World Cup 2019: 4 moments that made it one of the best tournaments ever
Everyone expected the 2019 World Cup to be dominated by the bat. But Indian captain Virat Kohli in the pre-tournament press meet stated that the latter part of the tournament would have a lot of low scoring affairs and his prediction was vindicated. While the first half of the tournament was filled with 300+ scores, the second half was more competitive with the pitches slowing down. This gave rise to a lot of interesting matchups and unexpected results. The race for the semi final berths was interesting as every team in the top 7 had a chance to make it to the top 4 on the points table.
This was possible due to the surprising defeats of the West Indies and South Africa against Bangladesh. Even England who were comfortably placed in the first half was in a do or die position as they lost against Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Unlike other World Cups, this tournament had 10 teams in which every team had to play the other in the league stage. This not only opened up opportunities for the lower-ranked teams but ensured that the tournament was a treat to the fans. Apart from all this, there are moments in every World Cup that you can’t forget. Even this World Cup was full of such moments. Let us take a look at 4 moments that made it arguably the best cricket tournament ever.
#1 Brathwaite vs New Zealand:
The packed crowd at Old Trafford witnessed a close finish as New Zealand escaped a defeat against the West Indies in a league stage match. It was going one way when West Indies lost four wickets with 150 runs to get. To add salt to the wounds, they lost three more wickets with Carlos Brathwaite at the other end. The remaining players to follow were all tail-enders which meant that Brathwaite had an uphill task in his hand. Yet, everyone knew that he had the ability to take his team home.
He built partnerships with his bowlers to take the total to 245 with just a wicket remaining. He took much of the strike and dominated the 10th wicket stand with 41 runs but that wasn’t enough, unfortunately. With 33 needed in the last three, Carlos smacked Matt Henry for 25 runs bringing the equation to just 8 runs off the last two overs. Brathwaite wanted to finish it off quickly but fate had different plans as he pulled one towards long-on that fell short by a couple of inches into Boult’s safe hands. Brathwaite, who had completed his century, was in total disbelief as the team lost by 5 runs.