Under-19 World Cup

The Under-19 World Cup gets under way in just over a week. I know it probably doesn't even register on most peoples cricket calenders but since I'm being starved of decent cricket this season, I intend to watch as much as possible.


All the usual teams are playing: Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India, Pakistan, England, Sri Lanka, West Indies, Bangladesh, Zimbabwe plus world powerhouses Canada, Afganistan, Hong Kong, Papua New Guinea, Ireland, Unites States of America.

As far as favourites go, Australia has to be rated highly, along with the usual strong teams of India, Pakistan, South Africa.
     Apparently Hong Kong is a team to watch out for to cause an upset with some HUGE hitters in their team who played in the Hong Kong 6's tournament.

West Indies defeated Northern Districts A in a warm up game I heard.  Windies U19 will put on a decent show - Kraigg Braithwaite is another Chanderpaul, you'll have to work for his wicket and Akeem Dewar is a good leggie, when he gets them to land, they land well with dip and a bit of drift and there's some other promising batsmen.

Star Cricket is showing it here. Not sure who else is

I am not too sure matey - haven't checked the program guide yet. Guess they will show selected matches like they did last time round.

Edited by zuhair_abbasi - 08 January 2010 at 12:55pm

Yes they do. But it is never a fair contest for the other teams as most of the Pakistan, India and BD teams consist of over age players.

I'm looking through the NZ squad and there's not really anyone who stands out. Our bowling attack is much, much weaker than last year, while our batting is a little stronger. I guess the names to look out for are Corey Anderson, Craig Cachopa, Tom Latham and Harry Boam.

Corey won the national fast bowling comp as a 16 year old but he is turning into more of a big hitting batsman who bowls medium fast. Cachopa is an aggressive batsman, who often scores 50s, also team captain. Latham is a solid opening bat who likes to play his shots but is mature and knuckles down when it's required, and Boam is a solid middle order batsman who bowls very useful medium pace.

Originally posted by Rough1 I watched the first two warm up games against Pakistan in Blenheim.Other names from NZ team apart from those Nz fast said are Ben Wheeler a good left arm bowler and Bevan Small who gave a few of the Pakistanis a hurry up.From Pakistan Usman Qadir(Son of Abdul) was an outstanding left arm spin bowler & Ahmad Shahzad seems to have so much time to play the ball.It was great to have cricket of this quality in Blenheim.

I have heard a lot about Usman Qadir, even Zuhair has said that he is a terrific talent. Still very young, I have never seen him play but surely I'll try to watch a bit of him in the U-19 WC.

Shahzad has also been in the news and we'll have to wait and see if he can grab the openers slot in the future.

It'll be grat for NZL if they can find a genuine fast bowler to replace Bond (in Tst matches) at the moment what they really need is a couple of decent pace bowlers.

Not great weather in the lead up to tomorrows games in Christchurch/Lincoln. Constant drizzle with some heavy rain at times since 1pm today. They have brought in super-soppers to absorb the outfield water and the bowlers run ups had covers on them so there is a reasonable chance of starting on time.

India vs Afghanistan and Zimbabwe vs Canada may not be the most mouth watering but I welcome any cricket right now.

Good match but the usual suspects won all the games. I saw the India Afghan game - I did not find the Indian team as strong as they traditionally have had.

So, my lads being 100 in about 10 overs ended up being all out for 250 odd.  Braithwaite got 93 not out, this kid is going to reach places, he has no intentions at all to get out.

for his good - hope he settles in UK - so the Proteas wont be complaining that all of England players are Safricans.

Watched the first couple of hours of the NZ game today, have to say, to the naked eye the NZ seamers were the quickest I've seen out of the four teams I've seen bowl (India, NZ, Canada, Zimbabwe). But it certainly looks as if it will be our batting that saves us this tournament. 

Seriously excited by the talent England have out at the WC, Joe Root, Chris Dent and James Vince look like they all have great potential as batsmen and with the ball Nathan Buck looks very good, he is already bowling at 83-84mph and once he puts on a bit more muscle i think he could operate around 90mph, will be keeping my eye on him in the next county season to see if he can break into the Leicestershire team. Also the two spinners Azeem Rafiq and Danny Briggs look like promising spinners. I don't think our England U19 side has even been as exciting as this, now go with this World Cup now i have bigged you up.

England is going great against India

I watched most of the England vs India game. I have to agree that Buck looks a good prospect, he was definitely the best England seamer on display. The way Stokes batted, something very Luke Wright about it, and the comparison doesn't stop there with him also bowling tidy mediums. Ball looked a handy bowler too. I thought Rafiq looked a fairly stock standard spinner, bit of dip, bit of turn, quite accurate, but nothing to raise an eyebrow about.