When Graeme Smith fell early we thought West Indies (WI) could win this one. At 32/1 after 10, it still looked promising for WI.
Then began the Kallis act. This was followed by the A B de Villiers act, the Boucher act and the Gibbs act. South Africa eventually reached 356/4.
The rediff.com expert didn't think WI could score more than 240. The pressure index (PI) opened at 171.
The openers Chanderpaul and Gayle had no clue how to start this mammoth chase; Chanderpaul chose the easy way out by lofting Pollock to Smith.
Suddenly Devon Smith turned up from nowhere and started batting exactly the way Chanderpaul should have. Gayle too briefly joined the party and at 61/1 after 10 overs, and a PI of 154, West Indies still hadn't completely lost it.
Then Smith got a little carried away, Gayle was run out and it was 69/3 with a PI of 167. Lara and Sarwan lingered awhile to show what they were capable of; but then Lara fell at 119. As he walked back one sensed that the great man had had enough.
Sarwan, and then Powell, hit many lusty boundaries. But this merely confirmed that West Indies are, at best, really attractive losers.
Sunil T and Sunil Patil of Cranes Software created this pressure map based on the details retrieved from the Rediff scorer.
