Its Only Cricket

3rd Test: Australia wins Sydney Test (scorecard), South Africa won Test Series 2-1.. T20 & ODI series follows.
Current Cricket Series : South Africa vs Australia, West Indies vs New Zealand. Coming Up : India in NZ 2009.

Filed under Afro-asia cup

Being a writer means you stay honest. not many liars can write long paragraphs & make a meaning out of it.

Staying honest myself, I'll admit team from African continent, Africa XI, looked much better every time they came out to chase the tall total Asia set for them in 1st, 2nd & yesterday in the 3rd ODI at Chepauk stadium in Chennai. Even the twenty20 game they played (in Afro-asia cup 2007) had major star cricketers from Asia but not 1 in African team.. yet the fight was worth a look.

Sad fact is, Africa lost ODI series 3-0 & that lone 20/20 International too. Asian confidence was so high, that rash shots by Yuvraj, Jayasuriya, Tharanga & of course Virendra Sehwag didn't surprise me. What did made a mark, was the way MS Dhoni accompanied captain Jayawardene. They together made 218 (a world record partnership) to prople Asia XI from 72 for 5 to 290 for 6.

Asia finally finished with 331 for 8 wickets on the board.

Africa, as I said, looked remarkably well while chasing 6th highest total, had they done it. Pollock, Kemp & de Villiers failed to complete the centuries Dhoni & Maleha had made for Asia, thus the result was Africa lose by 13 runs.

Asia XI vs Africa XI Cup, 3rd ODI at Chennai
Asia XI 331 for 8 in 50 overs	Africa XI 318 for 7 in 50 overs
Sehwag 8, Jayasuriya 13, Tharanga 10	De Villiers 70 (63), Sibanda 45 (63)
Yuvraj 31, Yousuf 2, Mortaza 1, Bhaji 4	Dippenaar 0, Tikolo 11, Boucher 7
Jayawardene 107 (106), 9 4s 2 6s	Kemp 86 (76) with 3 fours & 7 sixes
Dhoni 139 (97) with 15 4s & 5 6s	Pollock 58 (49), Johan Botha 18 from 9
Morkel 3/50, Ongondo 3/35	Mohammad Rafique 10-0-65-4
Asia XI won by 13 runs, n series 3-0

Notes :
[:] Mahela Jayawardene & Mahendra Singh Dhoni made the record partnership of 218 runs for the 6th wicket. They previous best partner-ship for the same wicket was only 165. Interestingly, it was equally achieved by two distinct pairs. 165 between Brad Haddin & Michael Hussey against WI at Kuala Lumpur & same 165 by Craig McMillan & Brendon McCulluam of New Zealand against Australia at Hamilton... thankfully, Dhoni-Jayawardene partnership has made 6th wicket International partnership record lot straighter.
[:] Ever seen Reverse Sweep? sure you have, but if you ca get the highlights package of this Afro-asia cup, watch Shaun Pollock playing 'reverse extra cover drive' as explained by commentator Arun Lal.
[:] In the lack of potential notes on this last afro-asia cup match, I've decided to look into how Dhoni is doing in comparison with Australian wicket keeper Adam Gilchrist. It says, this was Dhoni's 74th one day International, 66th innings, 2288 ODI runs at average of 47.66 & highest score of 183 not out. Dhoni's strike rate is 98.79 as of now. For Adam Gilchrist, who's about to retire from International onedayers, has an average of 36.00 from 261 innings of 268 ODIs he has played. His strike rate is 96.65 & best score being 172 out.... what I really want to put forward ~ is that Indian wicket keeper is doing much better than his idol, untill now.

All about Asia vs Africa (afro-asia)cup 2007

Imported Kiwi curators, Road roller n yes - Bangalore ready

Experience drives Asia to victory over innocent Africa

Africa slipped n slipped, but again made a match of it.

Asia XI cruise to second victory

Asia send Africa back home empty handed