Australia, South Africa warm up with easy wins

Australia vs Bangladesh

Australia had a good start to the ICC World Twenty20 campaign by defeating Bangladesh by 38 runs. Ricky Ponting won the toss and elected to bat. Australia powered their score to 219 for 6, thanks to Watson and Haddin who top scored 52 and 47 runs respectively. Bangladesh bowling was scratchy with Mahmudullah and Shakib Al Hasan being the pick of the bowlers with decent bowling figures of 4-37 and 1 for 31 respectively. Bangladesh started their batting in flamboyant style with the opening batsmen firing all guns taking 31 runs in two overs. Mitchell Johnson had the first break-through for Australia. Shakib was the top scorer for Bangladesh with 54 runs.

Brief scores: Australia 219 for 6 (Watson 52, Haddin 47, Mahmudullah 4-37) beat Bangladesh 181 for 7 (Shakib 54, Johnson 3-21) by 38 runs

South Africa vs Pakistan

South Africa had an easy sail-through in their first warm-up match against Pakistan at Trent Bridge. Smith won the toss and he also put South Africa to a quick start with some great stroke plays. The opening pair of Kallis and Smith put on 80 runs on board in 9.2 overs after which Kallis departed. After a buoyant win of his team in IPL 2009, Gibbs put on some cracking shots to score 43 in 23 balls. Albie Morkel also joined the bashing party with a quick fire 32 runs of 14 balls with three sixes, in the end taking the score card to 187. In reply, Pakistan’s start was shaky with Butt being taken off by Steyn in the first over. Opener Ahmed Shahzad scored 31 runs as rest of the team never got on to a decent partnership and were tethering at 65/5 in the 11th over and were bundled out for 127. Botha and Steyn were the pick of the bowlers for South Africa with each scalping two a piece.

Brief scores: South Africa 186 for 7 (Smith 70, Gibbs 42, Ajmal 2-20) beat Pakistan 127 (Botha 2-20, Steyn 2-19) by 59 runs