Kolkata on a ride

One need not consider the Kolkata Knight Riders to be lucky to have the D-L method being responsible for their win over Warriors last night at Bangalore. Kolkata would have emerged as winners at any cost irrespective of whether there was rain or not. One has to congratulate the Kolkata Knight Riders for coming this far when they were at one stage not even thought to make it to the champions league tournament after being placed fourth in the IPL. Now, the same Kolkata Knight Riders have outraced their competitors namely Mumbai Indians, Royal Challengers Bangalore and Chennai Superkings in the champions league.

A score of 155 put up by the Warriors was far from satisfactory which was easily chasable. In the past in the tournament, the Kolkata Knight Riders have chased down a total of 169 with 9 wickets to spare and few balls left against Royal Challengers Bangalore. Prior to that, they have beaten made 169 against South Australia. Though they lost to South Australia by 19 runs, they managed to go past 150 which was a positive sign. Now, the Warriors had to shed their sweat and blood to reach the total of 155 which was a result of late strikes by Mark Boucher and Colin Ingram.

The Warriors didn't try too many things and settled with a slow ticking of the scorecard. They lost only 4 wickets to do so keeping batsmen like JJ Smuts, Botha and Boje warm the benches. Prior to this match, there was rain which spoiled the previous match between South Australia and Somerset was washed out which gave a hint that the same might happen to the next match as well. Some thinking by the match officials could have made the match a 16 over affair to see both teams complete their innings. There were 29 overs of play meaning, 16 overs per innings was possible with the break reduced appropriately.

Coming to the man of the match debate, it was unfair to give the award to Colin Ingram who scored 61 runs. There is no doubt that his score laid the foundation for Warriors' total but, there were the likes of Kallis and Gambhir whose confidence saw their team total go past the required total by 22 runs. Looking at the way Kallis and Gambhir played, they would have reached the target in just 16 overs with just 72 runs being required off 60 deliveries. The run rate at which the duo were scoring was 8.3 an over and with 9 wickets in hand, the run rate could have only reduced.

The best South Africa can do

Well gone are the days when cricket fans used to pity the plight of the South Africans when they used to come so close to winning and all of a sudden lose the plot midway. That was the case in 1992, 1996 and the 1999 world cups but not thereafter. Since 2003 world cup onwards, South Africa have only been just another team and no extraordinary team. And in this world cup as well, they had no reasons to lose to England and in the match against India, it was India's loss and not the Proteas' win. Smith has only been a failure so far.

The South African captain has in most of the game games barring England and West Indies. But, in games against teams like Ireland, South Africa has everything to say. They did everything right in their game against Netherlands and the same can be expected against Bangladesh. They got a world record victory margin of 221 runs against Netherlands who are yet to taste a win in this world cup. Yesterday, their performance against Ireland was splendid only to add to their woes citing their plight against England and India. South Africa are yet to perform in this series though their place in the quarter-finals is rather guaranteed.

Coming to yesterday's game, the total of 272 on the board by South Africa was far below par when expectations reached a team total of 350+ or so. This should not mean that they would have been a better team had they been able to do so. Though bad luck has stopped haunting South Africa in world cups since the 2003 world cup, bad luck seems to have cast its eyes on the South African players when Jean Paul Duminy failed to get the three figure mark when he was caught by the fastest hundred scorer in world cups. Now, Kevin O'Brien was responsible in breaking a hundred.

It was nice to see every South African bowler returning with a wicket barring Alex Cusack who bowled just 2 overs and all ten Irish wickets were down. Why did South Africa lose 7 wickets en-route to their total of 272 batting first? Why only one batsman got a half century when the second best score happened to be the number 7 batsman-Colin Ingram who scored 46? Though Morne Morkel returned as the top bowler with three scalps, he was the most expensive bowler with 33 runs from 5.2 overs at a rate of 6.18 an over. And, no South African bowler bowled his full quota of 10 overs. Why?