Live
As Live Cricket goes Live on the world wide web, the cricket wold is waiting anticipatedly for the big game tomorrow at Perth. Australia and South Africa will lock horns one final time tomorrow in the 5th and final one day in what has been a fascinating and historical series between the two top teams in world cricket today.
As of today, 28th January 2009, Australia are on top of the ICC One Day International (ODI) Team Rankings - with an aggregate of 4040 points and 126 rating points. That situation can change dramatically by tomorrow evening. With 123 rating points South Africa are close on the heels of the leading team and a win tomorrow will catapult South Africa over Australia, bringing an end to a long reign by Australia at the top of the ODI Cricket Table.
The day after that, Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s India take on Sri Lanka in the 2nd ODI at Dambulla. India are on a dream run and were clinical and convincing in their win in the 1st odi which was played at the same venue. Captain Dhoni lead from the front, and except from an exceptional innings by Jayasurya Sri Lanka definitely looked second best. They will have to notch their games up by a good margin if they are to keep the series truly alive. The Lanka skipper is himself low on confidence - Jayawardene has been having a poor run with the bat of late and that seems to be affecting his confidene and the team’s. It’s important that he makes a longer stay at the crease tomorrow.
Action is hotting up in the other form of cricket - T20 - IPL is not too far away and player auctions are already grabbing headlines. Looks like there will be a number of English and Australian cricketers up for grabs next month - more about that later.
The minnows are in action too - in a ODI game at the Mombasa Cricket Club in Kenya, the hosts received a drubbing from Zimbabwe. With almost a run-a-ball 90 by Matsikenyeri Zimbabwe mustered up a huge score of 351 runs. Kenya could only make 200 in return. The only Kenyan batsman to sizzle was the veteran Steve Tikolo who scored a blistering 56 off 48 balls.
Somethings in cricket don’t change - Pakistan cricket is as embroiled in controversy as it was before Live Cricket Dot Biz went live! Now, Javed Miandad has resigned as PCB director over differences with the board. You can surely expect more tidbits and juice from Pakistan on this. Watch this space for more.