On this day last year, England and New Zealand played a heart-stopping World Cup final at Lord’s, with the hosts winning the contest in the Super Over on boundary count.
The two teams posted 241 in their allotted 50 overs before the game went into the Super Over where once again they levelled tie.
Recalling that epic game on the first anniversary, England skipper Eoin Morgan said he felt that his team was “dead and buried” against New Zealand at one moment.
“There’s only one (moment of doubt) for me and it probably came to me the second time I watched it. Jimmy Neesham’s bowling to Ben, he bowls a slower ball, Ben hits it down to long-on and I remember the ball being in the air ...,” Morgan was quoted as saying by ESPNCricinfo.
“And it’s gone high and not quite as long as he’d liked and for a minute I just thought ‘That’s it, it’s over, Ben’s out, we still need 15 an over’ - that’s when I thought for a split second we were dead and buried,” he added.
Chasing 16 in the Super Over, New Zealand managed 15 but the hosts were declared winner as they hit more boundaries in the match. While the Black Caps scored 17 boundaries, England were far more superior in that department, having struck 26 in total.
For Morgan, the World Cup 2019 final was ‘actually bigger than cricket’.
“The final is actually, it’s bigger than cricket. It’s actually propelled up as one of the highlights of a sporting day ever in British history that will be around for a very long time so it was probably more satisfying that it will continue to be like that,” he remarked.
Morgan, who was the first England captain to win the ODI World Cup, is now looking to top this achievement by clinching the two T20 World Cups lined up in Australia and India.
“There hasn’t been a team who have held T20 and 50-over World Cups so that would be a nice challenge,” he said. “But, realistically, probably out of the next two World Cups, winning one of them would be unbelievable. To win two would be a bigger achievement than winning the 50-over World Cup. Just because both of them are away from home and would favour Australia in Australia and India in India, so you would have to win both of them to top the 50-overs win.”
