Sri Lanka's captain, Mahela Jayawardene, tried to deny that his key
bowlers, Muttiah Muralitharan and Chaminda Vaas, (and the injured
Lasith Malinga) had been rested for tactical reasons, but nobody truly
believed his protestations.
When you set a trap for a beast as big, powerful
and terrifying as the Australians, timing is everything. To have sprung
a major surprise in a game as meaningless as this encounter
had become
would have been a criminal waste of their energies.
Forget all the talk of victories building momentum and other such
clichéd interpretations. Ricky Ponting's Australians are so crushingly
focused that a defeat would have been like a ricochet off a rhino's
hide. Australia would have stored up the indignity, redirected their
fury, and doubtless entered the semi-finals even more determined to
crush all resistance. One look at Ponting's thousand-yard stare tells
you that much.
"To tell you the truth it doesn't worry me
one little bit," he said, having long since dispensed with the
platitudes in press conferences. "They obviously had some you-beaut
plan going into the game, to rest a couple of the best players, but
that's fine with us. We'll take a comprehensive win against Sri Lanka
this close to the finals.
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To have sprung
a major surprise in a game as meaningless as this encounter had become
would have been a criminal waste of their energies.
(1) Is the above sentence grammatically correct? For me the words 'this encounter had become would have been a criminal waste of their energies' make no sense. What is 'had become would have been' ?
(2) What is the meaning of '
like a ricochet of a rhino hide' ?
What is the speciality of the hide of rhinoceros? For me the hide of rhinoceros or any other African animal has the same quality. Hides of animals are the same. The action or rebounding doesn't have any significance whether the surface is covered by lions hide or rhinos hide. It may be rhinos hide is thicker than hides of other African animals. It doesn't make a difference for the action of rebounding.