Good evening sports fans, I hope you’ve had a good day under golden skies! After a weekend of cricket coming thick and fast, the last couple of days have been a bit slower going but no less exciting!
Today’s game was between my North American team Canada and my South Asian team Pakistan. These two sides couldn’t be much farther apart in world rankings and world recognition. Pakistan are in the top tier of world cricket, whereas Canada, despite being Champions of the Americas, are bit players in the global game. This is tournament cricket though and as we know, anything can happen in tournament cricket! The maple leaves did lose their first game but they took tournament co-host USA right to the wire. Canada also beat Ireland in their second game, read back my “Oh Canada!” blog for my thoughts on that one. Pakistan on the other hand have had a torrid start to the competition despite their many attributes. Losing their opening game in an absolute thriller against the USA, a match that was a classic example of why World Cup tournaments are so great. The bad news continued for the Falcons in their second game when they snatched defeat from the jaws of victory in the biggest game of them all, Pakistan Vs India.
So with Pakistan in apparent free fall and Canada looking every bit the America’s champions, you wouldn’t have bet against a shock Canadian victory setting up a juicy, all American shoot out between USA and Canada for second place in group A!
Pakistan won the toss and chose to put Canada in to bat. The surfaces at New York’s Nassau County International Cricket Stadium have seemed to get harder as the games go on so The Falcons were backing themselves to get Canada out quickly and cheaply.
Canada, although a team who deserve our respect, simply aren’t used to facing bowlers with the pace, turn and skill of Pakistan. Shaheen Shah Afridi, Mohamid Amir and Haris Rauf ripped through the maple leafs batters like a hedge trimmer! Canada’s opener Aaron Johnson managed to squeeze out 52 runs but Canadian skipper Saad Bin Zafer was the only other player to reach double figures scraping a score of 106.
Even at this point, a Pakistan victory was far from a forgone conclusion, this New York wicket has been variable to say the least and the Falcons batters have hovered somewhere between mediocre and hopeless. Even so, with such a large gulf between the combatants and a low target to achieve, Pakistan should have romped home. As it was they crunched and squeezed and at times screamed their way to a winning 107 runs, but it took them 17.3 overs to do it!
Pakistan are finally off the mark but we need to be very careful not to impress this victory with the attributes of success. If results go Pakistan’s way and they manage to qualify for the next round, they’re going to have to play a lot better. As for Canada, they have looked great fun and I am all up for more diversity in the world game……..let’s book them for a test match!
We have 3 exciting games tomorrow, Sri Lanka Vs Nepal and Australia (booooooo) Vs Namibia are both doing the night shift. Then the afternoon game is another potential “Big Nation” banana skin, USA Vs India. That is just the sort of game India might inexplicably lose, one to keep an eye on!
Until then, thank you as ever for reading.
All the best,
Nick
All The Cricket 
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