England win the war of nerves
Every so often, one team or the other reinvents the one day game.
Sri Lanka did it as recently as the 1996 World Cup, when it deployed the explosive Sanath Jayasuriya, backed by the brilliant and rock solid Aravinda D'Silva, to knock the stuffing out of rival attacks.
Now England are doing it -- esentially with a bowling attack that is as soft as marshmallow. What they have put in the field are a bunch of bowlers who come loping in and release the ball -- and the batsman at the other end winds up for the huge hit and he waits and he waits and he waits and hey, the ball ain't got there yet.
It's nerve-wracking, this attack. As subtle as the Chinese Water Torture. And just as effective in reducing free stroking batsmen to jibbering insanity.
Who would have thought that against a Pakistan batting lineup that features Aamir Sohail, Saeed Anwar, Shahid Afridi, Ijaz Ahmed... and so on and so forth, through the potentially destructive Wasim Akram to the brilliant young Azhar Mahmood in at number 8, a target of 215 could cause the kind of tension, excitement and down to the wire finish as seen at Sharjah on Monday?
Thrice in succession in this tournament, teams featuring lineups of brilliant batsmen have found it impossible to get away against this attack. And if England retain this kind of thinking, if not personnel, for the 1999 World Cup, then it is back to the drawing board for all other aspirants.
The battle of ideas and nerves began even before the toss. Pakistan dropped Aqib Javed and brought on Mushtaq Ahmed -- a bogeyman for English batsmen, thanks to his exploits not only in the Tests against them in recent years, but also for his work in the county circuit.
In fact, Pakistan threw the dice for broke when it went in with four spinners, playing on the English team's known weakness against slower bowling. England skipper Adam Hollioake won the toss, and promptly decided to bat first. Asked why, he said, "Well, Pakistan has four spinners, this pitch gets slower as the game goes on, so we figured we'd bat first and deny them the advantage of spin in the second innings."
Lovely example, that, of strategy and counter-strategy.
When England batted, the openers made considerable headaway against the pace of Akram and the medium pace of Azhar Mahmood. However, once the spinners came on, all the old insecurities came out of the closet and batsman after batsman found himself crease bound, leaden footed, and helpless against the turning ball. openers Alistair Brown and Alec Stewart came out
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