Search
User Login
User Menu
Syndicate
Recent comments
- reply
1 year 43 weeks ago - John Howard ICC Nominations
1 year 45 weeks ago - where are these players????
2 years 25 weeks ago - they all do
2 years 36 weeks ago - live cricket Coverage
2 years 37 weeks ago - Great Bowler has a Great Job to do
2 years 38 weeks ago - Any info on Zimbabweans
2 years 38 weeks ago - Do you need info
2 years 38 weeks ago - Neither have featured in any
2 years 39 weeks ago - There were a lot of positives
2 years 39 weeks ago
SuperSport Challenge, 1st Match, Day Two
South African Composite XI 288 (Hector 79, Maruma 4/68), Zimbabwe 262/7 (Masakadza 88, Sandri 3/59). Zimbabwe trail by 26 with 3 wickets remaining.
Zimbabwe continued from where they left off last night, and bowled Composite out for the addition of 52 runs to their overnight score. Timycen Maruma ended up the best of the bunch for the visitors, taking 4/68 at just 3.26/over (with only Prosper Utseya being more economical). In reply, Zimbabwe have started reasonably well - openers Brendan Taylor and Vusi Sibanda put on 56 before Sibanda holed out to Snijman off the bowling of Mjekula; 3rd man in was Chamu Chibhabha, who put on 9 before his wicket fell, signalling lunch.
The second session didn't get off to the greatest of starts, either, with two more Zimbabwean wickets falling in quick succession - Taylor (41; 98/3) and Matsikenyeri (2; 106/4) - seeing momentum shift towards Composite. The partnership of Tatenda Taibu and Hamilton Masakadza - which saw the two adopt very different styles, with Taibu being noticeably more aggressive - saw the ship steadied with a 55-run partnership, and after Taibu's departure (caught Hector off Symes) Masakadza and Tino Mawoyo continued the good work, building an impressive partnership of 100 runs before both wickets fell just before the close of play - first Mawoyo (33, 260/6), then Masakadza (88, 262/7) .
After some wobbles during the day, Zimbabwe ended on top of the competition and within striking distance of a first-innings lead - while the ideal would have been for Mawoyo and Masakadza to have still been there in the morning, they did some good working throughout the afternoon session and have left Zimbabwe's challenge in good shape. Come start of play tomorrow, it will be up to Elton Chigumbura and Prosper Utseya to kick Zim on to hopefully a decent lead. See you then.
Comments
2/69 now. Taylor still out there, which is the main thing. He's on 25, he's made a start, he needs to convert it. Taibu in next, good chance to have a big partnership. The aim should be to get to 150 without losing another wicket. By that point, Taylor should start looking for a century.
I notice Taylor's not scoring all that quickly - looks like he's playing the anchor role again, which seems to be what he does best (can't think of a time he's lasted too long when he's started slogging before he's needed to).
Techincally, Zim are batting down to #8 with this side, so I'd like to think they should be able to catch 288 - especially with the Potchefstroom pitch apparentlyt being a batter's paradise, if you believe the SuperCricket report...
4/106 - the typical Zimbabwe crash. Taibu needs to stick around. I wish Taylor went on - he made 41, he could have gone on to a big score after making a decent start like that.
I'm confident in Masakadza and Taibu - they are arguably our most experienced Test campaigners.
I'd be tempted to send Gary Brent out next, I think he could really knuckle down and produce an innings worth some substance. If he added 30 or 40 but stuck around for a few hours and rotated the strike, that would be perfect.
Zimbabwe's biggest problem is that, on any given day, you can't rely on any of them - there's very little consistency there. Even Taibu's had a bad time of it lately.
Sometimes you get days when they all fire (like against Northerns last Sunday), but otherwise you're crossing your fingers and hoping that someone delivers a match-winning performance. It's hugely dispiriting - we all know the guys have the talent to do it all the time, they just can't seem to do it when it counts.
Grumble over. Chigumbura's also still to come, he can do the job on his day (which today hopefully is), and along with Brent he should be able to get us up to a decent score if Taibu and Masakdaza can hang around for a while themselves. I'm not holding much hope for Mawoyo.
Mawoyo hasn't done much to suggest he can score runs against anyone of international class. I suppose we can just hope he'll make a quickfire 10 or 20.
Utseya can bat a bit too. In fact, Only Utseya and Maruma don't have FC centuries among this XI... and Utseya's highest is 89*. We have a very long batting lineup, which is helpful seeing the middle order always seems to crash. I'm a bit worried about Matsikenyeri, he hasn't made a score for quite a while. It's pretty safe to say Williams will take his spot and Masakadza will stick around for the ODI's.
As a side note, do you know where Ten Sports (I assume it is them) are televising the matches for the West Indies series? Is there any place where a stream can be viewed for free or for purchase? Thanks :)
Not good news, I'm afraid. The series is notable for its absense from Ten Sports' schedule - I can't find any mention of it on their website. They don't do online streaming anyway.
willow.tv do pay-per-view streaming of a lot of cricket, and have covered Zimbabwe series in the past, but aren't covering this one. Neither are the usual suspects of Sky in the UK (who usually carry all WI matches), or SuperSport in Africa (who would be the obvious carrier for their Zimbabwean subscribers). So the chances of seeing any of this series aren't looking good...
Ah, damn. I suppose it is understandable though, Zimbabwe and the West Indies is probably the most unanticipated series in world cricket - if it was an Asian team, or [i]any[/i] other team besides West Indies, it would probably be easier to find a telecast.
I wonder if ZTV will be carrying it. I remember hearing that between power outages they were televising the Zim vs Ban series early this year.
An alternative option - radio. Do you think any radio stations, either in Zimbabwe or the Caribbean could be giving a radio commentary?
ICC requires matches between Full Members to be televised, so if no-one else is, I expect ZTV will be. The channel does have a satellite feed, but it's encrypted and I'm not sure what package it's part of. Used to be part of DSTV, but they aren't currently listing it in any of their packages.
What was Radio 1 (Spot FM now, I think) usually carries commentary (complete with the world's only blind cricket commentator) - there used to be an internet stream of the channel, but ZBC's website is now defunct, so that won't work either. There's a list of online Caribbean stations here - haven't had a chance to trawl through them yet, but that's probably the best bet.
I remember reading about Dean du Plessis when that article was published - I really admire him, it is amazing that he can commentate off the sound a batsman makes, the way a bowler lands etc.
That Caribbean list is promising, a lot of live audio links there. Surely at least *one* of them would carry the cricket.
But if not, if Spot FM is carrying commentary, it wouldn't be hard (for someone based in Zimbabwe) to create an audio stream - certainly much easier than a video stream.
So if there is anyone in Zimbabwe that would like to provide an audio stream and doesn't know how, please email me and I will explain! (email listed at the bottom of my website - don't want the spambots to get it ;))
But hey, what do I know. ^^; 21* and counting.
Obviously Tino had a look at zimcricketnews.com during the lunch break and our comments fired him up :D
Story of the day is Masakadza though, 59*, needs to turn it into a big hundred.
If only it were that easy - I've written so many negatives about Zim's batting over the past few years, they should all be sitting on Kallis-like averages by now...!
Well, 3 overs until stumps - Masakadza 22 away from a century. The sensible thing to do would be to bat out the day...
C'mon Hamilton, hit a few boundaries! Bring up your century Steve Waugh style! :D
Good batting from Masakadza and Mawoyo.
Hmm, hello. Cricinfo now says 5 overs remain, not 3. 20 more required for Masakadza. Can he bring it up before stumps... he probably could without too many risks.
Shame Masakadza and Mawoyo blew it at the end - although they did some good work and left Zim in good shape. Should be a good day tomorrow. Pity I won't be able to follow it as closely as I have today...
Yeah, but they did their job - they put on 100. We should be able to get a decent lead tomorrow, I'm predicting 50 or 60 runs. I think Chigumbura and Brent will put on a good partnership (hopefully following a good Chigumbura/Utseya partnership).
Until Zimbabwe can consistently make 350 against any First Class side, I don't think they are ready for a return to Test cricket. I'm really hoping they can make 350 tomorrow.
Were you watching the score updates on Cricinfo? Or is there a better source that I have missed out on? :(
I've been using SuperSport's updates (linked in the article above) - they seem to be a little quicker than CricInfo today...
Test return: It looks like they're aiming for the home series against India in May 2008. They'll need to get a few more first-class matches arranged than just these three if they're to be ready by then, but it's not an impossible target.
At least India Test matches will be well televised.
wat is ZTV IS IT ZEE TV AN ASIAN CHANNEL maehara let me know asap.
ZTV is Zimbabwe Television - state broadcaster in Zim.
thanks 4 lettin me know .
What has happend to the opener Barney Rodgers he is a good player who has 5 ODI half centuries is he playing any first class criket will he return to the Zim national squad please let me know maehara asap find out imformaton on rodgers asap let me know please.
Barney Rogers:
Short answer: don't know.
Long answer: there's been nothing I can find to show that Rogers has been playing since he last played for Zimbabwe. When I was putting together the Players page here, I could trace no reference to him playing at any level - although that doesn't entirely rule out club level, as they don't always get good internet coverage. brmtaylor.com has a list of everyone who's been listed as playing in Zimbabwean club cricket this season, and he's not listed there either - so my guess would be that he's not currently playing.
For future reference -for any former player, if I know what they've been up to it'll be listed on the Players page, as that was originally conceived to track what the "rebels" were doing. If they're not there, I don't have any details.
do u think he will return to play for zim hope he does.