West Indies reach 117 for 3 wickets in 25 overs against http://www.senore.com/Cricket/South-Africa-c757 - ICC World Cup 2011
http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Delhi-c780.
All eyes will be on the pitch since the last One Day International (ODI) played here was called-off due to the dangerous nature of wicket. There was some uncertainty over the wicket, but it was expected to be slow and favourable for the spinners.
The uncertain nature of the wicket forced South African captain Graeme Smith to field first after winning the toss. He would have thought about taking a good look at how the wicket played before coming out to bat. However, this move could go against the
Proteas, since the wicket might assist the spinners more in the second innings compared to the first.
South Africa opted to give the new ball to their wily off-spinner http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Johan-Botha-c67173. The trick worked for the Proteas as Botha got rid of Chris Gayle in the first over of the match. The explosive Windies batsman opened the innings with Devon Smith. However, they
were unable to provide their team a good start. Gayle edged a ball straight into the hands of the slip fielder Jacques Kallis, who didn’t make a mistake and took a good catch low down.
Gayle was out on the third ball of the very first over bowled in the day after scoring just two runs. This brought youngster Darren Bravo to the crease, who has shown shades of former West Indian great Brian Lara. Lara would have been pleased with the way
Bravo batted today. The youngster timed almost every shot to perfection and played a splendid innings. He scored a brilliant half-century for his team and amassed 50 out of the first 72 runs for his team.
After constructing a magnificent 111-run partnership for the second wicket with Smith, Bravo missed a straight ball from Botha, giving the off-spinner his second wicket of the match. However, he laid a solid platform for the middle-order and was dismissed
after scoring 73 runs on his World Cup debut. Smith wasn’t able to carry onto the start he got and was out after making 36 runs off 57 balls.
At the end of 25 overs, veteran batsmen Ramnaresh Sarwan and shivnaraine Chanderpaul were unbeaten on 2 and 1 run respectively. They will be looking forward to taking the score past 250, which will be a good total on this wicket.
Botha took two wickets for his team until the half way mark of the West Indian innings and got good support from http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Imran-c64193 Tahir, who picked up his maiden wicket in international cricket.
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