Australian cricket IQ missing in action

 

Roar Pro

By Brad Jamieson, 28 Apr 2009 The Crowd is a Roar Pro

Tagged:

 Australian Cricket, Cricket, ODI, Pakistan cricket

• Tweet this
• Email to friend

4 Have your say

Several words could be used to describe Australia’s batting performance against Pakistan last night: timid, fearful and woeful come to mind. Terrible and boring are apt descriptions, as well.

It is not so much that the batsmen played rash shots — with few exceptions the batting was restrained and respectful — more than it was too much so. On an excellent batting pitch, the Australians looked about as dangerous as vanilla ice-cream on a hot day.

After dreary over after dreary over of spin bowling was met by defensive shot after defensive shot, I found myself yelling at the Australians “just hit the ball!”

Surely they realised after 40 overs that a run rate of less than four would be unlikely to put them in a winning situation. Yet, short ball after short ball was met with a straight defensive bat.

Of course, it is always dangerous to theorise about what you would do if you were in another’s situation. But the Pakistan batsmen had no problem advancing down the wicket in the first over and on a regular basis after that.

Meanwhile our bowling seems to have suffered a brain freeze, as well.

Having just been shown the effectiveness of slow bowling the Australian bowlers came out and tried to bowl the leather off the ball. The resulting wides and fours were not hard to predict.

Pakistan was 0 for 57 before Australia’s spinner came on. Hmmm.

What about the Pakistan performance? The bowling was average to good, but at no stage was it match-winning.

The spinners were tight, but then the Australian batsmen were unwilling to attack the short ball, so they had a lot of latitude. The Pakistan batsmen attacked when appropriate and made the most of a good batting pitch.

I hope I never have to sit through such an awful and depressing display of batting by an Australian team again.

Enjoy sports? Enjoy a bargain? All Sports Online has your favourite sporting brands at up to 70% off. Online only, premium quality sporting goods and merchandise at discounted prices. Get a deal now.