Sunday, October 15, 2006

ICC Champions Trophy

Daily Result: £30.66

So after a series of almost circus-like one sided qualifying matches the tournament proper finally got going today with the much anticipated India v England game. Which immediately turned into another one sided encounter through a combination of poor England batting, preparation and dubious umpiring. While questions have to be asked about whether the type of pitch provided is really what is required for an international One Dayer with both teams struggling more than a little on it.

Excuses aside though England were woeful. Abject. Sure, England's record in ODI's isn't great while India's recent home record of 13 wins from 17 is impressive. And with a combined cap total of 476 for England compared to India's 1454 it's pretty obvious where the real experience lies.

But 125 all out in 37 overs?! Even on a tough pitch where 200 would have been truly competitive it's poor. And not simply because there were sections of play reading 14 balls, 1 run, 2 wickets. But because wickets were thrown away once the team was in trouble through suicidal shot selection. India struggled on the pitch too. A little more thought, an extra 50-60 runs and strange as it sounds England could have won.

And that's despite the appalling opening over from Steve Harmison. Who kept the scorers busy by conceding 20 runs from 9 balls. In fact, after 3.2 overs India had 45 runs and it all seemed over. Eventually they passed England's total for the loss of 6 wickets in the 29th over - showing that once England's bowling improved it was a tough pitch to make runs on. And with a little more thought and a few more runs England could have made a game of it.

Anyway, for the second day in a row my opening trade of the match went against me. Not as drastic today as yesterday's but after the second England wicket fell I changed my position in the same way, increasing my position on India as more wickets fell. The rest of the game was just a watching brief then just to make sure India won.

So a bit of another wasted opportunity but at least it's some profit. Getting a little frustrated with the one-sided nature of these matches at the moment. Hoping the tournament picks up in terms of competitiveness. There's a lot of day time tennis on this week (starts at 10am, same as the cricket tomorrow) and at this rate my time will simply be better spent doing the tennis. So here's hoping the South Africa and New Zealand game tomorrow is a good one.

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