I'm so glad the quarter finals have returned to the World Cup. Well that's what Cricinfo has reliably learned.
A World Cup never seems complete without a nice set of quarter-finals. Or maybe I'm biased because of that India-Pakistan match.
But the quarters add a sense of progression to a tournament. It's like a captain telling his team- well we're done with the league stages and all the ups and down. From now on, we lose one, we're out. It's now or never. Fiery stuff.
Somehow, the semi finals seem too late for the knockout stage to begin. The pressure is obviously more in a knockout match, and the earlier teams face pressure in a tournament, the better the quality of cricket.
And they've made the World Cup shorter while giving the top nations the main deal. Seems reasonable to me. I don't want to argue in favour of the minnows, we have enough people for that. I want to see a better world cup than we saw in 2007, and the moves seem to be in the right direction.
I really want Bangladesh to qualify for the quarters in 2011. All hosts in the quarters at least.
And then we can dream on, as I did for the recent under-19 world cup, for an all-Asian semi-finals.
Not going to happen I know. Bangladesh can hope to knock out England and the West Indies, but none of the other sides as of now. All this is on current form, of course.
3 years to go, Bangladesh are supposed to be top the test side by the end of this year.
Thursday, March 20, 2008
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8 Wickets:
They have a good nucleus.I think the WI will be become dominant in the ODI's.
2011 is far away. Anything can happen, really.
actually you have started a good debate...
whether QF is a way to go or Super6 was better...
i have laid my own arguments on my blog in favor of S6...
lets see what you say...
I'm all for QF's.
I actually read SP's post before this one and placed my views there.
The gist is the last two steps before the finals must have the keen edge...the knife-cut which could send you home.
The league phase is enough to warm you up and iron your kinks...a second league as a super 6 or super 8 is meaningless and diminishes the tournament. The teams must have the ability to walk the thin knife edge and survive if they want to be champs.
Whether Q/Fs are good will be decided if India makes the semis in 2011. Personally, I prefer the super 6s - but then I also liked the best of 3 finals down under. And that's scrapped too!
Sorry, I was out for the last couple of days.
Good point there, NC. If India does well, the tournament is a success, irrespective of the format.
But I definitely do not agree on the best of 3 finals. 3 finals stretch on, and I'm glad they are scrapped. All the tension built up for a final cannot be compared to that for a best of 3 finals.
I'm for the QF's. I think that that one possible bad day as SP says should be enough to knock any team out. Its the World Cup, you shouldn't have a bad day. If you do, then OUT.Its all about pressure and the team that handles it better is the better team.
One possible bad day can happen in a semi-final or a final as well.We could have a league stage then as well :D. Fantasic Fours and the Thrilling Twos.
Completely agree with Soulberry's points.
>> Ottayan said...
>> They have a good nucleus.I think the WI will be become dominant in the ODI's.
Huh? That is what I call wishful thinking.
http://cricket-forever.blogspot.com
I think the Windies one day team is made out to be worse than they are, because of their disastrous test record.
It's not that wishful, really.
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