A great weekend of cricket

Went to England vs Sri Lanka on Sunday, and a very enjoyable high scoring game. England looked much better than against New Zealand, making a respectable 309.

Sri Lanka played a very calculated innings in response. They didn’t try to blast their way to an early victory, but concentrated on getting at least five runs an over and protecting their wickets. There were a couple of points where the required run rate got over seven and if they lost some wickets may have struggled. But they kept nine of their wickets and comfortably started powering up around the 34th over and made it very comfortably in the end. Not often you see three centuries in a one day match.

I didn’t see the thrilling Australia vs NZ game, but followed it most of the day through the ICC app on my smartphone. I could only imagine how amazing it would be to see Australia dismissed for 151. Australia! You expect that from one of the bottom teams, not the favourite.

It was looking like the game against England again as NZ hit out and started piling on the runs to get it over and done with. But Australia is not England. They fight back, they don’t give up. And unbelievably they almost won as NZ collapsed to nine wickets down.

At 7.30 pm I was in a theatre with a play about to start, and half the theatre had their smartphones out getting updates. NZ were nine down and needed a six to win and the lights went out. A cacophony of groans went out as everyone realised they would not know whether NZ won or not for at least an hour. The moment we got to half time, phones quickly came out of the pockets and as we saw NZ had won, cries of relief throughout the theatre.

I still think Australia is favourite to win. NZ is in the best form I have seen them for decades, but Australia will have a home crowd for the final. NZ should easily win their quarter final, so the real pressure will come on for the semi-final and final.

Looking forward to many more days of cricket before then.