Irish eyes are smiling, again

ON THE BOUNDARY with Tony Becca

The International Cricket Council (ICC) Cricket World Cup is off and running, and despite the presence of the game's most savage batsmen and its most lethal bowlers, the presence of the most celebrated players and the most powerful countries, the first two weeks of action belonged to an unknown batsman and to a team which is gradually building a reputation as the giant-killer.

Three days after England battled India to the bitter end to earn a tie in Bangaluru (Bangalore of previous years), Kevin O'Brien and Ireland went to Bangaluru, took on England - one of the early favourites to win the Cup - and much to the surprise of all and sundry, with the exception of the Irish and to the embarrassment of England, beat them good and proper.

Winning the toss and electing to bat, England posted 327 for eight and looked all over the winners right down to near the end, or at least when the scoreboard read - zero for one after one delivery and 111 for five after 24.2 overs.

That was when O'Brien, batting at number six and entering the action at 106 for four, was joined by Alex Cusack (who hit 47 off 58 deliveries) and together they smashed the best of England's bowlers and carried Ireland to victory with five deliveries to spare.

Fairy-tale partnership

In a fairy-tale partnership the pair, batting as neither batsman had ever batted in his life, added 162 runs off 17.1 overs before Cusack was run out at 273 for six. O'Brien was later run out at 317 for seven.

In winning the match, Ireland scored the last 218 runs for the loss of two wickets, both by the run out route, off 24.5 overs.

The Man of the Match, undoubtedly so, was O'Brien.

Batting in a tournament in which batsmen such as Clive Lloyd, Viv Richards, Virender Sehwag and Chris Gayle have paraded their skills - their awesome hitting and scoring rate - O'Brien out-performed them all.

O'Brien's score was 113, he faced 63 deliveries and hit 13 fours and nine sixes. More importantly, he got to his century in a World Cup record 50 deliveries - 16 deliveries fewer than Australia's Matthew Hayden - while scoring a century against South Africa off 66 deliveries in 2007; and John Davison of Canada - while scoring his century against the West Indies off 67 deliveries in 2003.

Zimbabwe beat Australia in 1983, Kenya defeated the West Indies in 1996, Zimbabwe beat India in 1999, Zimbabwe defeated South Africa in 1999 and Bangladesh defeated India in 2007. None of those results, however, including Ireland over Pakistan at Sabina Park in 2007, compare with Ireland's victory over England.

They cannot compare because Ireland, an Associate member of the ICC, were not supposed to possess a batting line-up, to have a batsman with the quality to chase down such a huge score against a quality bowling attack.

England had been playing well, and on top of that, England were just coming off an impressive performance against India, another of the favourites for the title.

In the tied match, India, after reaching 305 for three, lost seven wickets for 33 runs in four overs, the last five for 11, and were dismissed for 338. England, after jumping to 281 for two, lost Ian Bell, 69, and Andrew Strauss, 158, in successive deliveries and were 325 for eight when the final over started.

So far, this World Cup is heading to be the best ever, at least in terms of the action.

Nineteen matches had been played at the time of writing, and despite Kenya's paltry 69 in the second match in an innings which lasted a mere 23.5 overs, and Bangladesh's 58 in 18.4 overs, there have been some huge scores, including India's 370 for four versus Bangladesh, South Africa's 351 for five against The Netherlands, India's 338 and England 338 for eight against each other, Sri Lanka's 332 for seven against Canada, and the West Indies' 330 for eight against The Netherlands.

Tight finishes

There have been a few tight finishes, including Pakistan's victory over Sri Lanka, with the scores reading 277 for seven and 266 for nine.

There have also been some fine individual performances.

Apart from the impressive bowling of South Africa's Pakistani right-arm leg-spinner Imran Tahir, there were some splendid offerings, including an innings of 119 off 100 deliveries by Ryan ten Doeschate for The Netherlands versus England, Tendulkar's 120 off 115 deliveries and Andrew Strauss' 159 off 148 deliveries in the tied match, Kieron Pollard's 60 off 27 deliveries versus The Netherlands, fast bowler Kemar Roach's six for 27 - including a hat-trick - also against The Netherlands, and fast bowler Lasith Malinga's six for 38, including a hat-trick, against Kenya.

It was his second hat-trick in the World Cup and, like Roach, he bowled fast and accurately.

Of his six victims, Roach had one batsman caught at slip, two lbw and three bowled; and in his first appearance in this year's action, Malinga trapped two batsmen lbw and bowled four.

Exciting cricket

After some two weeks of action, it has been cricket, lovely cricket, with exciting batting, steady and sometimes accurate bowling, with the exception of England, mostly brilliant fielding and two memorable results - one a tie and one in which the unexpected happened.

Despite that surprise, however, Australia, Pakistan, New Zealand and Sri Lanka form Group A; India, South Africa, England, even after the ambush, and the West Indies from Group B, are expected to go through to the quarter-finals and the do-or-die stage of the competition.

Seven of those teams were expected to go through with the last place expected to be a fight between the West Indies and Bangladesh. After losing easily to South Africa in their opening match, however, the West Indies bounced back to maul The Netherlands with 18.1 overs to spare, to beat Bangladesh with nine wickets in hand, and although they have England and India still to play, with four points in the bag, with Ireland to play, barring another upset, they appear headed for the quarter-finals.

The match between Bangladesh, ranked No.8 in one-day internationals, and the West Indies, ranked No.9, was expected, by many, to be close.

It was far from that, it was like taking candy from a baby, as after winning the toss and choosing to bat first, Bangladesh, all 11 of them, batted for 90 minutes and 18.4 overs. The entire entire match lasted for two hours and 14 minutes, less than one session in a Test match, and for 31.1 overs.