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The 50 over champions once again failed in the T20 match and this time they lose by very worst margin ever in the history of Australian Cricket. Aussies lost both their league match of T20 World cup .They also suffered an earlier defeat with West Indies. SriLanka seal the Australian’s hope of staying alive  in the  tournament by beating them with 6 wickets in hand in England today.

The match started with SriLankan new skipper Kumar Sangakkara winning the toss and choosing to bowl first. Australia got the early blow losing Warner for a duck. The follow up batsman did scored, but couldnt convert it to higher scores. Wickets continue to fall regularly in regular intervals. SriLankan bowler bowled exceptionally well among them were Ajantha Mendis who took 3 wickets for 20 runs and lasith malinga 3 wickets for 36.

Australia hoped a miracle for good score and it happened in the form of  M Johnson who scored 28 runs of 13 balls hitting 2 sixes and 2 fours. Australian Skipper failed again with 25 runs scored for him. Australia managed to pull out a decent score of  159 for 9 wickets. A defendable score actually with such fast bowlers in their side.

SriLanka batting had blessings in the form of  Dilshan who smashed apart all Aussie bowlers mainly Bret Lee ,Watson and Nathan Bracken and managed to score a half century of  53 runs of 32 balls . The fall of Jayasurya wicket was expectionally done with the superb catch by Warner which gave Australia hopes of winning the match. Remember its a must win game for Australia to see any oppurtunity staying in the tournament.

Their hopes was ripped apart by the pair of Sangakkara and Mubarak who smashed the ball all around the park.  Sangakkara completed his half century in  style and mubarak  hit 21 runs with few sixes. Both the batsman remained unbeaten and took their side to a convincing victory.Sangakkara rewarded Man of the match for his excellent knock.

Among the Srilankan crowd there was a statement written, “New Captain New Beginning”. Lets see how well Sangakkara manages his side victory in the remaining of the matches. It will be a treat to watch the Super 8’s matches. Both West Indies and Sri Lanka of group c qualified for Super 8.

Roger Federer has finally won the French title beating Robin Soderling 6-1 7-6 6-4 to clinch the French title cup. This title makes Federer second man after  Andre Agassi to win all the four grand slam titles in all the surface.

Emotional Federer after the victory said “It might be the greatest victory of my career.”  He was continously  beaten for  three times in the French open finals by none other than Clay king Rafael Nadal. But this time Nadal cannot make it to finals thanks to 23rd-seeded Soderling who crashed nadal in  fourth round of the tournament.”To me, Nadal  is the best player in history,” the Swede said.

“It was really not easy to deal with my emotions,” said the 27-year-old Federer. This win also makes him only the sixth person to win the 14th grand slam title and also equalled Pete Sampras’s record of 14 grand slams. The confidence of beating soderling in the last 9 previous matches helped me to keep up the pressure added Roger Federer.

Finally for Roger Federer,its  Mission Accomplished winning his First French title.

England players will be breathing high after winning the match with pakistan. It was a must win match for them after the loss which they face with Netherlands. It was a good team show by England. Now they are alive in the tournament.

The match started with England batting first. Ravi bopara failed to score and was out for a single digit 5 runs. Followed by the brilliant Pieterson and Luke wright show. Wright scored 34 runs of 16 balls and pieterson made a good half century . With the support of  lower order batsmen, England post a massive score of 185 for 5 on board.

It was a huge score for out of form Pakistan team who failed to win in both their warmup matches. Pakistan batsman have no answers for England bowling, only younis khan seemed resistent and played a good knock. But it was too late for them. England came strong on all the departments of the game with the brilliant bowling and fielding.

The result favoured England with a thumping win of 48 runs. Now they have a good hope to reach super eights.Luke Wright was awarded Man of the match for his 36 runs and a wicket which he took.

Netherlands win a stunning Match with England by the margin of 4 wickets. This was the World T20 opener in England homeground  Lords.

Earlier, Netherlands won the toss and decided to field first. It seemed a bad decision earlier of the play where England was scoring over 9 run each over. Its all thanks to their star batsman Ravi Bopara who scored a magnificient 46 runs and Luke Wright played a rocking knock of 71 runs for 49 balls. But they cannot convert it to the big score and managed a par level of 162 for 5.

Well that was defendable though. England as the experienced team over Netherland was confident  to defend it. Netherlands doesnt tour or play cricket as much as England do. As said by the Cricket Commentators, T20 can be any team game. This was the exact thing happened today in the ICC world T20 Opener.

Tom  de  Grooth of Netherland played a brillant knock of 49 runs of 30 balls. And also got the contribution from all players defeating England  by 4 wickets. He was rewarded the Man of the Match for his knock.

Now the worst part of  match is England’s fielding. England players showed a very poor show in fielding, missing almost 7 runs out. And thanks to the overthrow made by the bowler Broad in the last ball of  the over, Netherland ran 2 runs to make it in the Winner side. Each over they missed couple of run outs and granted runs. It  seemed as though not  one player can attempt to throw at stumps properly. Bopara missed a very simple basic run out.  Broad have missed 5 times of his own bowling.

Here’s the decider now, if  England want to stay alive in the tournament they have to beat  Pakistan by very big margin on June 7.

Finally, as England supporter i have been led down as a fan. Com’on man show them who we are. Fight like Lions next match and win it for  us.

Deccan chargers team with their Owner celebrating the victory

Cool finish at the end of  IPL 2009 SA. Deccan chargers made their stand more clear by winning the DLF IPL 2009 trophy. It was pretty close game though, but Gilchrist team held their nerve more than Kumble’s team. It was a treat for everyone who  watched the match.

It all started when Kumble won the toss and chose to field first. Pretty interesting decision though but it proved fruitful for the Royal challengers Bangalore by the fall of wicket of the Inform batsman Adam Gilchrist for duck. The man taking the wicket is none other than Anil kumble himself . The wicket of gilchrist created a huge buzz in the ground. It was because of the damage that Gilchrist can do to the opponent. The semifinal between Delhi daredevils and Deccan chargers is unforgetable ,where gilchrist slammed 85 runs of 35 balls.

After gilchrist wicket, the scoring rate of Deccan chargers drastically falled down to  nearly 5 runs per over. And within a over Suman was caught by Manish pandey which made Bangalore team in the drivers seat. On the other end though, Gibbs was playing sensible not taking any risk. Andrew symonds catch was dropped by dravid which was a sitter to lose, and he made bangalore pay them by smashing 4 fours and a six.

Kumble decided to ball again and got the wicket of symonds. The game again was turned on for bangalore. Rohit sharma failed to score as he did before by smashing all over the park. He played a knock of 24 runs. Gibbs was the star of the match for Deccan chargers scoring 53 runs not out. Deccan chargers made a total of 143 runs for 6 in 20 overs.

The second innings started with Bangalore came out to bat with the pair of Kallis and pandey. Symonds adopted old aussie trick of teasing the young pandey. When the momentem was shifting towards bangalore. The leading wicket taker RP Singh got kallis bowled out. And then Ojha proved why he is dangerous, by  getting Roel out who was hitting big shots for 6. The game was still any team game.

Ohja managed to take 2 wickets in 2 overs. Still that was not enough as bangalore had 8 star batsmen in them. Gilchrist trusted his old team mate Symonds and asked him to ball which was the turning point of the match. Symonds took 2 wickets in 2 ball getting Kohli and Ross Taylor out.  Deccan started to feel the victory here. But still there was Boucher and Uttappa to handle out. Boucher seemed uncomfortable and was caughed out for the ball of harminder singh.

Now the final breath taking moments with 30 runs to score for 3 overs and at the crease was Uttappa and praveen kumar. Deccan chargers planned well not to give width for uttappa and made him feel the pain. Praveen was caught with the ball of ojha for 2 runs. Vinay kumar seemed aggresive and smashed a four. He was  caught  in the deep by harminder singh which was the superb catch of the IPL. Gilchrist praised harminder singh in the presentation cermony for the catch he took.

Uttappa though had international experience couldnt make the score. And the deccan chargers won the IPL trophy 2009. It was a celebration for them. Anil kumble was awarded man of the match. Adam gilchrist was awarded man of the series.

KingsXl punjab win their 3rd match of the IPL 2009. It was a nail bitter match between punjab and Mumbai Indians. The game started with Punjab winning the toss and opting to bat first for the 20th match of the IPL tournament in Durban.

The openers of punjab failed to perform with their bat and middle order of the team failed along with the top order. Lasith malinga bowled excellent deliveries for mumbai indians and was very hard to play him along having a figure of 2 for 12.  The lone man to stay at crease and perform was Srilankan wicketkeeper Kumar Sangakkara who played a crucial knock of 45 not out for punjab. Ramesh power helped him at the end by scoring 10 runs for 10 balls.

The pitch was reported to be very slow  and was judged to be tough for batting by the pitch reporters before the play started. Punjab team was confident to show a  good match and defend their total. The second innings began with the mumbai indians batting.

Irfan pathan strike at the beginning dismissing Jayasurya for 2 nd ball he bowled. Tendulkar was caught in the 2nd over  by Jayawardene for the bowling of  Malik. The punjab bowlers was perfect in bowling and limited mumbai from scoring the boundaries. As sangakkara for punjab,JP Duminy of mumbai batted superb and completed his half century. He was caught in the 20th over of the match trying to hit a 6. This was the turning point of the match and punjab managed to win a nail bitting match for  3 runs.

Final Score:

Kings XI Punjab:  119/8     20 overs

Mumbai Indians:116/7     20 overs

Man of the Match: Kumar Sangakkara