da bet vitoria： Roelof van der Merwe didn’t hold back in this innings but there was no desperation in his game
da pixbet： Abhishek Purohit in Hyderabad26-Sep-2011At times, a batsman takes so much control over the flow of a game thateven a partisan crowd is stunned into silent acceptance of an inevitabledefeat. That moment arrived in the tenth over of Somerset’s chase whenRoelof van der Merwe, who had already brutalised his way to 62 off 30, gota bouncer from Jacques Kallis.van der Merwe’s response was to arch backand guide it over the wicketkeeper. He ended up playing the shot sodelicately that the ball went to the fine leg boundary. There was a gaspfrom the crowd as it realised decisively that Kolkata Knight Riders hadrun into a batsman so confident in his approach that there was no stoppinghim.It was that kind of innings from van der Merwe. He is usually not one tohold back but there is also, almost always, a sense of desperation to hishitting. He didn’t hold back today either but importantly, the desperationwas absent. From the moment he came in, there was a sense that he wasgoing to go after the bowling, and that he was going to get away with it.This made him even more dangerous, as he managed to inflict irreversibledamage by the time he was dismissed in the 14th over.In the second-wicket partnership of 105 between van der Merwe and PeterTrego, Trego’s contribution was 23. He didn’t need to anything other thanget van der Merwe at the right end. The first four overs of the stand, allagainst spin, went for 43 with van der Merwe finding the boundary seventimes. Gautam Gambir even brought Brett Lee back for an over but by thenvan der Merwe had gathered too much steam to be reined in.He later admitted that the knock was much more than his usual freneticcameos. “I felt that it was one of my more controlled innings upfront,” hesaid. He is aware of the active role he has to play at No.3 in theabsence of Craig Kieswetter and Jos Buttler and gave it everything.Whatever the Knight Riders threw at him, the boundaries just kept coming.He played the late cut, he drove over cover, he whipped over midwicket, heeven reverse-swept for six. That last shot brought a playful interventionfrom his captain Alfonso Thomas at the media briefing. “Don’t encouragehim,” Thomas told a reporter who asked van der Merwe how he had managed toplay the shot. “It was maybe just a rush of blood to upset the field abit; luckily it worked but won’t be playing it too much,” van der Merwesaid.When the deft upper cut was mentioned, van der Merwe said with a straightface that he was “just trying to get out of the way” of the ball. But thejoke was on the Knight Riders. After a flowing 40 against them four daysago, van der Merwe had again managed to hurt them, for the second gamerunning.