Kenya spark calculator frenzy and run-rate fear

The most feared initials in cricket appear increasingly likely to play a significant role in the eighth World Cup. That was about all that became clear in southern Africa yesterday after Kenya's astonishing but emphatic victory against Sri Lanka and Australia's clinical overhauling of Zimbabwe in matches that were free of trouble despite oft-repeated fears and threats.

The letters in question are not DGB for Donald George Bradman, the best batsman of all, who was long gone before one-day cricket was a twinkle in the game's bank balance. Nor even are they DL for Duckworth-Lewis, whose dispassionately statistical system may easily yet decide the outcome of more rain-affected matches. They are NRR, standing for net run-rate.

NRR is the figure that will divide teams in the pools when more than two finish on equal points. It is arrived at by deducting the runs yielded per over from the average runs scored. Thus, from now on, all countries must have one eye on scoring fast and conceding slow. Simply winning may not be enough.

Kenya prompted a rush on pocket calculators when they confounded all expectations by outclassing Sri Lanka, who had won their previous three matches. Kennedy Otieno ensured they had a solid start with 60 from 88 balls and a ninth-wicket stand of 32 took them over 200.

Still, it seemed that Muttiah Muralitharan's 4 for 28 would prove decisive. But, for once, he was outspun as Collins Oduyo, the Kenyan leg-break bowler, flabbergasted the Sri Lankans by taking 5 for 25, his country's best bowling figures, which also entered the World Cup's top 10.

Sanath Jayasuriya, Sri Lanka's captain, said his players, who threatened to strike before the tournament unless they were awarded a pay rise, batted like amateurs. He did not add that they might now give some money back.

The victory puts Kenya on 12 points – they earned four for free when New Zealand withdrew – and a win against Bangladesh would probably see them sitting pretty. It is Kenya's second World Cup giant-killing following their 73-run victory over the West Indies in 1996. There are many permutations this time, but it is possible that four teams could each finish level on 16 points. The only consolation in this is that NRR is marginally better than the tournament's second DL method, which would be used in the last resort: Drawing Lots.

Nothing that has happened so far suggests that NRR or either DL will be able to stop Australia's sweep to the trophy. DGB might struggle to get into their team at present.

The Aussies are due to have a bad day but, while they were below par yesterday, they won smoothly. It was their 10th successive victory. One more will equal the West Indies' record so Namibia might have their work cut out on Thursday.

For once, it was not an Aussie who was man of the match but Andy Blignaut, the unconventional Zimbabwean all-rounder who made 54 from 28 balls (Fifties in 20-something balls are becoming commonplace here). He briefly made Jason Gillespie, the world's best bowler, look like a pie thrower.

It was a relief to the International Cricket Council, despite its recent bullishness, that both matches were free of trouble. There was no sign of insecurity in Nairobi, where New Zealand refused to go last week, and threatened mass anti-government protests outside the ground in Bulawayo did not materialise. The feeling grows that it might, just, be possible to concentrate on the cricket from now on. And NRR, of course.