2ND MATCH -- ZIMBABWE v AUSTRALIA

There was a lot of discussion in this World Cup about whether, all things being equal on winning the toss, whether it was better to bat first or second. The feeling before now had been that it was better to bat second and chase a target, but in India this was very quickly proved to be misguided because the pitches tended to play low and slow, and got lower and slower as the game progressed, making run-scoring increasingly difficult.

In this particular match, John Traicos thought long and hard before deciding to bat; he was by no means the only captain to feel uncertain at this stage of the tournament. The end result supported the new theory; in retrospect, Zimbabwe felt that had they batted first they would have been, at the least, much more competitive. By the time they batted the pitch was playing so low and slow that it was very difficult for the batsmen to get the ball moving at all. Survival was no problem, but forcing the pace was virtually impossible.

The players tend to agree that this was the hottest and most humid match of the whole tour; Eddo Brandes, who was unable to play through injury, remembers Geoff Marsh coming off the field with perspiration running off the peak of his cap, and sweat pouring through the eyeholes of Dave Houghton's boots after their stint in the field. Drinks breaks were taken every 45 minutes as a result. Zimbabwe took two early wickets, including a superb run-out by Peter Rawson to dismiss Dean Jones. The Zimbabweans were employing a seven-two field, and Jones drove powerfully towards deep mid-off; Rawson dived from cover to cut it off and threw down the stumps at the bowler's end with Jones well short of the crease.

Kevin Curran bowled with fire and had David Boon caught at the wicket. But then came a crucial miss as Malcolm Jarvis, replacing the injured Brandes, dropped a straightforward return catch off Allan Border when he had only a single to his credit. Border misjudged a slower ball and lobbed a simple return catch, which the unfortunate bowler also misjudged completely, quite taken by surprise. Jarvis says the stadium was so stunned that they could have heard a pin drop.

Border then shared in a vital partnership of 113 with opener Geoff Marsh, and the course of the match might have been very different had that catch been held. On a slow pitch the batsmen played virtually everything off the front foot and ran the ball around the ground skil-fully, Border being more the attacker while Marsh played the anchor role. Both batsmen, together with Simon O'Donnell, fell in quick succession but Steve Waugh, still very much a novice, hit a dashing 45, while Greg Dyer and Peter Taylor also scored at better than a run a ball in the dying overs of the innings. The Zimbabwean fielding was out-standing throughout, and they achieved four run-outs.

Kevin Arnott, gradually regaining full fitness, was twelfth man in this match, and he remembers that all the players had at least one complete change of clothing, including even shoes. As the players walked out on to the field, the sweat would ooze out from the eyes of their shoelaces. He remembers Andy Waller, who sweats profusely even in Zimbabwe, using three or four changes of clothes and kit in this match. Because of the humidity, the use of a twelfth man was permitted virtually at the end of each over, and Arnott was probably busier than most of the players, shuttling backwards and forwards constantly bringing on new and taking off old kit. It was a logistical exercise in itself to have each player's kit ready in the right place, and at drinks breaks everybody wanted to change.

The Australians were clearly not happy with their final score of 235. Zimbabwe had bowled well, with Curran and Traicos particularly economical. But by the time Zimbabwe came to bat, the pitch had become very difficult to score quickly on and had virtually disintegrated into dust, and many batsmen in frustration got out playing desperation strokes that were not percentage cricket.

The openers found it particularly difficult to get the score moving, with Craig McDermott bowling with fire despite an unsuitable pitch. He indulged in some 'sledging' before the batsmen even reached the wicket, and tried to bowl a few bouncers, but not even he could get the ball above knee-height. Curran and Waller hit out riskily in the middle order, Curran actually hitting three sixes through sheer power, but that type of batting could not last. Steve Waugh in particular had discovered that slow-medium 'dobbers' were almost impossible to get away, and he bowled his six overs for just seven runs, which helped to gain him a rather surprising Man of the Match award. It was small comfort when Border admitted after the match that if his team had had to bat second on that pitch they would have struggled to reach 200.

This Australian team had less individual talent than that of the previous World Cup, but a much better morale; in fact, they were to surprise most people by winning the tournament in the end. This was the start of their steady rise from recent disasters following the simultaneous retirements of most of their top players, under the captaincy of Allan Border. Border in fact was the only survivor of the team that Zimbabwe had defeated in England four years earlier.

Andy Pycroft also gives credit to Bob Simpson, whom he rates as a very astute coach who had worked out what his side needed to do and adapted the team to the conditions. Simon O'Donnell was used at times as a pinch-hitter, and the batting order was kept flexible to fit the situation. They were a young, well-knit side, very competitive but without too much unpleasantness on the field.

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