Rain brings chaos to Sixes - but home team shine
It rained, but not on Hong Kong's parade, as the hosts bagged England in style on a chaotic opening day at the Karp Group/PC Jeweller Hong Kong Sixes, where the goalposts - or stumps, rather - kept being moved by harried organisers trying to come to terms with the weather gods.
Tournament director Glyn Davies described it as entering 'virgin territory', with organisers forced to chop and change, and come up with a revised format for the tournament, which had not been affected by rain since its inception in 1992.
The changes meant matches were played on a four-overs-per-innings format, with four games completed late in the afternoon yesterday after a frustrating rain delay had robbed the event of more than six hours of play.
The groupings remain the same, but, depending on the weather today, it will either be the top-two winners in each group meeting in a cross-over semi-finals, or, if there is insufficient time, the winners of each group going straight into a Cup final. If play is interrupted by rain, there could be more changes.
'This is the first time we have been forced to change the format,' said a harassed Davies after rain had resulted in eight games in the preliminary round being unfinished.
'We are in virgin territory, and it's not been easy.'
Under the revised rules, four matches were played, with Hong Kong, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and South Africa emerging winners.
The losers - England, New Zealand, India and Australia, respectively - will have their work cut out today. Another defeat and they can kiss goodbye to their Cup chances, especially if organisers are forced to take the second option, in which group winners will meet in the final.
'Our preferred choice is to have two semi-finals, with the top two teams in each pool playing,' Davies said. 'But if we run out of time, we will have no option but to go for a Cup final between the winners of each group.'
At least he has options to play around with, for at one stage it looked as if only one match might be completed yesterday - the first game, between Hong Kong and South Africa, played on the normal five-overs-per-innings format. That was declared null and void, to make it a level playing field for all the teams.
But the disappointment of having seen a 15-run victory against South Africa consigned to the bin spurred Hong Kong to even greater heights as they chased down England's total of 60 with eight balls to spare, once the revised tournament got under way late in the afternoon.
It leaves Najeeb Amar and his men in pole. 'It was disappointing to find out that our result against South Africa didn't count,' the skipper said. 'But we have to follow the rules and we are ready for anything.'
Last year's player of the tournament, Irfan Ahmed, was the star again for Hong Kong as he made two unbeaten knocks of 34 - the first of which, against South Africa, was in vain. But the second was more than useful as England's bowlers were knocked all over the park by his big hitting, with 30 of his runs coming from hoicks over the boundary.
England had been restricted to 60 thanks to Najeeb - he took two for 10 and was on a hat-trick after clean bowling Peter Trego and Rory Hamilton-Brown - and Irfan and Munir Dar also bowling miserly overs.
'I began the day [against South Africa] a bit nervous, but once I hit my first six the confidence came back,' Irfan said. A couple of days ago, he hit an unbeaten 135, including 15 sixes, in a practice for Hong Kong against China's Asian Games squad.
Sri Lanka romped to victory over New Zealand thanks to fluent knocks from openers Jeewantha Kulatunga and Indika de Saram as they chased down 77 for victory over New Zealand. Pakistan swept to an easy 22-run win over India, while South Africa chased down Australia's 73 runs for the loss of three wickets, scrambling a single to win on the final ball.
Hong Kong face David Warner and Australia, and again the South Africans, today. Win and they will be in the semi-finals, or even the final - if there are any more rain delays.
Irfan said: 'We are up against the top names in world cricket and every game is a final for us.'
Perhaps this is the best way to approach this truncated tournament, apart from donning wetsuits.
