Telford Vice's Blog, page 372
August 25, 2014
Leading Edge: Finally, not only one side has all the guns in Zimbabwe
Sunday Times
TELFORD VICE, Cape Town
“THE problem with Zimbabwe,” a proper journalist, the kind who has spent the odd night in jail for daring to do his job properly, told me a year or 10 ago, “is that one side has all the guns.”
Quite. And, of course, that side is the wrong side. So you have to feel for the Zimbos for again ending up on the wrong end of the arms equation in their test match and one-day games against SA.
Truth be told, not only were their arms about as threatening as a pacifist o...
August 22, 2014
SA steamroller Zim. Come on Aussie …
Times Media
TELFORD VICE, Cape Town
BRING on the Aussies. The Proteas’ romp to a 3-0 whitewash over Zimbabwe in Bulawayo on Thursday will make South Africans bullish about AB de Villiers’ team’s chances in the triangular series that starts in Harare on Monday.
SA, who won the first two games by 93 and 61 runs, surged to victory by seven wickets with 32.4 overs to spare on Thursday. The result was never in doubt after they dismissed Zimbabwe for 165, of which Elton Chigumbura owned 90, in 39.5 ov...
Abbott, Shezi keep SA places
Times Media
TELFORD VICE, Cape Town
VERNON Philander’s and Beuran Hendricks’ loss will be Kyle Abbott’s and Mthokozisi Shezi’s gain in SA’s triangular one-day series against Zimbabwe and Australia, which starts in Harare on Monday.
Philander and Hendricks have been ruled out with hamstring and back injuries. Abbott and Shezi, who were part of the squad that completed a 3-0 ODI series whitewash of the Zimbabweans in Bulawayo on Thursday, have cracked the nod instead.
Also still in the mix is Rilee...
August 21, 2014
Time for SA to take their eye off the ball
Times Media
TELFORD VICE, Cape Town
SA would be forgiven for taking their eye off the ball in the third one-day international against Zimbabwe in Bulawayo on Thursday. In fact, it would be irresponsible to stay focused on a mission that is already accomplished.
With the rubber won, SA’s thoughts must turn to bigger things like the triangular series in Harare that starts on Monday with a game between the home side and Australia.
AB de Villiers’ team will take on the Aussies on Wednesday in what sh...
August 20, 2014
Unfortunate events can’t stop SA winning series
Times Media
TELFORD VICE, Cape Town
FOR a while in Bulawayo on Tuesday, SA must have thought the script for the second one-day international had been written by Lemony Snicket – he of “A Series of Unfortunate Events”.
Then realities were checked and AB de Villiers’ team swept to victory by 61 runs to wrap up the rubber with a match to spare. But first there was fun and games, at least from a Zimbabwean perspective.
John Nyumbu bowled a sweeping Hashim Amla via his gloves – yes, really – before de...
Du Plessis not faffing about
Times Media
TELFORD VICE, Cape Town
TO faff, the Oxford English Dictionary tells us, is to “spend time in ineffectual activity”. Patently, that is not what Faf du Plessis does when he walks out to bat after the first wicket falls in SA’s one-day matches. But, just as clearly, he feels compelled to mount a case in his own defence.
“I’ve played most of my cricket at No. 5, 6 and 7, but if it was up to me I would definitely choose the No. 3 position,” Du Plessis said. “It allows me to plan my gamep...
August 19, 2014
Cheer up, India – things could have been worse
http://www.GOcricket.com – http://www.gocricket.com/Cheer-up-India-Things-could-have-been-worse/Telford-Vice/columnshow/40386961.cms
TELFORD VICE, Cape Town
DO not fuss, India, this too shall pass. Besides, it could have been worse – imagine if you were Zimbabwe, the land of nope and gory.
Or New Zealand, where cricket is meaningful only between rugby matches, of which there are enough to clog the consciousness for months on end.
Or South Africa, where everything on all sides of every divide is r...
Sacred and profane opening partnership already among SA’s best
Times Media
TELFORD VICE, Cape Town
SHANE Warne and Adam Gilchrist. Jonty Rhodes and Kepler Wessels. Muttiah Muralitharan and everyone who bowled with him. Cricket is not short on players who seem connected only by contrast but find a way to win together.
Warne and Gilchrist hardly shared a word off the field, not least because Gilchrist breakfasted at about the same time Warne went to bed. Rhodes was a Duracell bunny. Wessels was the epitome of stoicism. Anyone who tried to bowl like ‘Murali’...
August 18, 2014
Amla uber alles in SA win
Times Media
TELFORD VICE, Cape Town
HASHIM Amla is the only right-hander in cricket who plays with a left-hander’s elegance, and even if he had batted from the sinister side of the crease in the first one-day international against Zimbabwe in Bulawayo yesterday he would have made a significant impact for SA.
Amla’s undefeated 122, his 15th century in the format and his fourth in six ODI innings, was him at his peerless best. It was also the fulcrum around which SA’s total of 309/3 turned and the...
Promoting No. 3s not an open and shut case
Sunday Times
TELFORD VICE, Harare
CRICKET has Dereck Dowling to thank for the fact that Barry Richards became one of the finest opening batsmen yet to grace the game.
“You keep going in at 3/1, so what’s point of batting at No. 3,” was the blunt advice of former Natal batsman Dowling, by then an administrator, in 1965-66, Richards’ second first-class season.
With that, a player who had not been born an opener was made into one. Richards took first strike in all seven of his test innings and opene...
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