The World T20 is here, and just like most other sporting tournaments around the world, the teams have been carefully whittled down to two. Unlike most other tournaments, however, those two (Bangladesh and Afghanistan) are not about to play off in a final.
Instead, the tournament is about to suddenly unwhittle its way back up to ten nations again so we can keep going.
Here are the ratings from the first round of the World T20.
Reverse handicapping
Grade: A-
As alluded to above, this first round sees cricket at its most gloriously elitist. While other sporting events embrace the notion of handicapping in order to make the competition as even as possible, cricket is having absolutely none of that nonsense. Communism is dead. Egalitarianism is for suckers.
Instead, cricket embraces a form of reverse handicapping in which the Associate teams (along with perennial pseudo-Associates, Bangladesh and Zimbabwe), already weaker due to lesser funding and playing opportunities, play an entire extra round among themselves.
I’m all for this. I wish other sports did it too. For example, the AFL draft should allow the best teams to pick the best players first, so that the best players are always in the best teams. Seems silly to have them running around with lesser players.
The NRL salary cap? Let’s raise it for teams that can afford it, and lower it for the teams that struggle. Get that money flowing freely. It’s good for the economy.
And why not have the Melbourne Cup handicapped with horses carrying weights that are directly proportional to their odds of winning? Who among us doesn’t want to see a 200-1 shot carry half a dozen sacks of potatoes in addition to their jockey?
For the cricket, though, the end goal is obviously to have the Associates work their way through a tougher format in order to minimise the possibility that any of them knock out India too early and ruin the television ratings.
Ideally, the Associates will just get knocked out quickly and leave the Test nations to play with themselves.
The ICC Full Members – playing with themselves since 1909.
Raingladesh
Grade: B
Group A got the memo regarding the Test-playing nations. Not only did Bangladesh top the table without losing a game, the Group A gods also managed to organise rain to wash out two of the six matches at such a time that it immediately scuppered the chances of either Netherlands or Ireland challenging them.
Of course, it’s highly likely that Bangladesh would have topped this group regardless, given that they just finished second in the Asia Cup and are a strong T20 team. But sensible to get the rain on their side early.
Some of you may recall that during the ODI World Cup last year, Team Raingladesh shared the points with Australia in a match at the Gabba. Since Australia’s only loss in that World Cup was against New Zealand, who they later went on to beat in the final, that means that Bangladesh were the only opponents that Australia were scheduled to play but couldn’t defeat.
Going forward, however, they’ll want to do a lot better than just matching Australia in this form of the game. Aim high, Bangladesh.
Oman
Grade: B+
The final team Bangladesh needed to defeat in their group in order to progress to the next round was Oman. The Oman team were many people’s favourites, thanks mostly to their refusal to rule out the possibility of using mankads on the dubious basis that the laws of the game to permit it.
Sadly, they were unable to mankad their way to victory against the canny Bangladesh, who apparently found some obscure technique to counter the tactic.
Presumably all those people who are outraged by mankads will now have their best cricketing scientists working around the clock, studying the Oman-Bangladesh game in super slo-mo detail in the hope of someday being able to replicate the counter tactic.
Peace in our time? Let’s hope so.
Hamilton Masakadza’s running between wickets
Grade: B-
Over in Group B, meanwhile, Zimbabwe failed to go through, but their captain’s running between wickets won’t soon be forgotten.
He was the first wicket to fall in the tournament, failing to ground his bat, or his foot, or indeed anything, when he should have been comfortably in his ground, a la Ben Stokes in the 2015 Ashes Test at Lord’s. If you’re going to go for funny cricketing dismissals, Stokes is an excellent player to emulate.
Then in the next game, Masakadza collided hard with his opening partner and was knocked to the ground and run out yet again. A little bit less funny, because there were some injuries in the process. Still, it reinforces the classic cricket lesson: never keep your eye on the ball.
Last-ball running
Grade: A
In Zimbabwe’s final game, Afghanistan’s batsmen eked out every possible run against their alphabetically-opposed foes.
Most impressively, they took a bye off the last ball via the clever tactic of having the striker stand his ground while the non-striker ran. The Zimbabwe keeper, working on the assumption that both batsmen would be running, threw down the stumps at his end, at which point the striker took off for the other end, making it safely.
Super smart batting from Afghanistan. I want to see this lateral thinking taken a step further. For example, on a free hit, shouldn’t the first move from the batsman be to kick down his stumps? The only way he can be out off a free hit is to be run out. Breaking the bails maximises the difficulty of that form of dismissal.
I’m sure there are plenty of other exploits available. Let’s get thinking, teams. There’s still three weeks of this competition to go.
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