Legend has it that Jacques Kallis said that Australia were 10-15 runs short in this match. 438 ODI in Johannesburg in 2006. Ricky Ponting, who found himself on the losing end despite making 164 in that match, channeled his inner Kallis 20 years later, this time as head coach of the Washington Freedom in Eliminator 1. After MINY made 266 for 9 on an easy, line-punching pitch surrounded by small boundaries at the Auckland Coliseum, Ponting joked: “15 short, guys” and lifted the spirits of his players at halfway in the locker room.
“We were joking at half-time because Ricky, our coach, was in that 438 game in South Africa and Kallis made a comment saying they were 15 short and he just came out and said ’15 short guys’ and that relaxed the dressing room a bit,” Goes said in the post-match press conference after hitting 132 off 51 balls.
“Then we just go out… it’s such a simple game really and you just have to keep going and going and going. So it was quite nice in the sense that there was no tactics to it, it was just swinging from the hip and hoping you hit it. I think we just said when it needed 26 off 28 balls or 27 balls we said ‘okay now we can start planning something’ but before that it was just let’s just keep swinging, let’s keep swinging and luckily for us we just kept plugging it in.”
Before Freedom began their mammoth chase of 267 players, tipster Cricinfo gave them just a 9.96% chance of winning the match. This rate dropped further to 2.91% after they lost Mitch Owen and Rachin Ravindra in three overs. Smith and Goes then went about repairing the innings before scoring six hits. The duo hit 21 sixes, giving Freedom confidence that they were always in the game despite losing early wickets. This also caused panic in the MINY camp and their attack eventually ran out of options and ideas after Kieron Pollard was injured while attempting to catch a ball in the outfield.
“Yeah, it was really special,” Goes said. “I think we (Smith and I) are just trying to make it as simple as possible. You’re obviously chasing 14-15 per over, there are two boundaries per over and then a few singles and then you’re there. So from the seventh over we saw that we might have a chance and then at ten I think it (the asking rate) was 14 and a half and then we said ‘OK this is very possible’ and then by over 12 it was very difficult for us, close for us. So yeah, I’m very happy about it.”
In a madcap game that also saw more famous batters Pooran and Smith also hit centuries, it was Ghose who stole the show and ultimately walked away with the Man of the Match award. After hitting an unbeaten 120 from 58 balls in last year’s ILT20 knockout match for the Desert Vipers, Goes became the first US player to score a hundred in the MLC in the league’s fourth season. Upon reaching the checkpoint, the usually stoic Gous revealed his emotions with a loud roar and animated fist pumping. He even shouted: “Come on!” before his captain Smith pulled him into a hug. The rare display of emotion demonstrated how much this meant to Gaus. It was at times like these that he moved from South Africa to the United States in his late twenties. Ghous was indeed poised to reach the milestone against the same opponents in the final game of the season at the Freedom League stage, but Ehsan Adil stopped him on 96 and left him dejected in Dallas. But Gaus couldn’t be denied at the Oakland Coliseum.
“Yeah, I always wanted an MLC hundred,” Gaus said. “When I realized that I did what I did, I don’t know, I don’t usually show emotions, but I felt like everything just came out of me. Obviously I scored 96 in the previous game where I felt like I should have gotten to that hundred and it was a really big goal for me to get that first hundred.
“So to finally get it today, and I think it’s more about believing in yourself. I made a really big decision this season that I’m really going to back myself and believe that I can be one of the best players out there, and I think it’s more just emotion coming from all the faith that I have in myself right now and the belief that you’re good enough to perform and play opportunities like this.”
Ghous also praised Rachin Ravindra for his left-arm finger spin that kept MINY out of 300 and started the Liberty chase. Introduced into the attack in the 14th over, almost as an afterthought, Ravindra departed with figures of 4 for 29 in his four overs. No other bowler on either side took more than two wickets or conceded fewer than eight overs.
“Rachin was the golden boy who took wickets for us,” Ghous said. “I don’t actually know what his average is, but for Washington Freedom it must be very low. He takes a lot of wickets at crucial times for us and he’s obviously a very valuable player for us and I’m just glad tonight was his night.”
Perhaps Gouws was too generous. After all, it was his night.