ICC World Cup 2011: The Road to the Quarter Finals – Australia – Part 1
Unbeaten in the past three World Cups, defending champions Australia looked to make it four wins out of four world cups. Labelled pre-tournament favourites by many, Australia looked to make quick work of their opponents in Group A and reach the Quarter finals
with minimum fuss.
In their way was the unpredictable http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Canada-c748 and
Zimbabwe.
Their first hurdle was one of two African sides in Group A: Zimbabwe. The Aussies looked to get their campaign off to a winning start and put in a solid performance with the bat in the first innings. The Australian’s set a formidable total of 262 runs with
opener Shane Watson and Michael http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Clarke-c51120 starring for the batting side with 79 runs and 58 runs respectively.
The http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Zimbabwe-c3045 side in response only managed to crawl to 171 runs after Mitchell Johnson bowled a blinder. His four wickets in 9.2 overs at the cost of just 19 runs was the reason Australians cruised to such a comfortable victory.
Australia had their first win and first two points of the competition and reaffirmed the notion that they were to be a force to be reckoned with in games to come.
In what could easily be termed a ‘derby match’, the Australians took on their neighbours http://www.senore.com/Cricket/New-Zealand-c754. The Kiwi side batted out the first innings and we’re disappointing as they barely managed to reach the 200 run mark.
The lower order managed to steady the ship for their side with Nathan McCullum’s well engineered half century and very handy 44 runs from captain Daniel Vettori.
Shaun Tait and Mitchell Johnson were at the forefront of the Australian bowling attack with the former taking 3 wickets and the latter taking an impressive four wickets. Australia knew the match was theirs for the winning and they did so with minimum fuss.
Shane http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Australia-c746 made 207 runs at the loss of just 3 wickets with 16 overs to spare.
It seemed that they had carried the momentum over to this year’s competition without any real effort as they were set to face the host Sri Lanka in their next match.
A crunch match with both sides favourites to top their group there were high hopes for an entertaining game of cricket. The weather however, had other plans, as the game had to be called off and the points shared as rain washed out play.
Sri Lanka was in a comfortable position at 146 for 3 wickets with their influential captain at an unbeaten 73 runs. The match was in the balance with http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Sri-Lanka-c758 set to score a huge total but one must not delve too deep into ifs and buts.
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