England made their statement of intent with the most emphatic win we’ve seen yet, chasing Scotland’s 109 within 10 overs after England’s openers were apparently advised that winning within 10 overs would put them ahead of West Indies on Net Run Rate and mean they could lose their final match (v the Windies) and still qualify for the semi-finals.

Scotland 109-6 v England 113-0 #T20WC

— CRICKETher (@crickether.bsky.social) 2024-10-13T13:18:11.459Z

In fact, the circumstances where this would happen are quite narrow (though obviously still possible), and England certainly shouldn’t be relying on it; but if it got the England openers focused and playing the way they did, that’s what matters, and maybe that’s what Jon Lewis had in mind – we already know that he isn’t above playing psychological games with his players! The unbeaten Wyatt-Hodge-Bouchier partnership of 113 off 100 balls was probably the most entertaining hour of the tournament so far – there were no 6s, which have been incredibly hard to find at Sharjah; but there were 19 4s as England conquered the Bryces’ army and sent them homeward to… think again?

Actually, that wouldn’t be fair – Scotland should really go homeward in the knowledge that everything has gone pretty well. They might not have won any games, but they weren’t humiliated – they didn’t get bowled out for 24 or anything like, and they made over 100 twice, against Bangladesh and England. For a first World Cup, it is a pretty good return.

England march on, but they still really need to beat West Indies in their final group game to guarantee a semi-final spot – there are a few scenarios where they lose narrowly and still go through, but not many of them. And it was the other group that was supposed to be the Group of Death!

England will obviously be delighted with the result, given the romp with which the game ended, but there should be some reflection on the bowling, which (stop me if you’ve heard me say, stop me if you’ve heard this before, before!) lacked penetration – it took them 10 overs to take 2 wickets, which is going to be a problem if it is repeated in a semi-final against Australia or India.

Lauren Bell was brought into the XI, it seems to give her some game time in case England want to play her later in the competition, with Linsey Smith missing out. Sarah Glenn didn’t have a great game, and my guess is that Smith will be back for the West Indies, and probably the rest of the tournament, in place of either Glenn or (more likely) Bell – not because Bell did much wrong, but because the entire exercise confirmed that UAE is a slow bowler’s paradise. (Unless your name is Megan Schutt, who does seem to have mastered the conditions in a way that none of the other “pace” bowlers have.)

Scotland 109-6 v England 113-0 #T20WC

— CRICKETher (@crickether.bsky.social) 2024-10-13T13:18:39.119Z

On the other hand, if England can bat like this a couple more times, they won’t need to take too many wickets – the World Cup is now just 3 wins away, and England are motoring.

Any England win, the group is decided on points and NRR becomes irrelevant:

For completeness, if the match is rained off, the group is also decided on points:

If West Indies win, things get more interesting – all 3 teams will be level on 6 points, and NRR comes into play. Let’s assume England bat first and score 130.

West Indies chase 130 in 20 overs:

West Indies chase 130 in 15 overs:

So if England score 130 and lose very narrowly, they can go through; but if they lose anything other than narrowly, they will fall behind South Africa on NRR and go out. This goes for scores up to 134 – if England score 135+ and West Indies win even narrowly, England will fall behind West Indies and South Africa on NRR.

What if they score 199?

West Indies chase 199 in 20 overs:

West Indies chase 199 in 15 overs:

So England still go out if they lose!

Finally… let’s try 201!

West Indies chase 201 in 20 overs:

West Indies chase 201 in 15 overs:

So… South Africa are through unless England very narrowly lose a very high-scoring game; and England will out out if they lose, unless they lose very narrowly and score either 134 or less or 201+.

(Or am I wrong?!?!)

A totally different approach to batting on the low, slow wicket at Sharjah carried England through to a vital win over their main Group B rivals, South Africa. It may have gone to the final over, but it felt like England were always in control, managing the chase with precision.

South Africa 124-6 v England 125-3 #T20WC

— CRICKETher (@crickether.bsky.social) 2024-10-07T16:54:50.217Z

Batting first versus Bangladesh on Saturday, England made 118 – on paper a very similar total to today’s 125 runs – but they were such different runs. Against Bangladesh, England looked to drive everything, and eschewed the sweep shots that have been such a productive, trademark area for them in recent years. Just 13% of England’s runs against Bangladesh were scored backward of square – and in so-doing they made it all look like very hard work.

Today’s approach was totally the opposite: 43% of their runs scored behind square. On the scorecard that meant 42 runs scored to fine leg/ square leg, compared with just 11 versus Bangladesh; and suddenly batting looked a lot easier. Of course, it was a different wicket, but it wasn’t like they had suddenly relocated to Derby – it was still essentially the same conditions, but a whole new approach adopted.

Marizanne Kapp kept things quiet in the powerplay, pulling two maidens out of the bag; but then Alice Capsey, helped by coming in at her more natural position of 3 rather than 5, gave England’s chase the little jolt they needed with a quick cameo of 19 off 16 balls, pulling out that sweep shot for a couple of boundaries early in her innings. Capsey’s impetus got the run rate up to within touching distance of where it needed to be, and England were able to keep it there as Nat Sciver-Brunt and Danni Wyatt worked the gaps and ran hard.

Acknowledging that boundaries were going to be tough to find, they poked the ball into the pockets with the metronomic regularity of a snooker player potting red after red. For those who remember the glory-days of snooker in the 1980s, it was more Steve “Boring” Davis than Alex “Hurricane” Higgins, but it bears remembering that Davis won 6 World Championships, whilst Higgins won just 2.

With 4 overs left, England still needed a run a ball; but Kapp was bowled-out by that point, and though they lost Danni Wyatt off the last ball of the 18th over, it didn’t affect their momentum in any way, partly because Heather Knight faced just 1 ball, taking a leg-bye off de Klerk, leaving NSB to finish what she’d started at the other end, potting the final black with 4 deliveries to spare.

Earlier, England had delivered an efficient bowling performance to restrict the South Africans to 124.

South Africa 124-6 v England 125-3 #T20WC

— CRICKETher (@crickether.bsky.social) 2024-10-07T16:55:15.100Z

The middle overs were where South Africa let themselves get behind the game a little bit, particularly overs 7-11 as Anneke Bosch delivered the finest masterclass in anti-nominative-determinism since former Conservative cabinet minister James Cleverly – struggling to bosh anything much at all. It was a barely disguised blessing for South Africa when Bosch failed to get bat on an attempted ramp, and Kapp was able to come in and get things going for South Africa, making a quick 26 at a strike rate of 150, before Annerie Dercksen added an even more handy 20 not out off 11 at the end.

Dercksen hasn’t had much opportunity to show what she can do with the bat for South Africa – she has played 15 T20s now, and has only batted in 7 of them. But in those 7, she is averaging 22 at a strike rate of over 140, and there is definitely a case that she should be coming in above Chloe Tryon, who wasted 5 precious balls for 2 runs at a crucial point in the game. Had Dercksen faced those deliveries, and South Africa put another 10 on the board… who knows?

As it was, the result put England in pole position in Group B and means that South Africa really can’t afford a slip-up now – if they win both their remaining games (v Scotland and Bangladesh) they should be okay, but there is actually one scenario where even if they win both those games they don’t qualify, so they may end up cheering for England in their last match v West Indies, should it come down to it!

England ground out the ugliest of ugly wins – Heather Knight admitting post-match that “it’s not going to be sexy all the time” – in their first match of the World Cup in Sharjah, beating Bangladesh by 21 runs.

England 118-7 v Bangladesh 97-7 #T20WC

— CRICKETher (@crickether.bsky.social) 2024-10-05T16:57:54.727Z

Having chosen to bat, England got off to a decent start – 47 is by a fair distance the most runs scored in the powerplay in the 4 matches to have taken place so far at Sharjah. Maia Bouchier showed a willingness to go on the offensive in tough conditions – she looked disappointed after getting caught on the ring, but 23 off 18 balls was job done for her.

England 118-7 v Bangladesh #T20WC

— CRICKETher (@crickether.bsky.social) 2024-10-05T15:27:31.515Z

But England then seriously slumped thereafter, making just 44 runs in the following 10 overs as Bangladesh’s spinners pegged England back. Wyatt-Hodge battled her way to a run-a-ball 41, but struggled to get value for her shots. With long boundaries in place for this tournament, and the ball plugging in the outfield, anything that bounced more than a couple of times was running out of breath before it got to the rope.

The openers aside, the rest of England’s batters couldn’t deal with Bangladesh’s spinners, who kept them stuck in the crease – unable to move their feet much, and oddly reluctant to sweep.

Alice Capsey in particular looked like she was playing a game of The Floor is Lava in reverse (The Floor is Glue?) fending delivery after delivery back to the bowler, before being caught off a reverse sweep by one of the not-one-but-two fielders in place for that shot.

This isn’t entirely her fault though – coming in at 5 really isn’t where she is going to be at her best. I understand why England do this – to try to ensure that Nat Sciver-Brunt is batting in the overs in which she is likely to be at her most productive, after the powerplay, but while the ball is still newish. NSB has no doubt the right to have others juggled around to accommodate her; and to be fair, Capsey has repeatedly insisted that it isn’t a problem for her; but it leaves her in her own personal No Man’s Land in the middle order where she obviously isn’t comfortable, and her coming in earlier might have averted that middle overs slump.

Fortunately for England, they were able to up the rate in the final phase, helped by a Sophie Ecclestone Special – 8 off 2 balls, after hitting her first ball for the only 6 of England’s innings.

The interesting aspect to this game for England was going to be how the bowling went, with the decision to go with 4 specialist spinners, including Linsey Smith playing her first World Cup game since the group stages of the 2018 tournament in the West Indies, and her first England game not against New Zealand since 2019. In contrast with her other recent outings for England, Smith had the chance to operate in her preferred role, getting the new ball in the powerplay.

She didn’t quite find her rhythm in her first over, but she then switched ends and things fell into place. The ball that got Rani wasn’t the best Smith has ever bowled – it invited a shot that Rani just didn’t quite have the power to cash in on, caught by Ecclestone at mid off – but what followed was 5 tight deliveries to complete a wicket maiden, and set the pattern for Smith to fully justify her selection as she finished with 2-11 off 4 overs – half the Economy Rate of the rest of England’s attack.

England 118-7 v Bangladesh 97-7 #T20WC

— CRICKETher (@crickether.bsky.social) 2024-10-05T16:58:24.328Z

Bangladesh’s innings was a mirror image of England’s – after a limp powerplay, they outscored England 59-44 in the middle overs, but still left themselves with too much to do at the death to be in with a shot of winning, and they ended up shutting-up shop a bit towards the end. What they did achieve was getting close enough that their Net Run Rate didn’t take too much of a hammering, unlike Sri Lanka against Australia earlier in the day.

England will need to do better than they did today if they are going to beat South Africa and top the group, which (now that India have already lost a match) will presumably be the way to avoid Australia in the semi-finals; but for now it is a win and 2 points and that’s what matters.

Lalit Modi, the India businessman who kick-started the IPL, has publically rubbished the ECB’s valuations of The Hundred teams in a post on The Social Network Formerly Known As Twitter, backing up his arguments by publishing the confidential team-by-team revenue projections issued by the ECB.

Modi writes that the ECB’s revenue projections are “disconnected from reality” and argues that the teams are worth only between £5m and £25m – less than half of what the ECB are believed to be holding out for.

Modi believes that increasing the projected earnings from domestic TV deals from £58m to £85m is “plausible” but that the expected income from overseas TV rights is unrealistic, and that the idea that there could be a big increase in sponsorship income is “wishful thinking”.

There’s a lot to digest here, but let’s start with possibly the only thing Modi is wrong about: domestic TV revenues. Given the state of the UK economy,which is projected to become poorer than Poland in terms of per-capita income by the end of the decade, it feels unlikely that Sky will have that kind of additional money to throw at a sport where they are likely to be the only serious bidder. If the rights end up increasing by even half of the 50% Modi is suggesting is “plausible” (and to be fair, he only says “plausible” and not “likely”) that would be a huge surprise.

On overseas TV rights Modi is almost certainly correct – the networks aren’t going to pay big bucks for a franchise comp that has no big stars in the men’s tournament. The ECB might argue that once they get the money from the sale, they will be able to afford some more superstars, but that’s a chicken-and-egg argument: they can only afford the big stars if they sell the teams for a lot of money; but if there are no overseas stars, the teams won’t be worth that much, and they won’t be able to afford those top players.

As for sponsorship, the ECB is constantly struggling to keep its current sponsors on-board – the idea that someone is going to come along and give them “Barclays” Premier League kind of money is for the fairies.

It is worth bearing in mind that Modi may not be a disinterested party here – he could be “just commenting”; but he (or friends of his) could also stand to gain from low-balling the ECB on the team sales if they are planning to invest nonetheless.

Whatever the case, the ECB needs to wake up and realise that these are the kinds of people you are trying to get into bed with – people who will publically throw cold water on your proposals by shamelessly leaking confidential documents and daring the ECB to do anything about it. Of course – sources leaked the tender documents for Tier 1, including to us; but they did it anonymously, because they realised that they were taking a risk by doing so. But Modi knows he is taking no such risk – it was a power move – Modi is saying: ‘I can leak your confidential documents and there is nothing you can do about it!’ The ECB should sue, but won’t. In which case, we know where all the power lies if we continue down this road and (clue!) it isn’t with the ECB.

After 5 seasons of Regionals, the Final Final ended in a deluge of rain with a win by 27 runs for Sunrisers on DLS.

Champions 🏆

— CRICKETher (@crickether.bsky.social) 2024-09-21T15:42:01.085Z

The team that won no 50-over games in 2020; none in 2021; and none in 2022 – changing captains and coaches along the way – started to turn things around in 2023, getting their first RHF Trophy win against reigning champions Vipers on the opening day of the season. But it wasn’t until they appointed their 4th captain at the back end of 2023 that the gears really began to shift.

Grace Scrivens was just 19 when she was appointed captain in September 2023, but had already skippered Kent and England A. Leaders like Scrivens don’t come along very often – the last one that came from Essex caused the Romans a bit of bother back in AD61, burning Colchester to the ground in the process. Fortunately for the rest of us, Scrivens kept her warfare on the cricket pitch, with Sunrisers winning their last 4 games of the 2023 season to finish in 4th place, missing out on a semi-final place by just 5 points.

To say that ‘The tide had turned’ however would not be accurate – it would imply a degree of inevitability which in reality did not exist. In the group stages Sunrisers only just won more games than they lost – winning 7 and losing 6, and scraping into the semi-finals at the last gasp. But what they did do was win the games that mattered – the final ‘must-win’ group game against Vipers; a tough semi-final versus Diamonds; and now the final against Stars. Those are the games that you win by believing you can win; and that comes from leadership.

Of course, leadership alone isn’t enough – you have to back that up on the pitch as well, and Scrivens did so today – bowling 8.2 overs  at an Economy Rate of 2.5 and then adding a cool, calm 39* before the rains came to finish the game. But in neither case was Scrivens quite ‘leading from the front’. Asked about her style of captaincy following the trophy presentation, she had this to say:

“You’ve got to back your players and try and build good relationships with them, set roles and stick with them. It’s about sticking with players, and then they come out and deliver. Giving belief into players and trusting in them.”

She did that today, with Cordelia Griffith – allowing her to take the initiative from the moment she entered the fray in the second over.

Stars 212 v Sunrisers 121-3 (T: 95) #RHF

— CRICKETher (@crickether.bsky.social) 2024-09-21T15:23:33.915Z

Griffith reached 50 having faced twice as many balls as Scrivens, with the captain happy to turn over the strike to the player in form, putting Sunrisers well ahead of the rate required to maintain a “lead” on DLS, even if they lost a couple of wickets, which they ultimately did.

Remarkably, Griffith said afterwards that she wasn’t even aware that rain was threatening: “I had no idea rain was coming – it just so happened that I was given enough balls to put away and get ahead of the rate early.” You can bet that Scrivens knew though – the DLS par was after all literally writ-large in front of their faces, on the big electronic scoreboard in the corner of the ground. But again, that’s true leadership – Scrivens wasn’t shouldering the strike, but she was carrying the responsibility of worrying about the rain and keeping that from her partner so that she was free to play her game without those worries.

Another crucial player for Sunrisers, both today and through the season, was Lissy MacLeod. MacLeod has been around the block a few times – she won the first ever Kia Super League with Vipers, back in 2016 (and the second with Western Storm the following year) and has now added a winner’s medal in the final RHF Trophy, 8 years later. The weight of runs she scored this season (just over 200) might not be up there with Scrivens (553) or Griffith (420); but without the 50 she made in the de-facto quarter-final against Vipers, Sunrisers would not even have been here.

Equally, a 12 not out today from Macleod might not seem much, but at the stage she came in the most important things were a) support Scrivens, the set batter; and b) not get out, which would have made the DLS a lot closer. And she did both (a) and (b).

With the ball, both Kate Coppack and Jodi Grewcock finished the tournament with 19 wickets for Sunrisers; with the former starring today, getting a bit of swing early on, and a little (just enough) bite off the pitch later, to take 4-27. Getting rid of Alexa Stonehouse, and newly capped England player Paige Scholfield early-doors, combined with the run out of Bryony Smith (which goes down on the scorecard as ‘Run Out (Villiers)’ but should really be ‘Run Out (Bryony Smith)’ such was her own culpability) meant that the big hitters in Stars’ lineup – the ones that could have got them to a much more intimidating 250+ – were eliminated from the equation. Alice Davidson-Richards did a magnificent job, and was rewarded afterwards with the Player of the Tournament medal from the PCA’s MVP computer, but she is the anchor not the cannon, so without the big hitting going on around her, Stars ended up well short of par.

Stars 212 v Sunrisers #RHF

— CRICKETher (@crickether.bsky.social) 2024-09-21T12:22:25.198Z

Stars will no doubt lament that if the rain hadn’t come, they could have… would have… should have… worn Sunrisers down, and might have been able to bowl them out, which is realistically what they’d have needed to do – the required rate at 25 overs was under 4, so Sunrisers would have made it unless they’d been dismissed. But… them’s the breaks – the rains came, leaving the players watching puddles forming from the dressing room balcony before officials finally confirmed the abandonment and the result. The yelps of delight from the Sunrisers players could be heard from across the ground in the press box. They might not have been the best team through the season, but they won the games that mattered. That’s how competitions work, and for that reason their joy was thoroughly deserved.