NOT US!!! Zimbabwe, the first team to be leaving Sri Lanka, – Unceremoniously trounced and beaten into submission.

Nothing inspiring about SA vs Zim comes to mind. Its a bit like trying to passionately describe a smooth, flat, white wall. It’s white. Thats it. It’s not fiery, it’s not exciting it’s just white. Plain. Simple. Boring. Dull. Like last nights cricket. The local guys were all perplexed that we were going to M.Rajapakse Stadium on Thursday eve. “But there’s no match on?” was the standard response. And how right they were. The streets leading up to the stadium were empty, except for the customary massive police and military presence. You could easily start doubting yourself that there was anything going on other than a training session. Turns out it was.

For all technical and other purposes it was indeed a cricket match. Maybe if you were watching from the luxury of your living room and had access to a fridge of cold beer and the remote control handy for those duller times in the match when it seems more appealing to watch the 87th repeat of Animal Channel’s ” Lion eats Zebra”, series 237. But if you were at the Stadium, and there were only about 3000 of us. 9 SA Fans, 54 Sri Lankans, who really had nothing better to do and the rest were Military, Police, the teams and their entourage, a handful of media and some self styled VIPs.

On the bright side I didn’t have to get a rub down by the security when coming in as they probably thought that there was no way anybody was going to be bringing in any contraband or firestarting material. No point in blowing up empty seats!

A 90 minute tuk tuk ride one way. if it were not for the fact that it was scenically appealing and we could stop for coconuts and padkos along the way, then I’d be grumpy that I had to travel 3 hours to the middle of nowhere to watch a non match. It cant be called a match. There was no contest what so ever. Zim, oh dear, I feel dearly for teams that just get annihilated like this. The Afghans however, showed their intent by stepping up to the cricketing masters of India, nearly rocking the boat and surely giving them a wake up call. Here’s hoping they do the same (or more), again tonight against England. India will no doubt not be taking anything easy from here on.

I’m not sure what SA can take out of that victory against Zim, some people are claiming they have lost the chokers tag…? What?! Against Zimbabwe? Sri Lanka’s Mendis took 6-8. Kallis was almost as good with 4-15 and tagging the MoM award.
I think i could have taken a wicket or two myself…… SA have declined a practice session today to go surfing and fishing.

Sri Lanka lie in wait for tomorrow. Now that will surely be a contest worthy of traveling 3 hours. I’m taking an extra hour to do some coconut arrak cocktail stops long the way……

In the mean time I’ll do like the Proteas and go search for sunny shores and warm water. The beaches are definitely more appealing and refreshing at this stage of the games. We’ll try to find a cosy hole to watch the other matches later. Go Bangladesh! Go Afghan!! (not that I’m biased in any way……) 😉 Oh, apparently KP on ESPN Sports provides highly entertaining Match commentary if you can get it!

Useless Daily Trivia:Ireland team was all out for 68 runs against West Indies – Lowest total in a 2010 Twenty20 World Cup match. Lets hope they dont do the same against Bangladesh later