Tuesday, October 9, 2012

The Worst and the Best XI of T20 World Cup

Another Final, Another heart break for Sri Lankan fans. This has become the norm these days! John F Kennedy once said that "World never remembers the person who came 2nd" ! If someone is going to look back at this World cup after 25 years, they wouldnt remember Sri Lanka's flair and how they became second, Only thing they are going to remember is West Indies!
Ga(ngnam)yle

But true, this loss didn't hurt like that 2011 world cup loss! I can still remember people crying over that 2011 loss to India, whole country was in despair. Losing out to a team which we passionately hate does leave an imprint on you! On the other hand West Indies is the second favorite team for many people, its really hard to hate that team. The way they celebrated every wicket and the victory, I dont mind losing again to see that celebration!!
Moving on from the final, this World cup could be called a success! Even though it started with some boring matches in the group stage, Tournament kicked off during the super 8 stage. All semifinal teams got into Semi Final in the very last day of the super 8 stages! There were 2 super overs, We had the individual record for best figures in T20 and record for highest runs in a match!
 " WI - Triumph SL - Choke Aus - Fail, Pak - Derail, Ind - Exit, SA - MisHit, Eng - KPless, NZ - Super over team (Bad Super over team) Ban - Flop, Zim - Mismatch, Ire - No match and Afghans in the hatch"

This tweet sums it all about this WT20!!

Selecting the best XI of a tournament after a World cup is a must these days, But I am also going to select a Worst XI for this tournament too! Selecting the Worst XI is always more fun than selecting best XI !


Worst XI of WT20

1) William Porterfield (Ireland)

0 runs in 2 innings
Could someone could fare any worse than this performance in a tournament? The way he performed in this tournament would make Rohit Sharma feel proud about himself! He lost his wicket in the very first ball he faced in both the innings he played! Incidentally it is also the first ball for Ireland in those 2 matches.And apparently in that both matches Ireland could never get out from that shocking start! And to boot that he is also the captain of Ireland! 

2) Richard Levi (South Africa)

62 runs in 4 innings's
Levi is not the first ugly (shot making wise) leg side dominant opener to emerge from South Africa. But at least Graeme Smith is effective and also a great captain. 62 in 4 innings's doesn't look that bad, but keep in mind 50 of those runs came against a paltry Zimbabwe attack in a single innings! Yes, Zimbabwe was that bad, that even Levi scored a 50 against them.

3) Craig Kieswetter (England)

39 runs in 4 innings with 2 ducks
England preferred Kieswetter over Prior to do the wicket keeping duties in this WT20! And he struggled to make contact with the ball with his bat. They even dropped him to accomodate Bopara into the team. If you are going to be dropped from the team for Bopara, you know you are a shitty player! 

4) Dilshan Munaweera (Sri Lanka)

30 runs in 2 innings 
Maybe it's little harsh to include him in this XI, this being his debut tournament. But thats not an valid excuse in the international arena! He came into the squad backed by some spectacular performance in the SLPL, And even Mahela let his favored opening position to Munaweera! Even though that he started WT20 with a boundary in the very first ball, it was all downfall for him after that! He couldn't even edge those Steyn and Morkel deliveries! Real World is much tougher than the SLPL lad!! 

5) Brendan Taylor (Zimbabwe)

4 runs in 2 innings's 
Another captain and another Wicket Keeper makes the list. He is supposed to be the best T20 player in the Zimbabwe line up (Not as hard as it sounds)! But he struggled, struggled a lot even for Zimbawbwean standards! 

6) Jonny Bairstow (England)

37 in 5 innings's 
Jonny Bairstow, the batsman who is replacing Mighty Kevin Pieterson! How can one not succumb to that kinda pressure. And he succumbed! 37 in 5 innings's and 18 of those runs came in 30 deliveries when his team is chasing 180 runs target! Even a Morgan blasting couldn't take England home in that match. And to make things worse he kept wickets in their last match and there are reports saying that even Kamran Akmal laughed at Bairstow's wicket keeping! 

7) Jos Buttler (England)

40 runs in 5 innings's
He was coming back into the squad after scoring 32 runs off a single Wayne Parnell over, Whole world was expecting a Lance Klusner like tournament for him this time around. But it wasn't meant to be! He couldnt replicate that form in this WT20 at all! 

8) Shahid Afridi (Pakistan) 

Well, he has to do something, so he did press conferences!
Playing Cricket is too mainstream!
30 runs and 4 wickets in 6 matches
 When Afridi came in, DJs choice of song was "Boom Boom".And he forgot to turn it off for like 2 seconds, and he is now walking away from that same song!! #GoldenDuck
This status describes what kind of tournament Afridi had. He along with Porterfield is one of the original choices for the Worst XI ! He just has to be there, No questions!

9) Zaheer Khan (India)

3 wickets in 4 matches econ: 7.23
His stats may not sound that bad, but those three wickets came in that last match vs SA! And he is their strike bowler and he didnt strike for them! He even got dropped for one match! Zaheer is the most important cog in the Indian team and when he is off color team doesnt do well! He isn't that bad but he didnt perform upto the standards he set for himself!

10) Shafiul Islam

0 wickets in 2 matches Econ : 12.14
Statistics are never necessarily the best indicator for one's performance! But Stats aren't lying in Shafiul's performance, he was really that awful!!

11) Jade Dernbach

4 wickets in 4 matches Econ: 9.83
4 th English player in the Worst XI, speaks volumes about how Luke Wright, Morgan, Hales and Broad carried their team in this WT20 ! He didnt play well for his England team neither for my Fantasy team!! He was leaking runs as fast as it would rain in SL during a cricket day! 

12 th man : Virendar Sehwag


Honorary mentions should go to, Hafeez, Charles, Gambhir and Ramdin!
 My worst XI : Porterfield, Levi, Kieswetter, Munaweera, B.Taylor, Bairstow, Buttler, Afridi, Zaheer, Shafiul and Dernbach.

My Best XI (Do not want to make it any longer by giving descriptions)

1) Chris Gangnam Gayle
2) Shane Watson
3) Mahela Jayawardane (Captain)
4) Marlon Samuels
5) Nasir Jamshed
6) Luke (Not Fluke) Wright
7) Brendon Mccullum 
8) Dale Steyn
9) Mitchell Starc
10) Saeed Ajmal 
11) Ajantha Mendis
12th man: Virat Kohli