Is England a match for Sri Lanka?

One has to wonder who on earth crowned the English as the world T20 champions last year when Australians were the favorites to win the trophy. It is agreed that England were a tough opposition then. But, yesterday England never showed any signs that a world champion is expected to show. England were no match for Sri Lanka who beat them in every department eventually in the match by 9 wickets. There was no player from the English side whose contribution can be highlighted. Out of the eleven, only three players were able to cross the double digit score with Pietersen and Morgan scoring 47 and 41 respectively.

Adding to the misery, being the home team, England had absolutely no chances to lose the game with players like Morgan, Pietersen and Stuart Broad. As mentioned in my earlier posts, the match was of hardly any consequence with only one game to go. A winner or loser has nothing to take home. But, that should not be a reason for England to relax with 6 of their batsmen scoring single digit scores out of whom two of them got out scoring zero. This can just be considered as a continuation of the dominance of Sri Lanka over England since the quarter-finals of the world cup.

One can go through the scorecard of that quarter-finals match too see the way the Sri Lanka batsmen openers shattered the England bowling by winning the match by 10 wickets with an opening run partnership of 229 runs. Now, though the effect was not that devastating, a 9 wicket win for Sri Lanka over England should definitely make them think much hard about their future in the game. It is fascinating to see the age old Sanath Jayasuriya still wearing the Sri Lankan uniform and scoring in boundaries and scalping two wickets. I guess he is the oldest player to feature in T20 cricket.

Well rather than calling it a guess, it is a fact. Though Jayasuriya's batting had nothing in particular to say, his bowling fetched him 2 wickets from 3 overs giving away runs at a rate of 6.00 runs per over. However, there were the likes of Jayawardane and Sangakkara who could get the job done for Sri Lanka. One can sense the lack of responsibility from the bowlers of the England team who bowled 11 wide deliveries. The Sri Lankan batsmen finished the game in style by grabbing a victory with a boundary. But, England need to re-think about their fortunes i case they need to make their presence felt.

All three hosts for the semis

Well this can happen only if the world cup is being hosted by the sub-continent teams namely India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. For the first time in the history of a world cup or any other tournament, all the hosts have been into the semi-finals for the world cup. Of course, Pakistan is not a host but still a little bit of consideration can be given for it was once upon a time scheduled to host a few important games in this world cup before all teams starting from India started boycotting their tour to the trouble-torn nation since 2008.

Of course, Bangladesh have not been able to make it to the semi-finals (or even the quarter-finals) of the tournament. A little bit of hard work from them could have seen them scroll over against West Indies. West Indies are as good as Ireland or Bangladesh in this tournament needless to say. Both West Indies and Bangladesh had equal number of wins in the league stages of the tournament. One can consider Pakistan to be a replacement for Bangladesh for, long back Bangladesh was considered as East Pakistan and now, we can adjust those words calling Pakistan some West Pakistan.

Coming to the fourth and the final quarter-final between Sri Lanka and England, England were crushed by the Sri Lankans the way West Indies were done so by Pakistan. Then, West Indies were no match for Pakistan which was not the case yesterday at Colombo. And, just imagine what a lucky thing that the Sri Lankans were facing the Englishmen in their own land when they could have been either at Dhaka or Ahmadabad. More luckily, the Sri Lankans will be facing the Kiwis once again in their home land with the first semi- finals scheduled at Colombo a couple of days later.

I just cannot imagine why teams from only one group have been able to hold the upper-hand with Sri Lanka, Pakistan and New Zealand qualifying from group A with only India getting to the rank from group B. However, things were better this time compared to the 1996 edition where all four teams from group A qualified to the semis with Pakistan, England, New Zealand and South Africa losing out to India, Sri Lanka, Australia and West Indies respectively. Coming to the match, losing just four wickets, how could England end up with just 229 on board? Are England that bad bowlers that they couldn't scalp even a single Sri Lankan wicket?

England on a roll

I was just thinking about Sri Lanka having a chance this time with their other two counterparts namely Pakistan and India having their share in 2009 and 2007 respectively. But, Sri Lanka spoiled all my hopes by getting defeated effortlessly to England. It was as though Sri Lanka were battling an ordinary league stage match when they piled up just 128 runs on the board. There should have been a tough fight between the teams in the semi-finals of a world cup needless to be said. All I would like to say after seeing this match is stay at home moms.

Hardly anyone would have expected to enter the finals of a world cup tournament. England did this after a span of 6 years when they were last seen making it to the finals of a world cup tournament in the ICC champions trophy 2004 after beating Australia in the semis. Once again, Sanath Jayasuriya was not only included in the playing XI but was also seen disappointing his fans. One has to wonder what sort of pressure is there on the Sri Lanka cricket board to not only include Jayasuriya but also feature him in the playing eleven. May be the selectors have gone sick.

I wish Sri Lanka has to learn from the BCCI who have not included Sachin Tendulkar in T20 matches despite him being fit and form before including an unfit batsman. The only notable score from the Sri Lankan batting chart was Angelo Mathews who scored a brilliant 58. He was the only batsman who could manage to hi a six as well. One need not give hats-off to Mathews for his work, because, Mathews or Sri Lanka were not under any sort of pressure whatsoever. Sri Lanka had already accepted defeat with both hands when winning was totally out of question.

Selfishness can be evident from the way the Sri Lankan batsmen played when neither did they go for big ones nor did they lose their wicket instead continued to play at a snail's pace in a format which expects quickfire knocks. The England bowlers never had any sorts of trouble with such a batting approach and stuck to a 5 bowler formula. One can see Sanath Jayasuriya getting belted for 15 runs of his lone over from the scorecard. Else, the top three batsmen from England sealed it for them and all that the Sri Lankans could do was to congratulate them for winning the game.