adminNELSON. — Zimbabwe captain Elton Chigumbura says his men will enter their match against UAE, which got underway at midnight, with some confidence after their encouraging performance against South Africa. However, Chigumbura said Zimbabwe would not make the mistake of under-estimating UAE, who are playing in their first World Cup game since 1996.
Zimbabwe’s tournament began in fine style as they reduced South Africa to 83 for 4 in Hamilton on Sunday, and even later in the innings when the score was 228 for 4 after 44 overs Zimbabwe were still well in contention.
Then came a remarkable finish in which JP Duminy and David Miller mauled Zimbabwe’s seamers and took 111 from the final six overs.
Set 340 for victory, Zimbabwe’s top order performed admirably and while the required run-rate was ultimately too great a challenge, they reached 277 before being bowled out in the 49th over.
Given South Africa are among the strongest favourites to win the tournament, Chigumbura said the feeling in the Zimbabwe camp after the game was a mixture of positives and negatives.
“It was a bit of both, a confidence boost the way we played, and obviously it’s always disappointing to play the way we did for 90 overs but we didn’t manage to finish off the last ten overs,” Chigumbura said.
“We took a lot out of the game we played and hopefully we can carry on with that form.”
One of Zimbabwe’s key men in this tournament will be Hamilton Masakadza, whose 80 from 74 balls against South Africa followed an unbeaten 117 in the warm-up win over Sri Lanka in Lincoln.
However, there were other contributions in the South Africa game — Chamu Chibhabha made 64 and Brendan Taylor scored 40 — and Chigumbura said it was important the batting workload was spread.
“He’s leading from the front as a senior batter in the team and it’s rubbing off to the rest of the players,” Chigumbura said of Masakadza.” — Cricinfo.
Online Reporter