Tag: malaysia cricket

In the Slot

FeaturedLiam Tebb

So after 47 matches, 353 sixes, 656 wickets, 10 teams have been whittled down to the final 2. England and New Zealand will play the CWC2019 final at the Home of Cricket on Sunday. Lords will be hosting its 5th world cup cricket final and this will be England’s second final appearance there after losing by 93 runs to the mighty Windies in 1979.

Who will prevail on Sunday? Will it come down to the toss, or an amazing piece of fielding? No matter, there will be a new name on the trophy as neither side have won the cup before with England losing in 1987 and 1992 as well as 1979, New Zealand lost in the last world cup against Australia in the cathedralesque MCG. The last new name on the trophy was Sri Lanka in 1996.

Whilst the cricket powerhouses have been playing across England and Wales, other nations with aspirations have been playing in tournaments and tours across the world. Malaysia, the hosts, came out on top of the Tri-Nations tournament with Maldives and Thailand coming 2nd and 3rd respectively. The Maldives were helped by a no-result match against Malaysia which saw them awarded 1 point which kept them above Thailand – so weather does affect other countries as well as this green and pleasant land.

Zimbabwe have toured Netherlands playing T20s and ODIs – the T20s were shared but the Dutch prevailed in the ODIs. Perhaps the Dutch are heading back to the times when they humiliated England in a T20 World Cup – dark days indeed. Zimbabwe have moved on to Ireland – check out the series here.

So back to Sunday – won’t it be interesting to see what the viewing figures are like now that Channel 4 and Sky 1 will be showing the match on free to air tv? First time since 2005 – Mambo No5 or not, it’s going to be exciting.

On the edge.

FeaturedLiam Tebb, LiamTebb, Liam Tebb rugby

What a week or so it has been at the Cricket World Cup. There have been records in terms of the number of sixes hit in an international match by one batter, the most sixes hit in a CWC match and the most runs conceded by a bowler in a CWC match – all in one match.

There have been some edge of the seat thrillers, India and New Zealand prevailing by what turns out to be inches (possibly the top 2!!) against Afghanistan and West Indies. The pre-tournament favourites are wobbling (losing 2 consecutive matches at home for the first time since 2015) and whilst not quite requiring snookers, they do need to win their last 2 matches to be in the mix to qualify. The next week will determine who finishes in the final 4 to reach the semi-finals.

With most of the eyes of world’s cricket followers focused on this green and pleasant land, other world tournaments sometimes get overlooked. We have had the World T20 European qualifying tournament held in Guernsey – this featured the top 6 associate nations competing in 15 matches for a place in the world qualifier. The teams competing were Guernsey, Germany, Norway, Denmark and the favourites Jersey and Italy. There were some rain affected matches but in the end Jersey prevailed and topped the table going through the competition unbeaten including a 73 run victory over the Italians – here is the scorecard.

So where next – well its great news for both Italy and Jersey, as the top two teams qualify for the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup Qualifier in United Arab Emirates from 11 October to 3 November 2019, where the seven qualifiers from regional finals will join Hong Kong, Ireland, Netherlands, Oman, Scotland and Zimbabwe, who missed out on qualifying for the event proper after finishing outside the top ten as on the cut-off date of 31 December 2018. The UAE have also confirmed their spot in the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup Qualifier as hosts of the event.

Six qualifiers from the UAE event will join Afghanistan, Australia, Bangladesh, England, India, New Zealand, Pakistan, South Africa, Sri Lanka and West Indies who have qualified already directly for the Men’s T20 World Cup after finishing in the top ten as on the cut-off date of 31 December 2018.

Another tournament has been a women’s T20 tournament in Rwanda featuring Uganda, Tanzania, the hosts Rwanda and Mali. Spare a thought for the Mali team – they started off poorly with scores of 6, 11 and 10 – the latter resulting in a 304 run defeat, in 20 0vers! The team did bowl 28 wides and 30 no balls, here is the scorecard. The team did improve with score of 30-9 in the next match before reverting to score 17 and 14 in their next two matches. Unsurprisingly Mali finished bottom of the table – conceding 885 runs and scoring 88 in the 6 matches. Here is the final table from that tournament.

Look out for more news and views from World Cricket in the next instalment – with the Maldives, Thailand and Malaysia playing in a tri-nation series.