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People might try to suck the colour out of one day cricket, but as long as the players are still wearing pyjamas, there’s always going to be plenty to talk about, and performances to rate.
Aaron Finch
Grade: A+
Fresh from captaining Australia to victory in the T20 a few days earlier, Aaron Finch took on a senior role again here, heroically getting out first ball of the match. (Interestingly, the last batsman to be dismissed first ball of an ODI was also Finch, against England, last year. He’s developing into quite the specialist at this role.)
Finch’s first ball wicket accomplished several things.
Firstly, it enabled Dean Jones in commentary to bang on about the correct nomenclature for Finch’s duck for the next 45 minutes. (It’s apparently a ‘royal duck’, presumably because the Queen is notoriously prone to a shaky start to her innings.)
Secondly, it thrust responsibility back on Dave Warner, who is all about responsibility these days. Warner steadied the innings and now averages 96 in international cricket as a dad.
Most importantly, though, it gave Steve Smith the opportunity to bat for almost a full fifty overs. Smith made the most of this chance, scoring his first ever ODI 50. So difficult was it to believe that Smith had never previously scored fifty runs in a one day match for his country, that he immediately did it again, piling a second 50 on to bring up his first ever ODI 100, just to put us all at ease.
Brilliant stuff from Finch. A quality leader both in terms of cricket and first name alphabetical order.
Caps
Grade: B
One of the highlights of Smith’s innings was the sight of him removing his helmet and batting in a cap. It evoked such nostalgic joy that the ICC must have been sorely tempted to retrospectively award Smith at least half a dozen more ODI fifties as a reward.
Less beloved capwork was seen by Pakistan spinner Fawad Alam, however, who bowled while wearing his cap backwards. Trent Copeland was just one person outraged by this, declaring on Twitter that he had never seen anything so bad in cricketing terms, adding that it was ‘not a net sesh’. It also inspired Australia’s full-time stand-in captain George Bailey to declare after the match that ‘there were two teams out there. One was trying to wear their caps properly. The other was not.’
Can't recall ever seeing anything as bad in cricketing terms as bowling with a cap on backwards! It's not a net sesh! pic.twitter.com/Ie9RRjBKok
— Trent Copeland (@copes9) October 7, 2014
However, with the ICC wasting time investigating match-fixing and not focussing on important issues like headwear, perhaps Australia should instead embrace the modern game. I, for one, would give anything to see Glenn Maxwell bat in a top hat.
Par scores
Grade: D
As is typical these days, the commentators spent most of the Australian innings discussing what a ‘par score’ might be for the pitch. Estimates varied wildly, but none seemed to get anywhere near the 255 that Australia eventually ended up with. Or the 162 that Pakistan later crumbled to.
It made me wish I had a full-time intern to track all the references to ‘par scores’ this World Cup summer and see by how much they differ from actual scores.
Also, a masseuse. A full-time masseuse would be very useful too.
Sorry, what was I talking about?
Pakistan
Grade: C
As alluded to above, the Pakistan batting was something of a shambles. After a decent start, racing to 50 off their first 10 overs for the loss of only one wicket, Nathan Lyon came on and took two wickets in two balls. From there, the Pakistan batsmen came and went with clockwork regularity, sharing their wickets among all the Australian bowlers (Well, not Faulkner. That would be silly).
Given the revelations from Kevin Pietersen earlier this week that the England team were worn down by bullying from their bowlers, it was enough to make one wonder whether Pakistan suffered from the same problem. I’m pretty sure if he was inspired to do so, the seven foot tall Mohammad Irfan could bully a team like nobody’s business.
Could there be any other explanation? Because a Pakistan team collapsing seems otherwise incomprehensible.