Clarke's ability to play spin crucial
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As Australia's most accomplished player of spin, Michael Clarke has an enormous responsibility in this World Cup. Zimbabwe sent down 39 overs of slow bowling on Monday, a key factor in Australia posting fewer runs than they wanted, and it was Clarke's unbeaten 58 at better than a run a ball helped them open their tournament with a solid victory.
The efforts of the eleventh-ranked ODI team in the world would have piqued the interest of the other sides, all of whom are aiming to end Australia's World Cup winning streak that now stands at 24 matches. Things won't get any easier against New Zealand on Friday in Nagpur, where there is every chance Nathan McCullum will open the bowling, as Ray Price did for Zimbabwe.
Then there is Daniel Vettori, the highest-ranked one-day bowler in the world, while New Zealand could also look for a few overs from the part-timer Kane Williamson, if he plays. After the Australians also struggled to force the pace against the slow bowlers during the warm-up games against India and South Africa, they know they should expect plenty of spin from all their opponents.
"I would be very surprised if we don't get 20 to 30 overs of spin from any team," Clarke said. "I guess it's an area of our game where we continue to try and improve [because it] probably slows our scoring the most. It's an area we're individually all working on. In these conditions, how you play spin and how you bowl spin is going to play a huge part in this tournament.
"I think they're going to take the pace off the ball again through the middle. They might open the bowling with spin so we'll have to look at that. Daniel Vettori, the captain, is a very good bowler and has had a lot of success around the world. I'd imagine he'd be one of the best bowlers in these conditions throughout this tournament."
But despite Vettori's fine one-day record, he has an average of 39.83 against the Australians, who tend to play him with respect and attack the other bowlers. One of the keys in the middle overs against Vettori and McCullum will be Clarke, who has regained his limited-overs confidence in his past few outings.
He has now made three consecutive half-centuries, having finished the England series with 54 and 82, and he also made 73 in the warm-up game against South Africa. It has been a solid turnaround after a tough Australian summer, during which he struggled throughout the Ashes, quit Twenty20 and began the ODI series with questions over how quickly he could score.
But Clarke seems to have found his role as a middle-order anchor, keeping the scoreboard ticking over so the bigger strikers can go hard later in the innings. Against Zimbabwe he hit 30 singles and at no point did he face more than two dot balls in succession, ensuring that even if the boundaries weren't flowing, the innings did not stagnate.
"My role, batting at No.4 in these conditions, is about consolidating through the middle," Clarke said. "But I get the occasional opportunity [to bat for longer] when we lose a couple of wickets early. It's just about doing whatever the team needs. With our hitters at the end, if we've got wickets in hand we know we can score really freely in the last ten overs.
"Everybody plays differently. We've got guys in our team who can hit a lot of boundaries. For me, my strength throughout my whole career has been running between the wickets, so if I can't hit fours I try and hit ones and twos. As the innings goes on and you spend more time out there you can hit a few more fours.
"It also depends who you're batting with. If you're batting with a big hitter - a Cameron White or a David Hussey - my role might be to get off strike and get up the other end. But when I get in early with a bit of pace on the ball when the ball's quite new I can hit boundaries as well."
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