South Africa completes hat trick of wins over Australia

Prem Panicker

If I were Erle Stanley Gardner, I would probably title this match report The Mystery of the Missing McIntyre.

I mean, does anybody know what the gent who goes by the name of Peter McIntyre is doing in this Aussie squad? He was last spotted bowling with tight control against India in the Delhi Test - after that, he's been sighted even less frequently than the Loch Ness Monster!

Against South Africa, with Australia needing to win - if only to break what is becoming a surprisingly long losing streak for a team this good - I can't figure out why the touring management opted to go with three fast to fast medium bowlers (and a fourth, if you count all-rounder Steve Waugh). I mean, the Protean batsmen eat that stuff for breakfast while - as India demonstrated with a troika of spinners - they are much more circumspect against the turning ball. An attack of two spinners (plus non-regular spinners Law and Bevan) and two pacemen (McGrath and Fleming, with Waugh in support) would have made a lot more sense for this game. And as things stood, the over-emphasis on pace cost the Aussies dear when they went out to defend a fairly decent total.

Here's how...

Given the drenching the Nehru Stadium - and, indeed, the whole of Guwahati - took earlier this week, the wicket for this game was a little beauty. Hard, with just a hint of sub-surface moisture early on. Likely to take turn as it dried out, but not alarmingly so. And the outfield was, though wet and heavy, liable to dry out as the day progressed.

So what does the captain winning the toss do? Does he bat first - which means combat a wet outfield on which strokes might stop short of the boundary? Or does he bat second - with the attendant risk that the ball could get lower and slower in the latter part of the game.

A hard call, that, made harder by the fact that nobody can accurately judge a wicket of this sort given that the rains had abated just 24 hours previously. Taylor in the event won the toss, and opted to bat first.

Australia went into the game with just the one change, Mark Waugh sitting out a slight indisposition, and Michael Slater getting another chance to redeem himself. Taylor, though, elected to open with Stuart Law as partner - good thinking, as Law had looked in great touch in the previous game.

As for South Africa, Hudson came back to the side which meant Herschelle Gibbs was out. And Fanie De Villiers was rested for this one, Cronje preferring to give his big fast bowler a bit of a break ahead of the final. So Lance Klusener, who looked none too impressive against India the other day, got another chance to come good.

The strategy for this game would be pretty simple - try to top the 250 mark, batting first, and then defend the total with accurate bowling...

There are two keys to building a good one day innings. One: at an individual level, if you take time to get stuck in, then don't throw it all away with injudicious strokes. Simply because if you have used up x number of balls trying to get your eye in and then throw it away, it means the new batsman has to start all over again. Two: at a team level, always get partnerships going. Acceleration is always easier when two batsmen have been together for a while, and have got used to each other's play and running between wickets.

In the event, Australia was to contravene both these rules - and end up with a total at least 20, 25 runs lesser than what it should have been.

Taylor and Law, opening in a situation where Brian McMillan and Pat Symcox were in charge of the attack (De Villiers, remember, was not playing here) got off briskly, with Law in particular timing the ball sweetly and hitting four effortless boundaries in a cameo of 22 off 17 balls. But just when he looked to be getting a stranglehold on the bowling, a momentary lapse meant that Klusener, whom he had thumped for three boundaries in the latter's first over, got a free wicket when Law hit a rank half volley straight to Darryl Cullinan at mid on.

In came Steve Waugh, at number three ahead of the off-form Ponting. And Waugh and Taylor, in ponderous but safe fashion, took Australia along to 45/1 in 10, 83/1 in 20. In the process, both used up a lot of deliveries that were unscored of - but that would have been fine, if the two senior players (Waugh ranks just below Border in the total number of one dayers played by an Australian, while Taylor was playing his 100th ODI here) had managed to step on the gas pedal from the halfway stage on. After 25 overs, Australia was 96/2 and with Ponting, Bevan, Slater and Gilchrist to follow, 250 looked a pretty fair total to aim at.

And then Taylor, after taking 78 balls to get to 38, swept at Symcox. A dicey enough stroke, given that the burly bowler hits the deck and always gets bounce and turn. Doubly risky, because Cronje had kept a short leg just for that shot. In the event Taylor swept, the ball balooned up, and Jonty Rhodes didn't have to move an inch to take the chance.

In came Michael Bevan, looking in good nick from the first ball he faced - and out went Steve Waugh, again to the sweep, again off the top edge, only this time it was Nicky Boje who bowled, and Brian McMillan who caught the batsman out. The very next ball, Ricky Ponting pushed forward blindly to a ball that was short of length and should have been played back, the ball sneaked in between bat and pad, and for the fourth time in the Titan Cup thus far, a bowler found himself on the threshold of a hat-trick.

That Slater prevented the 'trick is one thing - but the more important fact was that from 96/2 in 25, Australia had slid to 114/4 in 30.

If Australia recovered to respectability, credit goes to a brilliant partnership of 124 between Slater and Bevan. The former was tentative and palpably out of form to start with, but then settled down to play strokes of trademark audacity. And Bevan was, well, Bevan - that is, one of the finest middle order batsmen in the world today, mixing superb strokeplay with brilliant running between the wickets and forcing misfields from even the normally scintillating South African fielding. In fact, so intense was the pressure these two mounted, as they took the score along at breakneck pace, that Jonty Rhodes and Derryck Crookes, the two most brilliant fielders in the SA outfit, both spilled catches while the likes of Cronje and even McMillan fumbled while fielding.

When Bevan finally left, lifting Donald straight to Pat Symcox at long on, he had more than done his job and there was just two balls to go in the final over. Gilchrist tried to take a run off the penultimate delivery to give the strike to Slater and was run out, Slater got a single off the last ball, and the Australians looked to have recovered very well indeed, having gone from 114/4 in 30 to 238/6 in 50 overs.

For South Africa, the only weak link with the ball was Lance Klusener, whose seven overs went for 55 runs. All the other bowlers used bowled with both economy and penetration, concentrating on keeping the ball between the wickets and denying width to the batsmen, forcing them to take risks to push the score along.

Throughout this tournament, getting runs off Glenn McGrath has been harder than getting pennies out of Uncle Scrooge at Christmas.

So why Mark Taylor chose to go with Damien Fleming and Paul Reiffel against Hudson and Kirsten, I will never be able to figure out.

In the event, Kirsten and Hudson played with characteristic abandon, the former playing strokes of sheer class and elegance, the latter chancing his arm and getting runs with a mix of good, bad and downright ugly strokes - and S'African galloped along, to 34/0 in 5 overs, 59 for no loss in 10. And by the time Kirsten left, trying to pull Hogg and missing the line of the straighter one, South Africa had got off to a flier again, and the target had already been reduced by 60 runs.

In came Lance Klusener - Cronje, I suspect, letting the young Natal opening bat get a taste of batting under pressure - and the mayhem continued.

Taylor, meanwhile, held back McGrath till second change, using Brad Hogg ahead of the tall paceman. And the runs flowed unabated. The mistake the Australian bowlers made, on this wicket, was to try and attack just that bit too much. Rather than bowl wicket to wicket and deny width, Fleming, Reiffel and even Hogg kept giving the batsmen at least one, if not more, deliveries that strayed either down off or leg. The result, SA 85/1 after 15 overs, and the match already won and lost by the time the field restrictions were off.

After that, the whole innings took on the inevitability of a typical South African performance - having established their domination, the Proteans never throw it away. Thus, if 60 runs were added for the first wicket, then a further 73 were put on before Hudson, whose early heaves gave place to a free-flowing style as he got his eye in, finally got out sweeping at Stuart Law for a well made 68 off 85.

That brought Darryl Cullinan to the crease - and Klusener and Cullinan were still there when the target was passed - a lesson, there, for the other two sides in this tournament as the two young players played with cool nerves, never showing the slightest sign of rushes of the blood and yet mixing the singles to with the stunning drives or pulls whenever the Australian bowlers strayed - which was quite often.

Criticising the Australians in the field seems to smack of kicking a person when he is down - but honestly, I don't quite understand why Taylor just tossed the ball to Law, and let him bowl unchanged for 10 overs in the middle.

Granted, Law bowled tight, giving away just 43 runs and taking one of two wickets to fall. But whatever happened to aggression in the field? Given that Law was getting turn, why then was Hogg forgotten after an initial spell in which he did give runs, but also took a wicket and, more to the point, kept beating Klusener's bat? Waugh gets four overs of medium pace which disappear for 24 - while Michael Bevan, who could have provided another spin option, keeps cooling his heels in the field.

When batsmen are coasting - as Cullinan and Klusener were - the fielding side has only one option. Ring in quick bowling changes, try and keep the batters from settling into a rhythm. This Australia failed to do and, compounded by the fact that they gave away far too many free hits in the first 15 overs, resulted in a loss by eight wickets, with five overs to spare.

And so we have the stage now set for a killer battle at Mohali, on Sunday. A game that if Australia wins, it will edge into the final on marginally better net run rate. A game that India has to win, to avoid being knocked out of the tournament.

Oh well, it's jsut 48 hours away now.

Scoreboard:

Australia innings                            R   B   4  6
MA Taylor       c Rhodes       b Symcox     38  78   2  0
SG Law          c Cullinan     b Klusener   22  17   4  0
SR Waugh        c McMillan     b Boje       36  65   1  0
MG Bevan        c Symcox       b Donald     79  70   7  0
RT Ponting                     b Boje        0   1   0  0
MJ Slater       not out                     53  68   4  0
A Gilchrist     run out (Cronje)             0   1   0  0
GB Hogg         not out                      0   1   0  0
Extras          (lb 8, w 2)                 10
Total           (6 wickets, 50 overs)      238


Fall of Wicket: 1-38 (Law), 2-94 (Taylor), 
3-113 (SR Waugh), 4-113 (Ponting), 
5-237 (Bevan), 6-237 (Gilchrist).

Bowling                      O      M      R      W
McMillan                    10      2     35      0
Symcox                      10      0     32      1 
Klusener                     7      0     55      1
Donald                       9      0     47      1 
Boje                        10      0     43      2
Cronje                       4      0     19      0
McMillan                    10      2     35      0

South Africa innings                         R   B   4  6
AC Hudson       c Hogg         b Law        68  85   7  0
G Kirsten                      b Hogg       27  33   5  0
L Klusener      not out                     88  98   8  0
DJ Cullinan     not out                     43  63   1  0
Extras          (lb 1, w 4, nb 8)           13
Total           (2 wickets, 45 overs)      239


Fall of Wicket: 1-60 (Kristen), 2-133 (Hudson).

Bowling                      O      M      R      W
Fleming                      7      0     37      0 
Reiffel                     10      1     51      0 
Hogg                         8      0     42      1 
McGrath                      6      0     41      0 
SR Waugh                     4      0     24      0
Law                         10      0     43      1 

Teams                                Comparitive scores  
Overs          5   10   15   20    25    30    35    40    45    50 
Australia    18/0 45/1 63/1 83/1  96/2  114/4 136/4 158/4 182/4 238/6
South Africa 34/0 59/0 85/1 115/1 142/2 158/2 191/2 213/2 239/2