The first match of the 2007 tournament between South Africa and the West Indies saw history being written when Chris Gayle became the first Twenty20 International centurion.
Unfortuntely for Gayle and his side they went on to lose the match by eight wickets as Herschelle Gibbs and Justin Kemp matched Gayle’s fireworks.Having scored over 200 in the defeat to South Africa, the West Indies were expected to comfortably dispatch Bangladesh in their second group match but they were in for a surprise.
Many people said before the tournament started that the ICC World Twenty20 2007 could provide the lower-ranked sides the chance to shine. And having beaten both India and South Africa at the ICC Cricket World Cup 2007 in the West Indies, Bangladesh pulled off another shock in Johannesburg.
Gayle failed to put a run on the board and only a half century by Devon Smith helped West Indies reach 164 as Shakib Al Hasan claimed four wickets.
A spirited Bangladesh then galloped to the target thanks to two brilliant half centuries from Aftab Ahmed and captain Mohammad Ashraful to win the match by six wickets and send the West Indies packing.
Though many of the West Indies players had taken part in the Stanford Twenty20 they had never hosted a T20 International match in the Caribbean before this competition. That has now been rectified and with more experience under their belts and Gayle still likely to be a prominent threat at the top of the order they will expect to progress from the group stage in 2009.
West Indies Team for T20 world cup 2009:
Chris Gayle (Captian)
Denesh Ramdin (Wicketkeeper)
Lionel Baker
Sulieman Benn
David Bernard jnr.
Dwayne Bravo
Shivnarine Chanderpaul
Fidel Edwards
Andre Fletcher
Xavier Marshall
Kieron Pollard
Darren Sammy
Ramnaresh Sarwan
Lendl Simmons
Jerome Taylor
No comments:
Post a Comment