True, in bowling reverse swing from round the wicket, Pakistan left-armer Mohammad Amir did make life awkward in that right-handed batsmen can easily be drawn into playing at balls that they should be leaving.
Despite a snail-like start he had struck 115 off a total of 136 balls playing genuine cricket shots throughout.
Clarke was shockingly booed by his home supporters when playing out dot balls, but with the required run-rate approaching eight an over, Watson smashed Yardy for consecutive leg-side sixes en route to his highest ODI score to relieve the pressure.
Strictly speaking none of this has anything to do with spending hours putting, pounding balls, or actually playing golf.
At cricket matches, beach balls that transgress onto the playing area are confiscated and punctured.
If people had said when I started playing that we'd have pink balls I'd have said, 'No chance'.
If, for example, we had Peter Crouch with some other 6ft 4in centre forward, then maybe our best way of playing would be to hit much longer balls.
"All the resistance training is to ensure I have physical power and can create explosivity on court to quickly react to opponents playing fast and hitting deep, hard balls, " she says.
Within nine balls, Ben Hilfenhaus, playing in front of his home Tasmanian crowd, had Kallis caught at backward point, while De Villiers stumbled while attempting a second run and was run out to leave them 156-3 in the 37th over.
Hussey hit five sixes in his 111 off 83 balls to boost his hopes of playing in Sunday's Twenty20 match with England.
The 21-year-old, playing in his sixth Test, spent 25 balls on 49 either side of lunch but duly recorded what England hope will be the first of many half centuries before he was the ninth wicket to fall.
Nathan McCullum, brother of Brendon, made just seven off 11 balls before seeing his leg stump uprooted by Gul, who again took two wickets in two balls as James Franklin was bowled playing across the line and Kyle Mills was caught by Shahzaib off a leading edge.
"He bowled some good balls and it spun and I was playing the line, " he said.
Vaughan took 15 balls to get off the mark before playing Fernando onto the leg-stump as England slumped to 17-3.
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Indeed England were ahead of the rate from the off with left-handers Strauss and Steven Davies playing in calm fashion, picking off the loose balls and using the pace of Shoaib Akhtar to good effect.
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She tries to put the balls back, and I'm the person who is playing aggressively and going for the winners.
Gambhir recorded the fifty stand with Yuvraj from 43 balls with a six over long-off against Paul Hoffman, playing his final match for Scotland.
One change now being considered is an experiment with larger balls, which are designed to slow down the game on quick playing surfaces like Wimbledon's grass.
We saw short fly balls routinely drop in front of outfielders that McCarver had noted just moments earlier were playing too deep.
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Benn then pointed at Haddin over Johnson's shoulder and two balls later the bowler threatened to throw at the stumps with the batsman well in his crease after playing a defensive stroke down the wicket.
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