Eoin Morgan’s Whirlwind knock – a Treat to Watch at the ICC World Cup 2019
Jun 20, 2019 at 10:59 AM
In an amazing game on Tuesday night, June 18, England scored the tournament’s best scores till now. England’s skipper Eoin Morgan took an onus on himself to go around and play with the Afghanistan spinners. Morgan played his own best game even with a sprain in his back, before defeating Afghans at the ICC World Cup 2019.
The Irish-born English cricketer Morgan rampaged the opponents with his lightning sixathon, surprising even himself. The audience saw a bewitching total of 25 sixes and 21 fours hit by the English men across the ground.
Whereas, the Middlesex player went a bit harsh on the Afghanistan spinners hitting a record 17 sixes across the ground. He outdid his own performance in the game by a scintillating knock.
The England skipper hits the most-ever sixes in ODI cricket
Morgan surpassed the previous records by India’s Rohit Sharma, West Indies’ Chris Gayle and South African AB de Villiers, in an audacious display of ball-striking at the Old Trafford. He accumulated a stunning knock of 148 runs off just 71 balls at an impeccable strike rate of more than 200.
The skipper was surprised with the strength he himself possessed during the match. He exclaimed that he had never thought to give a record-breaking performance.
“Never, never have I ever thought I would play a knock like that. I’m delighted that I have,” said Morgan at the press conference.
In the press conference, Morgan talked about the low time of his batting career. The dip in his performance with the burden of captaincy on his shoulders and the emergence of Jos Buttler in the English cricket.
“I think coming in at the timer where it was a 50-50 shout whether myself or Jos(Buttler) went in probably helped that because after I faced a few balls, I had no choice.
“I had to start taking the risk because of him coming in next. And then after I got dropped, it was a matter of just keep going. Yeah, one of those days.”
England rode on Morgan’s innings to dismantle Afghanistan in last 15 overs
The Southpaw endured back spasm during a game against the West Indies, last week. The injury left everyone unsure of him playing in the next game, let alone give a record-breaking performance. However, he fared quite well and ended with shipping his team to the highest total of the World Cup 2019.
Talking about the scores and the performance, the captain admitted they exceeded their expectations.
“We were on a target for 280, 290, maybe 300,” said Morgan.
“I thought it was quite cagey. I thought the wicket was a little bit tacky and we were always talking about getting a late 200 score. And we thought that would have been enough to be competitive,” added the Man of the Match.
The remarkable game by Morgan had pushed England to the head of the points table with eight points. Australia is now in the second position due to the difference in the net run-rate (NRR) created by England’s last victory.
Next up, England will look to take Sri Lanka down on June 21 at Headingley. After that, the next three games will be the most interesting and important ones for the Thre Lions. England will go against Australia, India and New Zealand respectively in the last three games before the kicking off of knockout stages.