“The Oval” ground at Surrey is often a track for those batting, but with big boundaries in some directions its not always the easiest place to score big. Yesterday though, Surrey smashed the world first class one day record for a limited overs game. They scored a massive 496-4, with Ali Brown the main run scorer with 176 runs from just 97 balls!

Its quite difficult to put into words quite how difficult this is, especially against a first class county. I’m part of a club where we managed to score 514 in a limited overs game last year, but the ground was pretty small and the opposition didn’t consist of a full complement of players either! So how did they get to this total?! I would like to have seen this feat, why did Sky have to choose to go to Somerset instead?!  Rikki Clarke chipped in after Brown and Benning had hit centuries, by smacking 82 runs from just 28 balls! Must have been some batting track!

Congrats to Surrey, and I’ll be looking out for any more big scores coming from London!

In pure darkness, in a bit of a farce, Australia deservedly lifted the World Cup last night thanks to a magnificent innings from Adam Gilchrist. The best team of the World Cup won, although not quite in the way that cricket lovers around the world would have hoped.

The day started badly with a bit of dodgy weather around meaning the start of the game was delayed and delayed, and when they got round to agreeing a start time the game was to be 38 overs each. Not perfect when this is the final of the premier one day competition, but at least both sides knew the score from the beginning. Adam Gilchrist hasn’t had the best of tournaments (by his standards), but he set upon Vaas early on and was delight to watch. His eventual score of 149 had really set up the Australian total, and it was always going to be tough for Sri Lanka from there.

Sangakarra and Jayasuriya started slowly, but once they felt the pace of the pitch they started to release themselves, and a real contest looked like it was on. Just what the World Cup wanted in a final! But a couple of wickets from Aus, then a bit of rain lost any momentum that the Sri Lankans had. Then we had the start of the farcical events.. Sri Lanka came back onto the field after a rain break, and they may have known, but no-one else knew what total they were now chasing after losing a couple of overs! By this point it was close to all over anyway, and then a couple more wickets meant it was a matter of time before the game was over.

Cue the really farcical events.. The light was offered to the batsmen, who accepted it with three overs left and knowing they had no chance of winning. The Aussies celebrated, the Sri Lankan’s had accepted it was over, but the umpires read the rules their way and said they would all have to come back the next day for the final three overs! They wouldn’t though, as the duckworth lewis method would have been enforced, but the umpires were having none of it. So we had three overs of Australia bowling spin, and Sri Lanka just standing there in the dark hitting the ball back to the bowler. Completely farcical, and I’m sure there will be some ramifications.

However, for me it doesn’t take away from Australia’s achievement of winning another World Cup, and in completely dominant fashion. They beat all comers, look strong in every department and I find it hard to believe we beat them in the CB series earlier in the year! They had Hayden to thank for scoring a shed load of runs, Gilly for the MOM performance in the final, Tait coming to the party and bowling well, and of course to the leading wicket taker in the cup, Glenn McGrath. He now retires from cricket, and as one of the very best bowlers there has ever been.

I’ll take a couple of days to reflect on the cup before I pick my best XI, as there’s been a lot of good performances over the long long period of the cup! And for now, time to move onto domestic cricket and the English summer of test cricket as well!

The World Cup semi finals are upon us, with four teams all capable of winning the cup, if they play to their best.

The first semi final sees the potentially exciting game which looks like it could go either way between Sri Lanka and New Zealand. I can’t really pick a winner in this game, with both sides having match winners – but it depends which ones of them are fit and turn up. For Sri Lanka there is of course Murali and Vaas with the ball, and they are hoping to have Malinga back as well after missing the last four games. With the bat they need Jayasuriya to get them off to a good start as he can be explosive in the power plays. New Zealand are hoping to be back to full strength also with Bond and Oram returning, and they need Bond in particular to try and restrict the score in those early powerplays. The top order for New Zealand hasn’t really got going yet, but Styris has been a revelation with bat and ball, and he could continue to do just that. Which way will it go and which match winner will it be? I can’t say, but it should be good viewing!

The second semi final between South Africa and Australia looks to be more clear cut, but it can be dangerous to say that too early. These two played each other earlier in the tournament and the result could have been closer if South Africa didn’t collapse like they did in that game! I think if they bat first they can cause Australia a problem if they score a total in the mid 300’s, but if they are asked to chase such a total then I wouldn’t be so confident. Overall though, the Australians are a stronger side throughout and I see them going through to the final.

It’s taken a while to get to this period of the World Cup, but I’m looking forward to the final three games and seeing someone lift that Cup on Saturday!

A couple of big bits of news came out from the World Cup arena yesterday – the first was the expected news that Fletcher is leaving his post as England coach, and the second was that Lara has retired from all international cricket.

Fletcher’s position had become pretty untenable after the ashes whitewash and poor performance from England generally over the last year or so. Fletcher has done lots of good things we all know that, but 7 years in the job is long enough and there needs to be a fresh impetus. When Fletcher took over we were ranked the worst test nation, and to get us up to 2nd is a great achievement, but you must start to run out of fresh things to say to a team to attempt to motivate them. Also, our one day cricket has not improved one bit, and as an England coach you have to get both forms of the game right. We’re a fickle bunch in the UK, but we do demand a fair bit of success. Just look how long England football managers get before the media get on their back, and thats the kind of thing you’re dealing with in England.

We are expected to put Peter Moores in charge temporarily in the next couple of days, and he’s a highly rated coach so it will be good to see what he can do for the test series against the West Indies.

Moving onto Brian Lara, he’d already announced that he was quitting one day cricket, but now he has said he is quitting the test arena as well. This is a real shame as he is a great batsman, and one I was hoping I’d get to see play in the test series over here next month. He scored just under 12,000 test match runs which is a true testament to the staying power he had at a time that West Indies cricket wasn’t at its strongest. He held the world record for the highest test match score twice, and at 400 not out the current record will be difficult to beat. The West Indies will find it hard to replace a man with such a record, but there are a few players coming through for them at the moment and it is a good chance for them to stand up to the challenge and make the spot their own.

Well, what can you say after a dismal, embarrassing defeat such as the one England suffered yesterday at the hands of South Africa? The answer to that I’m not sure to be honest. We won’t be in the semi-finals, but then we never even looked close to deserving to be there. In the last FOUR world cups, we have beaten one, just ONE, major country – yet blind optimism helps us fans through normally.

All that has gone, after the debacle of the defeat in Australia on Australia Day when the game was over within a couple of hours, and now the pathetic showing in the world cup. What to do though is now the question. And to be honest, I agree with much of what Aggers says on the BBC blog. We need a new one day captain, one that can command a position in the team other than as specialist captain. Send Vaughan back to Yorkshire to put in some big time in the middle, as he clearly can’t put an innings together at the moment. And I hope it happens before the test series against the West Indies, as I’d like him to lead from the front as captain in that series.

Fletcher has done some good stuff, but I’m sick of hearing from him, and Vaughan to the same extent, saying how everything is alright. It clearly isn’t, no matter how much you say you’ll learn and come back stronger etc etc. I don’t know who the answer is as coach, whether its someone from the county circuit, or whether you could entice someone such as Tom Moody from the Sri Lanka position. Its not for me to decide, I just want something done, otherwise it looks like we are tolerating failure, and we’ve had enough of that…

With the county cricket pre-season friendlies on at the moment, and the first county championship games starting this week, it seems a good time to take a look at the runners and riders for this season.

And instead of having to do all the research and write it all up, I’ve been looking around for a preview which sums it up best, and I think that the one that fits the bill is at Sky Sports. It is listed by county, so it can take a while to read it all, but it cuts the right balance showing enough useful information without going into overload.

As you’ll see when you read it all, there are some good players coming over this year as overseas players, and seeing people such as Shane Warne play all year will be fantastic. The fact that the Rose Bowl is the closest first class ground to me makes it all the better! There are also some controversial signings, mainly those coming in as Kolpak players. Jacques Rudolph playing up at Yorkshire is one of these, and there are also people such as Saqlain Mushtaq who is playing for Sussex from May time after he gains a British passport I believe. The rights and wrongs of this kind of player are probably for another debate and blog posting though at some point in the season!

The first one-day competition of the season will be the Friends Provident Trophy, a 50 over affair attempting to replicate International Cricket. One difference this year though is the ability of the fielding side to be able to argue an umpire’s decision, which will see the decision referred to the third umpire. I’m not too sure on this as I’m wondering where will it all end? Will batsmen be able to appeal when they’ve been given out they think wrongly? I suppose in my thinking “It’s just not cricket”.

The middle of the season will see the ever successful twenty20 competition again, and will Leicestershire be able to retain their title? I’m a big fan of this competition, and enjoy coming in of a summer evening to watch it on Sky Sports, so lets hope it continues in the way it has in recent seasons.

The Telegraph Fantasy Cricket season also kicks off this week, when you can start to register. Seeing as I won the mini-league I was in last year I’ll definitely be entering this again! Enter from Wednesday at Telegraph Fantasy Cricket. I may give out my super tips once I’ve seen the list of players but it may give my competitors an advantage so I may keep it close to my chest!

Hopefully that has given you everything you need to enjoy the county cricket 2007 season, if you know anything else of interest please leave me a comment!