#CWC15 day 11: #WIvZim

Five years ago, on 24th february the great Sachin Tendulkar hit first double century in ODI cricket. Let's applaud that feat first. Five years later it was day 11 in ICC cricket world cup 2015 and there was a clash between West Indies and Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe has really impressed with its fighting spirit in this world cup. While West Indies got its lost confidence back with the win against Pakistan. Both the teams were looking for their second win to move one step closer towards quater finals.

Game 15: West Indies vs Zimbabwe

Holder won the toss and chose to bat first. West Indies had scored 300+ runs batting first in both the previous matches. Thus it was a good decision to bat first. Smith and Gayle came out to bat. Second ball of the match went through the gate of Dwayne Smith. Smith was out for duck and Panyangara performed a belly act to celebrate Smith's wicket. I thought it is going to be repeat of the same story and West Indian middle order and lower middle order have to come into play again to get some runs on the board. I thought Zimbabwe had great opportunity to take a lead in that match.

Samuels and Gayle carried the innings forward. Gayle was playing his shots but was not finding the middle of the bat. While Samuels was slower than the snail. Samuels was not even rotating the strike. He was just happy playing the dot balls. West Indies' 50 came up of 67 balls. Gayle still was not finding the meat of the bat but was at the crease like a rock. Samuels on the other hand was enjoying his dot balls. Gayle reached to his 50 of just 51 balls. At that time West Indies' total was 73. Imagine Samuels' contribution in that partnership. 100 of the partnership came up in 24th over in which Gayle contibuted with 61 runs while Samuels' contribution was just 32 runs. Feature of that partnership was that both of them were pretty much comfortable at the crease by then.

Both of them brought 150 of West Indian innings in 31st over in which Gayle's contribution was of 91 runs while Samuels' contribution was only 49 runs. Samuels brought up his half century then of 95 balls which was way slower as per his standards. I didn't liked his approach in this innings. Then Gayle brought up his 100 on the first ball of 36th over. His 100 came of 105 balls. Gayle didn't find the middle most of the time in that innings but he didn't lost his cool through out. It was his first century since June 2013. In this innings Gayle hit 5 sixes but 4 out of them was not Gayle like sixes. It just cleared the boundary ropes but 5th one suggested that now Gayle is hitting tge ball well.

West Indies took batting powerplay in 36th over and from that over both the batsmen shifted gears. Both of them collected 55 runs in that powerplay. At the end of 40th over West Indies' total was 220/1. What happened after that was absolute Carnage. Both Gayle and Samuels became the beasts and were hitting the ball like anything. Gayle completed 150 runs in just 126 balls and then he set his eyes on 200. West Indies reached 300 run mark by the end of 45th over. Now records were to be broken. Gayle and Samuels broke the record of highest partnership of Dravid and Sachin as well as Ganguly and Dravid. Gayle reached milestone of 200 runs in just 138 balls. Samuels also hit a century and West Indies finished the innings at the total of 372. West Indies lost its second wicket on the last ball of the innings but what an innings that was! I consider myself lucky whenever I witness such innings.

It was about to rain in Canberra but before rain city of Canberra witnessed Gayle storm. It rained after West Indies' innings was over but it stopped soon and the match was resumed with Zimbabwe's innings. To chase such a big total Zimbabwe needed to do only one thing 'hit out or get out'. It was as simple as that. The other way was to play for themselves. Zimbabwean batsmen chose 'hit out or get out' approach and due to that Zimbabwe lost 3 wickets under 50 runs. It was almost over for them at that stage but Taylor, Williams and Ervine brought them back into the match. They never lost the sight of the total and kept the scoring rate more than 6 till they were at the crease.

Zimbabwe lost Taylor at the score of 126 in 21st over then Willams on 177 in 28th over and then Ervine on 226 in 34th over. Ervine and Willams gave Zimbabwe some sort of chance with their quick fire half centuries. They never allowed the required rate to go out of their reach. If two of them could have carried on till the end then Zimbabwe literally had a chance. Even after the loss of these three batsmen Zimbabwe still scored more than 6 runs an over. Zimbabwe got out on 289 in 45th over. Zimbabwe showed a great fighting spirit through out the innings. They played to win the match and that fighting spirit has impressed me a lot about Zimbabwe in this world cup. Batsmen are doing their job well for Zimbabwe but bowlers are letting them down. Congratulations to Christopher Henry Gayle for his double hundered. We were waiting for double hundered in this world cup and who else than Gayle could have got that feat. West Indies moved one step closer to their quater final berth.

On 24th February 2010 Sachin Tendulkar got first double hundered in ODI cricket and exactly five years later Gayle got first double hundered in world cup cricket. Next up is clash of Associates. Ireland will play against UAE. Both the teams play each other a lot. So they know each other well. It is very important game for Ireland as they desperately want to qualify for quater finals. While UAE will play to spoil the Irish party.

#CWC15 day 12