England 287-8 of their 50 overs. At the moment, as I type, Jon lewis has dismissed K Tucker for 2 runs leaving on 24-4. They bowled wel to start bermuda, but they just don't have what it takes to finish off the middle order quick enough. K Pieterson aout for 46, typical pieterson, makes a start and goes out. Him and Collingwood were both dismissed by a 20 stone policeman, sounds bad? Well he can bowl a mean off-spin, like panesar. Leverick is the name and hes batting now.

Good 76 from Dalrymple but apart from bell and pieterson, who put in about 93 between them, England really haven't had any other contributers. They seem to be leaving it to the bowlers to do the work. Anderson has 2 wickets and Mahmood and Lewis took 1 each.

I hope for a better batting performance from the openers against Australia next, but as long as we can put a decent knock, say 250-300, we can always bowl well and get them out. But this is the Aussies, and i would rather we bowled well than chased, they don't look so hot at the moment.

How the other games going? Oh, and this message took a while to type and Lewis just got Leverick out lbw, they are 28-5, ripping through them now, but we can see the difference class. Bowling them out for under 50 will do us a world of good.

Hmm, all typed at the same time 'ey? Well, what I can say about the captaincy? We beat Aussies and NZ without Vaughan, but with Bermuda 32-5 (Yes, Mahmood with a long hop, gone for 4) All I can say is, he proved himself. I think Strauss was a better captain than Freddie, but the selecters gone with him and all I can say is good luck. Joyce should be rested for the aussies clash, give Strauss a chance to show. Maybe a good 40-60 runs for him will put his confidence up.

Woah, Lewis just made it 32-6, bowled Mukedden after he leaves it and misjudges the bounce. Turning embaressing for Bermuda, will they even make 50 runs?

Not so sure about that at the moment, Moss. Ireland are 97-4 from 29 overs, and if we can work on the usual rule of thumb that half the runs come in the last 20 overs, Ireland are within reach of turning over the world's number one one-day outfit.

I'm sure you're right about Scotland not getting close to Sri Lanka, and Bermuda failed to trouble England at all by being bowled out for 45 runs in 22.2 overs.

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Money won't buy you friends. But it gets you a better class of enemy.
Spike Milligan

Ireland were 134 for 4 at one stage with 12 overs to go, but Hall came to the rescue again with the ball. The Guiness guys are now 149/8 with 6 overs left.

I didn't watch the game...but looking at the scorecard...Hall again put his hand up high...on both fronts...

If we didn''t have 11 players that can sort of wield of bat...SA would have had half that score.

Though it looks like Langeveldt and Hall both did well at the death...which is is why they there...
And the veteran Telemachus took very little tap...I'm finding it hard to fit Nel into the 11..he can get wickets but he can get hit silly too.

Why didn't Ireland complete 50 overs ...rain??

Its a good thing that they got a nice wake up call from a minnow...

No. They were all out.

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Money won't buy you friends. But it gets you a better class of enemy.
Spike Milligan

South Africa manage to escape by 35 runs.Ireland had their chance at 138-4 but crumbled from then on.England on the other hand piled up 286 and then bowled out Bermuda for just 45.And in the third warm-up match,West Indies won but not before recieving a shock from Kenya.West Indies scored 268 and was home by 21 runs as Kenya batted out the 50 overs scoring 247-7.

The warm-up games for today are Australia vs Zimbabwe,Bangladesh vs New Zealand,Canada vs Pakistan and India vs The Netherlands.

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Karthik Venkatesan

Three clear mis-matches there by the look of it. India v The Netherlands might turn into something of a game though.

__________________
Money won't buy you friends. But it gets you a better class of enemy.
Spike Milligan

Did Kenya look a good outfit?I missed the matches (they don't seem to be televised? or on radio?)

How many players per side were there? I count 13? for sa v ireland? is this cricket they're playing or rugby?

there is nothing like a warm up match is there?

India did well to reach 300 - even against Holland. The 'multipurpose' ground in Jamaica looked as though it was just that; the wicket might have been imported from the Kalahari Desert with its uneven bounce. But at least most of the players got their eye in.

For Kiwi fans, the disappointment of the smallish total against Bangladesh was compensated by the assurance that Oram was back. He did well to score 88 with a recently broken finger.