DUBAI: Super 12s – England outperformed Australia in every department to win by 8 wickets with 50 balls remaining and now is most likely booked a place in the semifinals. Australia’s score was limited to only 125 (all out) off 20 overs due to star class English bowling performance especially by Chris Jordan and Woakes. It was followed by a master class in batting by Jos Buttler with sixers raining all over the park was a sight to watch for any cricket lover. England has won all 3 of their Super 12s matches played up to now.
England won the toss and invited Australia to bat first. Australia’s score card was in tatters for 21 for 4 wickets by the sixth over with Woakes and Jordan running through the Australian batting line up.
Aussie captain Aaron finch tried his best to settle the chaos with 44 runs off 49 balls. Finch batted well with Matthew Wade (18 runs) and Ashton Agar (20 runs) before he got out as the 7th wicket when the total was 110. A late flair by Cummins (12 runs off 3 balls) and Starc (13 runs off 6 balls) saw Australia reaching 125 runs in 20 overs losing all wickets. Chris Woakes (2 for 23 runs) , Chris Jordan (2 for17) along with Adil Rashid (1-19) starred in England’s deadly attack on the Aussie batsman.
It was clear that the English batsman wanted to be on par with the English bowling performance. The openers Jason Ray & Jos Buttler were on a hurricane run putting together the highest number of runs in this world cup during the power play with 66 runs off 6 overs. After the exit of Jason Ray (22 runs), Jos Buttler continued his brilliant batting to reach the fastest 50 of this tournament (in 25 balls) by hitting a six off Zampa’s bowling. Jos Buttler went on to score 71 runs unbeaten off 32 balls. He hit 5 boundaries and 5 sixers in his innings.
The England carnage of Australia meant Australia moves down to 3rd place based on run rate and South Africa fresh after the win over Sri Lanka moves up to 2nd place. England leads Group 1 with 6 points and a very healthy run rate of 3.948.
Chris Jordan’s 3 wicket haul for 17 runs won him the player of the match award. (RZ)
[Image credit icc-cricket.com]
