“ICC CWC 2015 Final – NZ v Australia – The cream always rises to the top!”

Mar 29, 2015 Sports

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Colin E. H. Croft  
If I had my wish, South Africa would have played New Zealand in ICC’s CWC 2015 Final, thus confirming that massive coffers do not always make winners!

While much money does buy some success in English Premier League, USA’s National Basketball Association, even National Football League, its prominence in cricket operates differently.
Just be thankful that that is so in cricket, or India would win everything possible!
A NZ v SA final would have indicated that even though India, Australia and England – “The Big Three” – have finances, influences and clout to do whatever they want, their funds cannot sway success to their teams.  After all, just look at England, one of the worst teams at CWC 2015.
Had SA beaten Pakistan and India, as they should have, semi-finals would have been different, showing that despite not having overflowing cash-vaults, enterprising know-how could still translate to progress and success for teams prepared to take chances.
Anyway, at tournament’s inception, I did suggest that NZ was a good outside bet, so I was right!
But SA, early favorites, even if no-one seems to want to address it now, did indeed “choke,” even panicked terribly, yet again, in that semi-final v NZ, initially from even their team selection.
Why was Kyle Abbott, who had done sterling opening-bowler work accompanying Dale Steyn, dropped for slower, more hittable, poorer returns overall, Vernon Philander?
Could it have been for that unwritten, but always-in-mind, even now, quota system?  Stupid!
No team can drop that many catches, misfield so often, miss crucial run-outs, then expect to win! SA simply did not have the psychological nouse to cope with the torrid pressure, making unaccustomed mistakes in sequences they had reveled in previously, so forget the damned tears.
So, final captains Brendon McCallum and Michael Clarke have been good in different ways.
McCallum, more boisterous, has no experience in W-C finals, while Clarke, quieter, has substantial final-day experiences.
McCallum seemed to understand that that rare chance to create history for his country; to be its first captain to lift ICC’s World Cup Trophy; had presented itself.
His tenacious leadership has been inspiring, with outrageous field-placings – three slips and a gully at one stage of that scintillating semi-final against SA – making sure that the confidence he has in his excellent bowling attack always comes shining through.
As previously suggested, McCallum’s captaincy reminds of leadership in 1970’s and 1980’s, when several close-in fielders posted by Australian captains Ian and Greg Chappell, West Indies’ Clive Lloyd and (Sir) Vivian Richards, and England’s David Gower and (Sir) Ian Botham, complimented fast, aggressive bowling, similar to what NZ presently has in such abundance.
At least 50% of NZ’s success has been down to McCallum believing in himself and his team, and reacting positively to universal support from 4.5 million country-persons.
Having gone unbeaten to the final, including beating fellow finalists Australia by one wicket earlier, McCallum must have thought that destiny was on his, his team’s and country’s side.
They could also have lost to SA in that heady semi-final everyone will remember forever!
McCallum has certainly led from the front as batsman, taking no half-measures.  In eight games to the final he had 328 runs, 41.62 average, with an ultra-impressive 191.81 strike-rate.  What carnage!
He moves his left foot away from areas where the bat will arc, then swings that bat with as much strength, precision, power and freedom as using a tooth-pick, connecting with such ferocity that boundaries, more sixes than fours, are realized, even from edges; scary whenever it comes off!
Only (Sir) Viv, Sri Lanka’s Sanath Jayasuriya, England’s Alan Lamb, from history, or SL’s present opener Tillakaratne Dilshan, could boast of such similar destruction of opposing bowlers.
Australia’s bowlers must have had migraines thinking of how to bowl to McCallum!
Michael Clarke, as a batsman coming back from a near-career-ending debilitating hamstring injury, has been more restrained in this tournament.  Six games, 145 runs, one fifty, average 29.00, strike-rate 94%, are not, collectively, the kind of returns that he is accustomed to.
But Michael Clarke, as Australia’s captain, has been absolutely stellar in his astute use of wonderful bowlers, cunning in his always evolving field placements, and especially smart in rotation of his batsmen.
Mahendra Singh Dhoni and India’s supposedly all-conquering batting line-up looked desperately frail, totally out of their depth, when Clarke seemingly instructed his fast bowlers to use “body-line” tactics.  No Indian batsman looked comfortable against real pace in their semi-final.
Clarke’s promotion of Steve Smith from No. 5 or No. 6 was as intelligent and flexible as a captain can get, realizing that Smith is not set, physically or stroke-wise, to slog, but to play as he does in Tests, threading spaces to get runs.  Moving Smith up to No. 3 was a master stroke by Clarke!
If only West Indies could take pages out of McCallum’s and Clarke’s play-books, perhaps even read them entirely, and learn something, anything, instead of producing dull, unimaginative cricket as was seen in CWC 2015.
Yes, the cream has risen to the top, displaying fully what “thinking cricket” is all about!  Enjoy!
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