 West Indies played South Africa in the first Test match of the series and were
no match to the all-round strength of the tourists. The game, that was played
in Trinidad, saw the South Africans win the toss and elect to bat first, but lose
half their side for 100.
It was only in the second half of the innings that they got to 352, thanks
mainly due to the half centuries by AB de Villiers, Ashwell Prince, and Mark Boucher, all of whom played nice little innings.
In reply, the West Indian side lost six wickets for six runs and capitulated
to 102 all out and gave the opposition a lead of 250 runs. Instead of asking
them to follow on the South African side batted again and set the West Indian
side a target of 457 for a win.
The West Indian side batted a little better this time around and were still
bowled out for 293 in the 81st over of the innings.
The Indians took on Zimbabwe in the first and the second T20I at Harare,
and ran away easy winners in both the games. On both the occasions, the Indians
won the toss, and decided to field first and there was no looking back after
that.
In the first game, the Zimbabweans ended on 111 in their 20 overs, and that
was achieved rather easily by India in 15 overs. Yusuf Pathan was the
star of the game with a 37 to his name and he went on to win the man of the
match award again.
In the second game, the Zimbabweans, batting first again, got off to a very
bad start, as they did not even get to 50 in the ten overs. However, they batted
well in the second half of the innings to get to 140/5 in the 20 overs.
In reply, India lost Naman Ojha early, but Murali Vijay's 46 and later,
Suresh Raina's 72 won the India the game with a couple of overs and seven wickets
in hand. Raina not only won the man of the match award but also won the man
of the series for the way he played.
In another Test match at Old Trafford, England emerged easy winners against Bangladesh, who collapsed rather badly after a Tamim Iqbal century.
Next week, the Asia Cup begins, and will also see Australia begin their
tour of England with a game against Ireland.
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