A view from the Gully (9 June 1999)
Rains have made Zimbabwe happy, New Zealand unhappy and India sad
09-Jun-1999
9 June 1999
A view from the Gully
Tawfiq Aziz Khan
Rains have made Zimbabwe happy, New Zealand unhappy and
India sad.
The first match of 1999 World Cup Cricket that ended
inconclusively even in 48 hours has so much of impact on
the group standing and chances for qualifying for the
semifinals. Zimbabwe, outsiders to be fair, find
themselves on the threshold of World Cup glory by virtue
of nature's interference.
Having said that I must recall their heroic encounter
with the tournament favourites South Africa whom they
defeated convincingly and also their dramatic win against
India - two of the strongest teams in the tourney. They
are already acknowledged as 'giant killers' and their
achievements at this level of the game is very
encouraging. On 9 June 1983, Zimbabwe, as qualifiers,
surprised the tournament favourites Australia at Trent
Bridge, Nottingham, by 13 runs. It was their debut
tournament. This match was a personal milestone for DAG
Fletcher of Zimbabwe for his 69 runs and 4 wickets. They
came back again in 1992 and again as a qualifier. This
time the victim was England. At Albany, a small township
north-east of Melbourne, Zimbabwe took on the might of
England that included Gooch, Botham, Lamb, Hick and
Stewart. But the parttimers were not impressed. On 18
March they were skittled out for a meagre 134 in 46.I
overs. Botham and Illingworth did the damage. But nobody
knew what was in store for England. What looked like a
chicken feed was actually eaten up by a chicken farmer
named Eddo Brandes. With his fast medium deliveries he
licked the top four English batsman that included the
scalps of Gooch, Lamb, Smith and Hick. England slumped to
125 in 49.1 overs leaving Zimbabwe with a sensational
victory by 9 runs.
Now coming to the match at Headingley we might as well
say that a good contest was spoiled by rain. Zimbabwe's
modest total was interfered by rain at least on three
occasions. Their batsmen lost concentration. But a gutsy
innings by Mervyn Goodwin supported by Johnson and
Whittal gave respectability to the total. Geoff Allott
once again bowled beautifully to be in the record books
of World Cup with Roger Binny of India. Allott will
definitely pose quite a few problems for South Africa and
India.
Perhaps New Zealand missed out on their chances of full
points from this match. They needed 106 in 35 overs with
7 wickets in hand. Or another 10 overs by which it could
be taken to be a match and the Duckworth-Lewis system
would have come into play. Their chances for a semifinal
place will depend on their ability to win at least one of
their two matches either against India or South Africa. A
difficult proposition indeed, but not impossible. India
could at best look for full points from their matches
against Pakistan and New Zealand but unless something
extraordinary happens their chances of playing in the
semifinals will be really difficult.
Source :: The Bangladesh Daily Star (https://www.dailystarnews.com)