Windies send England home,Enter semis…[icc wt20,Sup8,game 10]

Monday..the 15^th of june 2009… London…The 10^th match of the super8 stage at the icc wt20 championship was to be played between hosts England and the West indies.It was clear that the winner would find a place in the semi finals and the loser would pack their luggages.England,playing in front of their home crowd would have been in enormous pressure to perform and win in the do or die encounter.Meanwhile West Indies would play a fearless game as they always do.India were out of the competition and the Proteas had already qualified.Being a semi final qualifier,this match had an enormous importance.Battin first,England lost Wright withonly 8 on board,Pollard striking early for the Windies.Bopara and Pietersen made the recovery and repair act.They put on 56 vital runs for the 2^nd wicket,Kevin doing the bulk of scoring.KP hit 31 in 19 deliveries with 5 hits to the fence before being caught by Fletcher off Simmons.The other batsmen made small contributions without troubling the Windies bowlers with Shah making 18 in 15 balls.Collingwood,Foster and Swann made 11,13 and 10 runs respectively almost scoring run a ball.But it was Ravi Bopara who made the bulk of scoring at the other end before being adjudged leg before for Gayle.He made a 47 ball 55 with 5 fours.Rain played the spoil sport every now and then disturbing the momentum of the game.England would probably be cursing the rain god for playing a mischief which cost them the match and the championship chances too.When England were at 129 for 4 in the 17^th over,the showers came in and went away as quickly.The number of overs were not curtailed and England played their full quota of 20 overs finishing at 161 losing 6 wickets,thanks to the finishing touch given by Broad when he smashed a four and a six in the last two deliveries to take the score past 160.The Windies bowling was tidy.Bravo picked 2 giving away 30 runs.Gayle,Simmons,Pollard and Benn picked a wicket each.

The commencement of the second session was again delayed due to the rains,this time for a pretty long time.The DL calculations came into the scene as a curse in disguise for the English team,setting a winning and qualifying target of 80 runs in 9 overs for the Windies.Anderson dismissed Fletcher in the first over and got the necessary breakthrough for his team.Gayle blasted 3 boundaries in his short stay,where he scored a 8 ball 15.But Sidebottom bowled a beauty of a delivery to get Gayle,once again putting England on top.In the third over Simmons went without disturbing the scorers dismissed by Broad when the score read 16 for 3.Pollard and Bravo put on 25 runs for the 4th wicket to get some revival hopes in the Windies camp.Pollard hit a six and was bowled by Rashid for 9 when the score was 41.Everything seemed to be working in Englands way when Bravo who was playing well was outin the 6th over being stumpped wonderfully by Foster off Swann.He made a 13 ball 18 with a six and a four.That was the last time when England rejoiced.At that level Windies needed 35 runs to win in 22 balls with half their team back in the pillion.Then came the experience of the windies,with Sarwan and Chanderpaul joining hands at the crease.The senior players made sure that there were no more hiccupps.They took their team home with 4 balls to spare.This 5 wicket win took Windies into the semis while it was the end of the story for the host team.The dejected England team had to walk back home having lost to a better team.Chanderpaul made 17 in 10 balls with a four.Sarwan was adjudged the man of the match for his 9 ball 19 in pressure situation which guided the Windies to a win.He hit 3 boundaries in his knock.Good luck Windies…see you in semis….