Any lingering hopes of World Cup glory that England and the Barmy Army may still have had were shot to pieces by the combination of a pathetic show by their batsmen and an outstanding all-round performance from a rampant South Africa side in Barbados.

The match, played at the Kensington Oval on 17th April, 2007, proved to be woefully one-sided. The Proteas cruised to a nine-wicket triumph with more than 30 overs remaining and a humiliated England side limped out of the tournament.

South Africa's decisive victory set up a probable semi-final between themselves and Australia, the two top-ranked sides in the world, in St Lucia on 25th April, 2007. Australia's batsmen will not be looking forward to facing the Proteas' ace bowler Andrew Hall.

Hall was all over the England batsmen, claiming five wickets for 18 runs and ridiculing the bullish comments made by spokesmen for their opponents in the run-up to the game. England were hopelessly outclassed and look to be almost clueless about what is needed to succeed in one-day cricket.

Unlike all the other leading sides in the tournament, England have consistently played steadily at the start of their innings in order to preserve wickets. Having won the toss, their opening partnership of Ian Bell (7) and Michael Vaughan (17) stuttered and spluttered to a paltry score of nine in the first seven overs.

Vaughan, the team captain, who has had a woeful tournament, took 20 deliveries to get off the mark, forcing Bell to do all the hard work. Bell was caught by Ashwell Prince, off Charl Langeveldt and was followed five overs later by Vaughan, who was given out lbw to Andre Nel's second delivery.

Kevin Pietersen, the lone star among England's top-order batsman throughout the tournament, was next to walk, having been caught by Graeme Smith, off Nel for three. If it had not been for a stubborn 58-run stand between Andrew Strauss (46) and Paul Collingwood (30), England may have struggled to amass even a century of runs.

In a devastating assault on the England wicket, Hall then removed four batsmen in nine deliveries. The upwardly mobile Ravi Bopara put on an unbeaten 27 but England's final tally of 154 was never going to be enough to worry the Proteas.

South Africa captain Graeme Smith shared an outstanding opening stand of 85 in less than 10 overs with AB de Villiers. This ended when de Villiers was caught by Paul Nixon, off Andrew Flintoff for 42. 

Smith blasted an unbeaten 89 off only 59 balls, including 13 fours, while Jacques Kallis's seventeen not out carried the Proteas smoothly to their final score of 157-1. Afterwards there were calls for England coach Duncan Fletcher and skipper Vaughan to resign.

Article by Julian Armfield, BBC World Service Sport, reporting for Totally Barbados 

Article Posted On:
April 20th, 2007

http://www.totallybarbados.com/barbados/Entertainment/Sports/Cricket/