New Zealand Rugby Coach Steve Hansen Takes Dig At Cricket's Rules Ahead Of WC Semifinal Against England

Ahead of his team’s semifinal clash against England in the ongoing Rugby World Cup, New Zealand head coach Steve Hansen has taken a sly dig at the way New Zealand lost the Cricket World Cup final to England. The thrilling final between the two teams ended in a bizarre manner.  Both the teams finished with the same score at the end of their respective 50 overs.

Even the super overs could not decide a winner. In the end, England walked away with the World Cup for hitting more number of boundaries than New Zealand. Unsurprisingly, there was widespread criticism over the rule. And recently, the ICC put an end to boundary-count as a way of deciding knockout games.

Steve Hansen is perhaps unaware of the new rule introduced by the ICC but he made it clear that he was not convinced with the way New Zealand lost the final. Steve Hansen will prepare his team for a place-kicking shootout if the semifinal against England is tied after extra-time and sudden-death extra time on Saturday.

“Have we prepared for that? We know those are the rules, so yes. I would be highly surprised if after 80 minutes, then 10 minutes each way (extra time), then sudden-death extra time…that someone hasn’t scored extra points,” said Steve Hansen before taking a dig at the rules in cricket, stating:

“But funnier things have happened. I don’t know if they got the cricket one right.”

Meanwhile, the ICC resolved that in semi-finals and finals in future world tournaments, more Super Overs will be played if the teams score the same number of runs in their Super Overs. Had the rule been in place for this year’s World Cup, England and New Zealand would have played another over to decide the winner.

The Super Over will also now be in place for every game in both 20-over and 50-over World Cups, having previously only applied in the knockout stages. In the group stages of a tournament, if a Super Over is tied then the match result will be logged as a tie.

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