Saturday, January 28, 2012

Zimbabwe reach new low, get bowled out twice in a day

In a stunning turn of events, New Zealand picked up 20 wickets for 194 runs as they bowled out Zimbabwe twice on Day 3, winning the one-off Test by an innings and a mammoth 301 runs.

It was Zimbabwe marking a return to Test cricket in the last few months and this was their first overseas tour since 2005. They started well with Brendan Taylor calling correctly at the toss. The track looked green and he immediately chose to bowl, hoping that his seam bowlers will strike early.

The openers Brendon McCullum and Martin Guptill started off with a bang, adding 124 before there were a couple of wobbles which brought Zimbabwe back into the game. However, skipper Ross Taylor scored a fine century and had good partnerships in the middle and stood unbeaten in the end, on 111. The Kiwis ended the day on 331/5, a day which did not belong to the visitors at all, as their bowlers struggled.

Day 2 began positively for the Kiwis as they scored quickly but lost Ross Taylor in the process. No, not his dismissal, but an injury to his calf. The hosts had reached 392/5 when rain played spoilsport and washed out the remainder of the day.

On the morning of Day 3, Vitori struck early, cleaning up Bracewell(11). Southee(44) then added a quickfire 74 with Watling before holing out to Waller off Cremer. The Kiwis declared on 495/7 as soon as Watling got to his century. However, it was Ross Taylor who finished with a better Batting Momentum of 120. The bowling was good in patches with Cremer picking up 2 wickets and finishing with a Bowling Efficiency of 55.

Zimbabwe were then caught unawares by the Kiwi bowling. Martin and Boult reduced them to 20/5 by Lunch and a few minutes after the break, they were bundled out for 51, their lowest Test total. Only Waller(23) managed to reach double figures. It was a combined bowling effort by the team and Tim Southee earned the best Bowling Efficiency of 96.

Needless to say, the Kiwis enforced the follow-on and reduced Zim to 12/5 before Chakabva(63), Cremer(26) and S Masakadza(21) gave some respect to the total as the team was bowled out for 143, losing by an innings and 301 runs.

This is the second time that Zimbabwe have been bowled out twice in a day, both by the same opposition. This is New Zealand’s biggest Test victory and Zimbabwe’s biggest Test loss.

Regis Chakabva top scored with 63 and ended up with a Batting Momentum of 57. For New Zealand, Chris Martin took 6 wickets and finished with a Bowling Efficiency of 267.

Have a look at the scorecard.

New Zealand finished with a whopping Castrol Index of 322  as compared to 69 of Zimbabwe.

Chris Martin was named the Man Of The Match and was also the best performer of the game, with a value of 174 on the Castrol Index. For Zimbabwe, Graeme Cremer bagged a value of 67.

India drowned under!

Australia fared exceedingly well in the fourth Test at Adelaide to outsmart India by 298 runs and gained a 4-0 series whitewash.

Having been 3-0 up in the series, the Aussies came into the final one with an aim of winning the series 4-0, whitewashing the Indians. Skipper Clarke won the toss and elected to bat on what looked like the flattest track of the series and wanted to put on a good score. His team did not get off to a good start though.

The openers, Warner and Cowan got off to a flier before India struck twice to reduce the Aussies to 31/2. Ponting and Cowan then had a bit of a stand worth 53 before Cowan threw his wicket away and at 84/3, India had their noses in front. But Australia had other ideas. A deja vu of Sydney as Ponting and Clarke got together and had yet another massive partnership. They went on and on, each getting to his double century, staging a partnership of 366 for the 4th wicket. Clarke was finally dismissed for 210 and Ponting followed later on 221 but not before taking Australia to a respectable total. They eventually declared on a mammoth 604/7. Clarke earned a better Batting Momentum of 343. Ravichandran Ashwin was the pick of the bowlers, with 3 wickets and finished with a Bowling Efficiency of 108.

In reply, India got off to a poor start, losing Sehwag and Dravid early yet again. Gambhir and Tendulkar provided a brief respite but eventually got out. India were in all sorts of trouble at 111/5 but two youngsters, Virat Kohli and Wriddhiman Saha, staged a fine fight back. The duo added 114 runs for the sixth wicket and nearly played the entire second session before Saha fell in the last over before Tea on Day 3. It did not take much time for the Aussie bowlers to wrap up the innings after that and bowled India out for 272, gaining a lead of 332 runs. Peter Siddle was the star of the show, with a 5-wicket haul receiving good support from Hilfenhaus with 3 scalps. Siddle finished with a Bowling Efficiency of 166. For India, Virat Kohli was the lone star, making a brilliant 116 and ended up with a Batting Momentum of 139.

Due to the excessive heat and also with the amount of time remaining in the Test match, Clarke decided not to enforce the follow-on and gave his bowlers some rest. Once again, as has been the norm in this series, Australia lost three wickets pretty quickly. But Ponting and Clarke came to the rescue once more with a half-century stand. Ponting remained unbeaten on 60 as the hosts declared on 167/5, setting India a target of 500 in around 5 sessions, with a minimum of 142 overs to be bowled. Ponting finished with a Batting Momentum of 90.

The onus was once again on the Indian star-studded batting line-up but nothing changed. Gambhir lost his wicket pretty early and then the Indian skipper decided to counter-attack. He played a breath-taking knock of 63 but that was not the need of the hour. Sehwag’s wicket opened the floodgate and from 2 down for 80, they were soon struggling on 6/166, courtesy another mega middle-order collapse.

The hosts required 82 balls in the first session of day 5 to pick the remaining four wickets and earned a massive win. This was the seventh occasion of a series whitewash for India, thrice by Australia and England and once by West Indies. 

Nathan Lyon finished with four wickets and gained a Bowling Efficiency of 98 while Sehwag received a Batting Momentum of 79 for his quick-fire innings.

Have a look at the scorecard

Australia completely overwhelmed India on the Castrol Index, finishing 149 points ahead of the visitors. Peter Siddle was awarded the Man of the Match for picking six wickets on a placid wicket, which earned him the Overall Castrol Index of 97. But the top performers of the match were Clarke and Ponting. The former ended with 202 Index points while the latter got two more. Michael Clarke was the unanimous choice for the Man of the Series award for scoring 626 runs in the series.

These two sides will now face each other in a couple of T20Is and then will get involved in the ODIs, which also involves Sri Lanka. First T20I is on the 1st of February at Sydney.