da stake casino： A career-best score and a brilliant runout by Melissa Reynard saw the Englandwomen’s team to a 20-run victory in a low scoring match against South Africaat Chelmsford yesterday
da wazamba： Rick Eyre21-Jun-2000A career-best score and a brilliant runout by Melissa Reynard saw the Englandwomen’s team to a 20-run victory in a low scoring match against South Africaat Chelmsford yesterday.England’s win in the opening game of the five-match one-day internationalseries was their first in an ODI since July 11 last year against India andtheir second since the World Cup quarter-final against Sri Lanka on December21, 1997. Unfortunately they also lost 17 in the same period.Yesterday’s clash was, on the whole, an unimpressive display by the majorityof batsmen on both sides, and it was the superior fielding of the Englishwhich made the difference.Reynard, newly appointed as England vice-captain, was named player of thematch for her 54-ball 46 late in the England innings and her direct-hitrunout of Helen Davies, but went wicketless in the role she is selected for,that as left-arm nedium-pace change bowler.England captain Clare Connor won the toss and elected to bat underthreatening skies yesterday morning. Her decision to drop herself down theorder appeared to backfire with the early loss of openers Charlotte Edwards(2) and Claire Taylor (9), both falling to Yulandi van der Merwe. Her newball partner, off-spinner Kerri Laing, removed 18 year-old debutante ArranThompson, who played an audacious shot to be dismissed, charging down thepitch, missing the ball, and being stumped by wicketkeeper Daleen Terblanche.With the score at 39 for 3, and play reduced to 44 overs a side following a114-minute (less lunch) rain delay, Clare Connor came to the crease and wasduly trapped plumb lbw first ball. Since taking over the England captaincymidway through the disastrous Antipodean tour earlier this year, Connor hasscored 27 ODI runs at 4.50 – a figure that has probably not escaped thenotice of fans of the now-discarded Karen Smithies.Jane Cassar survived the hat-trick ball, and built a fine partnership withBarbara Daniels, who was the dominant figure in the early overs of theEngland innings. She was one run short of her fifty, however, when LevoniaLewis’ first ball of the match saw the England number three drawn forward andstruck on the pad, out leg before wicket. Daniels’ 49 had come from 89deliveries, in which she struck five boundaries.The run out of Kathryn Leng without scoring saw Reynard come to the crease at83 for 6. She brought some much-needed aggression into the England batting.Reynard and Cassar scored at the high rate of four an over before Cassar (26)was run out, taking off from the bowlers end for a single that was not there.Reynard took advantage of some poor outfielding as England built a score thatgained at least some respectability. One over from Levonia Lewis saw fourteenruns and two dropped catches. Reynard was in sight of her first internationalhalf-century when the last two wickets fell in an eventful 44th over. ClareTaylor (not Claire who batted earlier) was run out attempting a foolishsecond run after Lewis dropped a caught-and-bowled from the previous ball.Bereft of the strike, Reynard could only watch as Lucy Pearson smashed astraight drive back into the hands of Lewis to go for a second-ball duck.England were dismissed for 159 after it looked at one time that they maystruggle to get past 100. Kerry Laing had the best of the South Africanbowling figures, with 2/12 from nine overs.The Duckworth-Lewis calculations were applied to determine the South Africantarget following the earlier rain interruption, when England were 26 for 2after 12.2 overs. As it turned out, the revised target was unchanged at 160.South Africa, making their first full international appearance since February17, 1999, started their chase badly, Kerrie Laing suffering the unusualindignity of being caught by Claire Taylor at slip off the bowling of ClareTaylor. Three runouts saw South Africa at 44 for 4 in the 21st over, thebest of them coming when Melissa Reynard threw down the stumps from fine legto remove Helen Davies. All three runouts could be put down to poor runningbetween wickets.South Africa were down to 46 for 5 when Terblanche took a swing and a miss tobe stumped by her opposite number Cassar off Clare Connor’s bowling. At theother end, Linda Olivier, who had an accomplice to each of the three runouts,scored her 20th run from the 75th ball she faced in the innings. This,however, represented an acceleration in scoring after taking 49 balls toreach double figures.The departure of Denise Reid (6), attempting unsuccessfully to hoist DawnHolden over Clare Connor at deep mid-on, brought the score to 62 for 6.Sunnette Viljoen, who turned seventeen just eleven days ago, joined Olivierand the pair took a liking to the leg-spin bowling of Kathryn Leng. Olivierbrought up her half-century from 117 deliveries (four fours). Dropped nextball by Arran Thompson, she departed soon after on 52, chipping a ball fromLucy Pearson straight to Charlotte Edwards.The seventh-wicket partnership between Olivier and Viljoen, one player twicethe age of the other, yielded 50 runs in 12 overs – not enough to stem amounting required run-rate. South Africa were still 21 short of the victorytarget when Viljoen snicked the last ball of the match to Cassar to be theninth batsman out. Her 37 from 51 deliveries included just two boundaries,and she will be a player to watch, both in the remainder of this series andin the World Cup later this year.For England, Leng, though expensive, was the most successful bowler (2/36from seven overs), while Clare Taylor took 1/14 from her nine overs.The next meeting of these two teams will be at Trent Bridge on Thursday. IfSouth Africa can sharpen their fielding and their running between wickets,they can show that will threaten England more often in this series.
