Australia - Small nation great success in sports

Today Australia became the world champion in cricket for the 5th time. It is noticeable that Australia has made it to the finals of the World Cup for 7 times and won an impressive 5 times , that's a very high success rate. 

What's impressive about the Australian cricket team is its bench strength. Players of excellent quality like George Baily, Mitchell Marsh , Shaun Marsh were sitting in the bench. Australia could have sent a team of its reserves and may have still won the world cup. 

The reason for this is Australia has a tremendous sports infrastructure for all sports including cricket. The first class competitions in Australia is competitive and there are acadamies that produce excellent cricketers. 

Its not just in cricket in almost every sport that is played globally Australia tends to do well be it hockey, rugby, soccer, swimming. In every Olympics Australia ends up as one of top medal holders. Even the Australian people are great sport enthusiasts. 

Australia has a population of around 25 million people. India adds this many people to its population each year but still lags behind Australia in the most popular game in India --cricket and in other sports Australia is way ahead. 

However sport is not everything in life. Play for fun. :)

   

World Cup Final: New Zealand vs Australia

The world cup final between New Zealand and Australia actually turned out to be quite an anti climax. The match was completely one sided . Batting first New Zealand lost their first wicket without a run on board. The wicket was of Brendon McCullum. At one stage NewZealand was 39/3 when Ross Taylor and Grant Elliot steadied the innings and formed a good partnership of 111 runs. 

At the begining of the batting powerplay in the 36th over New Zealand lost the wicket of Taylor and consistently kept loosing wickets after that . In fact 36 th over bowled by James Faulkner was a double wicket maiden. The next over they lost the wicket of Ronchi so suddenly from 150/3 the score became 151/6. 

The rest of the batsmen were able to do very little as the entire team got out for a mere 183 runs. 

In reply the Australians comfortably scored 184 runs for the loss of 3 wickets in the 34th over. Thus winning the world cup for the 5th time. They were certainly the best team of the tournament and deserving champions. 

CONGRATULATIONS TO TEAM AUSTRALIA

2nd Semi Final: India vs Australia

In Sydney the second semi-final match between Australia and India was played and India lost the match by a margin of 95 runs. The loss though does not make India a bad team but it is clear that Australia in home conditions is a superior team. Having born and brought up on those pitches and grounds they are naturally adept to playing in those conditions. 


Probably Australians had a psychological advantage over India as well since in the entire season India has not won any match against Australia. After Australia chose to bat at SCG India did manage to get the first wicket pretty early and cheaply. However Steve Smith who has scored tonnes of runs against Indians in the Test Series once again proved to be thorn for Indians . Smith and Finch build a big middle over partnership at over 5.3 runs an over. 


Australia did lose lots of wickets in the later part of the innings in trying to make the scoring rate faster. However a deep batting line up ensured that the rate of scoring was maintained. Australia ended up with a mammoth total of 329 runs for the loss of 7 wickets. In reply India did start off solidly and well in the first 10 overs India scored 55 runs. 16 runs came of the 10th over. By the 13th over India's score reached 76/0 and India looked good with Shikhar Dhawan going after the bowling. 

But from the last ball of the 13th over the carnage started. Shikhar Dhawan who was playing beautifully till now ended up hitting a ball straight down the throat of Glenn Maxwell. Virat Kohli came to the crease and played 5 dot balls in the 14th over, off the last ball of the 14th over he scored a single. The next over played by Virat was a maiden. 

Virat seemed to be under pressure having made just 1 of 12 balls . The next ball he got he tried to pull a ball that was outside off stump but the ball bounced too much took the top edge of the bat and was out caught by the wicketkeeper. After that the Australians bowled well and Indians kept losing wickets at regular intervals and struggled to keep up with the scoring rate . By the 40 th over India had lost 5 wickets and needed more than 12 runs per over.

Although Dhoni was there in the crease and did play a few good shots he could do very little and India lost the match by a big margin. Cricket is a highly condition dependent game . The same Australian team lost all 4 test matches when they came to play a test series in India. 

But there is no reason for Indian fans to despair , India did win 7 consecutive games on the trot. The bowling has been exceptional. Only today India managed to get a mere 7 Aussie wickets whereas in the previous World Cup games India had got the oppositions all out every time they took the field. 

The kind of performance showed by Australian team makes them hot favourites to win this world cup on home ground . The MCG is a large ground so miss hits there would end up in the hands of the fielders. 

This is the first time the world is going to witness a trans-Tasmanian rivalry in the final of the Cricket World Cup. The two nations Australia and New Zealand have tremendous rivalry in every sport they play . The final is likely to be a cracker of a match with Australia being firm favourites. 

World Cup: - 1st semi final

The semifinal match between South Africa and New Zealand was a match between two sides that have been extremely unlucky  in the previous editions of the World Cup. Both the teams have made it to the semi-finals several times but every time they lost. So today it was clear that one of them was going to brink that jinx. 

Both teams are brilliant when it comes to their current performances. NZ has won all the matches they played in this edition of the World Cup. While South Africa had won 6 out of the 7 matches it played. The ground was a small ground for cricket and the kind of cricket that is played today with those big bats it was clear that the match would be a high scoring one. 

South Africa did start slowly lost 2 wickets in the first 10 overs then there was a good but slow partnership between Faf du Plessis and Rossau. South Africa had scored a mere 129 runs in the first 30 overs. The first 6 of the innings came in the last ball of the 31st over. After AB de Villiers came to the crease the scoring rate picked up and by the 38 th over SA's score went up to 216/3 when rains came in. The match had to be reduced to 43 overs a side. After the rain break David Miller went after the Kiwi bowling scoring 49 in no time and helping South Africa add another 65 runs to the total.

SA ended up with a score of 281/5. New Zealand had to score 298 runs to win after the Duckworth Lewis adjustment. Macullum took advantage of the powerplay and the small stadium hit lots of sixes within 6 overs NZ reached a score of 76 making the job of other batsmen much easier and then NZ batters batted well and kept their nerve to win the match in the penultimate ball of the match. 

The 5 th ball of the last over was hit for a six by Grant Elliot thus ensuring that NZ go to Melbourne to play the winner of the match between India and Australia. The South Africans were in tears the world cup jinx and the chokers tag stay with them. This was definitely the most exiting cricket match of the world cup. 

Thus South Africa has to wait for one more world cup to rid of their chokers tag. South Africa surely is the best team in cricket that has never won the World Cup. Since the return of South Africa in cricket the standards of fielding went up . Youngsters started idolizing the likes of Jonty Rhodes . Other cricket teams got a formidible opposition to compete against. 

But somehow nature is playing some tricks with this team when it comes to World Cup. The never lacked in terms of talent and hard work. But in the World Cup knock out matches luck has not been on their side. 

On the other hand though this is probably the best New Zealand side that we have ever seen. They are ideally suited for one day cricket the team has so many allrounders and big hitters like Ross Taylor, Corey Anderson and Brendon McCullum. They have played some delightful cricket in this World Cup and they have been unbeaten till now. They are deserving finalists of the World Cup. 

All eyes are now set on the second semi final between India and Australia . After a lack lustre Test series and one day tri series . India has jumped back to form with the bowlers finding the right spots to bowl and some of the out of form batsmen coming back in form. This is bound to be an evenly faught contest and will be viewed by more than a billion people across the world. Tomorrow even the Australians may find themselves out cheered by Indian fans. 

World Cup Cricket - Quarter Finals

On the big Melbourne Cricket Ground , India has gotta be the firm favourites . On small grounds with the size of bats and the strength of batsmen that we have today even misshits tend to go for 6. On MCG the ground is so big that even a goodhit can end up in the hands of the fielder on boundary line. So in MCG Ashwin and Jaddu are gonna have a field day. Also the pitch will definitely help fast bowling. Only quality batsmen are going to make runs on that wicket. 

  Tomorrow's match between South Africa and Sri Lanka is expected to be the most competitive among the matches to be played in the quarter-finals as both the teams are more or less equally strong. But South Africa have this chokers tag. Some unfortunate event keeps happening to them in WCs that knocks them out of the cup. I has been happening since 1992 when the played their first cricket world cup.


Like Netherlands in soccer South Africa is the best one day cricket team that has never won a world cup. Worst of all they were constantly knocked out of the cricket world cups due to some freakish event. Like in 1992 there were some of the most stupid rules the world of sports had ever seen . South Africa needed some 22 odd runs of 7 balls when rain came in which ultimately turned into an impossible 22 of 1 ball.  In 1992 again South Africa were beaten by West Indies. The West Indian team had been beaten by cup débutante Kenya in a league match.  In 1999 no one can forget that nerve wrecking semi-final against Australia in which they did tie the match but lost to Australia on run rate. Same has been their story in other editions of the cup. 

In the other two quarter finals Australia and New Zealand are likely winners. However Pakistan historically has been an unpredictable team can spring a surprise against Australia. New Zealand must get the wicket of Chris Gayle as fast as possible he the other threat is all rounder Andre Russel. The inner politics of the West Indian team have made them devoid of likes of Kieron Pollard and Dwayne Bravo. Presence of this two players would have made West Indies a much more stronger team. 

As the World Cup of cricket enters its quarter-final stage the interest in each game will go up. I just hope that cricket fans around the world get to see some great cricket in the next 7 matches. 

INDIA -The World Cup so far

India's performance in the ICC World Cup 2015 has been pleasantly surprising. This is the same team that lost every match in the Tri Series that was played between Australia, India and England. The bowling was awful and the bowlers looked totally out of sorts. Shikhar Dhawan was completely out of form and was getting out early in each and every match. In the Test series held prior to that India did not win a single match and the bowling was average. 


However the team seems to have totally transformed come the World Cup. The bowlers began bowling at the right places the batters are batting well Shikhar  Dhawan came back in form from the very first match that was played against Pakistan and even the spin duo of Jadeja and Ashwin are doing quite well. 

Beating Pakistan and South Africa convincingly in the first two matches must have done a world of good to the confidence levels of the players. The bowling has been impressive and good . It seemed that the team was actually stretched in two league matches against relatively lesser teams like West Indies and Zimbabwe. 

The match against West Indies was played on the fastest wicket on earth ie Perth. Indian pacers did well and got the West Indian team out for a  paltry 180 runs. While chasing India did manage to score the runs but lost 6 wickets in the process. 

The most difficult match seemed to be against a much lower ranked Zimbabwe which will not be playing in the quarterfinals. The ground in Auckland was small so the Zimbabwean batsmen took advantage of it and managed to score 287 at one point of time it seemed like they would score 300 plus runs . However the tail was very quickly polished off by the Indian quicks. However India didn't find it east to chase down 287 at one point of time India had lost 4 wickets for 93 runs and at that time the run rate was not great either around 4 runs per over. 

India had to score more than 90 runs in the last ten over which the duo of Dhoni and Raina managed to do. Earlier there was a easy chance given by Raina but the fielder dropped a very easy catch. Had that catch been taken it very well could have been a different  story. 

But anyhow its great to see Team India make it  6 out of 6 in the league phase . The semi-final match is scheduled to be played against Bangladesh at MCG on 19th March. India should in no situation underestimate Bangladesh and treat them at par with Australia or South Africa. Should India play to it full potential in the match against Bangladesh , India will win and make it to the semi-final. 

I wish that India wins the World Cup again this time in Australia.