History repeats in the space of seven days !!! South Africa successfully chase 414 in the fourth innings against Australia in WACA, after India's chase of 384 in the fourth innings in Chennai few days back.
Smith played a repeat of what Sehwag did in the 4th evening for South Africa with an aggressive knock and did bit better than Sehwag to reach his century in pursuit of 414. DeVillers knock was a repeat of what sachin did in cheenai with a watchful and well paced century and reached the target in company with the debutant Duminy. Duminy to an extend played the role Yuvraj played in chennai. On looking at both the run chase, the South African victory was more assured with absolutely no big moments in the course of the run chase even though both India and SA won the match by 6 wickets. Smith and SA is proving to get to the top slot with such fabulous victory and Australia was no match to the SA with hapless bowling performance.
Australia is shot of confidence and needs some big scores from captain Ponting and Hayden and most importantly their spear head in bowling BrettLee. Brett Lee is just out of sorts and has not been able to pick wickets and also proves to be too costly and looks very ordinary without the company of giants McGrath and Warne. Johnson is bowling his best but with very little support in the other end its not easy to tame the SA.
South Africa performance is not just a one off game but it should be attributed for their professional preparation and execution of the plan. South Africa took the help from all the past coach and cricketers who successfully beat the Aussies like Fletcher former England coach when England won the Ashes in 2005 and also took the help from Gary Kirsten as India under him won the home series against Aussies.
Over all South Africa was well prepared for the tough series and most importantly believed in the unit that they can win in Australia. Australia is just short of confidence and aggression which is always associated with the Aussies and without that its not going to be easy.
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4 comments:
Vasu,
There is only that much Aussies can do. Their bowling looks absolutely paltry what with Brett Lee not at his best and Siddle nowhere near international class. Johnson is the only saving grace and Krezja is not experienced enough to be frontline. McGrath & Warne have gone for sometime now, but it is surprising why they don't include Nathan Bracken, Stuart Clark who could be potent forces (if there are reasons other than injury, I fail to understand them!).
And I guess Shane Watson is a much better bowler than what Siddle is currently. Overall, I will not be too worried about the Aussie batting. It is the bowling and the captaincy that needs some refreshing change. Read somwehere that Ponting is still attempting to set fields like he did for Warne/McGrath for his current crop of bowlers, I guess that is not going to work so well either. So the Aussies better pull up their socks or they are going to get mauled again in the Boxing day test.. will be eagerly following that on TV.
VJ
as VJ said.. Ponting is yet to come into terms with the current set of bowlers. Before almost all the time warne and McGrath have delivered. So, there was no need of a plan-B for Ponting. But, now that being the case, seems like Ponting is not able to cope with the mounting pressure(which is quite new for him.. after tasting success for a very long period). Atleast clark or bracken should be included as they atleast seem like wicket taking bowlers. Watson did a lot better than his strike bowlers during the last tour to India. His inclusion would also strengthen their batting. Hope they fight back and provide us some thrilling games against S.Africa who are gaining from strength to strength
For a long time now I have been wondering why Bracken is not seen with the baggy green while he is a regular member in the shorter version of the game. Even now he is rated as the No. 1 ODI bowler in the ICC ODI ratings. Is his bowling in the tests that awful when compared to Siddle? Or is it any injury concern. Vasu can you please throw some light over this, if have any idea.
Coming to the Australian sides recent sloppiness, I feel they are no more the dominant super power they used to be in the past decade. The team was very well built under the reins of Steve Waugh. Ponting so far did not have any major problem in captaining the well built ship. But now when few of his vital resource are missing and the replacements failing to play up to the expectation he is having a difficult time coping up the pressure.
Now the No. 1 spot is wide open. What I guess is in the coming days we are not going to have a single dominant side which will retain this spot for this long period. There will be some neck to neck competition between the Aussies, Indians, Proteas and even the English side may rise under KP's captaincy. The out come of each test series will be a decider. This is a much needed healthy competition for Test cricket.
Agree with most of the comments and Australia is under great pressure to stay on top and the loss top players in short time has also contributed to the downfall but you can not write them off.
On captaincy, as many cricket pundits put it "A captain is as good as his team" and this is true to Australia now, with loss of their ace bowlers (McGrath and Warne) in quick time and over dependence on Brett Lee has shown their bench strength is not that great.
On Bracken, yes he is great bowler but from what i have read in the blogs and news items, he does not even figure in the state side regularly for the four day games but a regular for the shorter version of the game. He is a bowler in the Stuart Clark type and i don't rate Clark big, he is a good steady bowler who can restrict the run flow but i don't consider him to be wicket taking bowler and i see the same stands good for Bracken also.
I think they need to induce young players into the side to bring that freshness and most importantly in the bowling department.
I am also sort of worried for the Indian batting line up on the same lines, we will be seeing the back of great players in the coming years and i don't see that we are looking for replacements to the legends like Sachin,Dravid,Laxxman, we need to try youngsters in R.Sharma.Kholi,Pujara when these big guys are around fit playing and not after they retire, if we delay their entry then we may face in batting department what Aussies are facing today in their bowling department.
May be i will write a post on this sometime latter.
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