Thursday, March 22, 2007

Scotland might lose

You can’t help but think that that Scotland should have invested more of their energies into beating the Netherlands, than trying the improbable of beating Australia. Today Scotland slumped to an appalling score of 136, being bowled out in 34.1 overs. The penetrative bowling of the well-known Billy Stelling getting three for 12, and the dangerous Mark Jonkman taking two for 22. Look at Jonkman in the picture. Look at that tenacity. He face is saying, “I bowled you out, Scotchman. I bowled you out, and now I am going to knock you down. I knock you down easy.” That’s the sort of attitude I like to see in minnows: undirected, futile aggression.

This Scotch failure brings joy to my heart. As I have noted, I have immature yet good reasons for wanting Scotland to lose, and lose badly. The problem is I don’t have pets, or children. I have nothing to nurture or help develop. So, I have decided to nurse a bitter grudge, feeding it with sulky remarks and sour observations. My precious one is growing strong.

In other news, New Zealand are showing England how it is done, and are destroying the Canadians. No fuss, no messing about with batting strategies. Just good, straight-forward slogging. Lou Vincent hit 101 in 117 balls, with nine fours and a six. None of the top-order deliberately played slow, and the crowd did not give them a slow hand clap. The reason for this is that the Kiwis are playing proper cricket, which is something the England Cricket Board may like to think about.

I’m starting to wonder whether the Black Caps might do a Sri Lanka, and sneak into the Semis without actually being that good. I don’t think so, though. There’s something indefinably mediocre about the New Zealanders. They have players of flair, and match-winners, but there’s just something of the defective about them, but I can’t put my finger on it.

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