No cake-walk Unbalanced in the past, World Cup groups intriguing Click here for more on this story Posted: Monday May 17, 1999 04:22 PM   Despite having a fierce rivalry, the Indian team will not face bitter enemy Pakistan in World Cup pool play. AP By Tunku Varadarajan, CNN/SI Cricket, unlike soccer, is not a planet-wide game. And frankly, we like it like that. A shared and close-knit history makes for keen competition, of course: but it also ensures a more civilized rivalry onfield than one tends to see in other sports. Given the small number of cricket-playing nations, there have never been more than two groups. In World Cups past, the groups have sometimes been unbalanced. Take 1975, when this was jarringly so, with England given a cake-walk to the semifinals. This year's groups, however, are intriguing. Group A, at first sight, looks to be the more dangerous. There are no pushovers: Kenya, the apparent minnow, beat the West Indies in the last Cup and has a victory over India under its East African belt. Group B, on the other hand, has two absolute no-hopers in Scotland and Bangladesh. Beating them will be as easy as snatching a cookie from a toddler. But I think group B is the more difficult, in which there are four potential winners. Australia and Pakistan are the prize bulls, with my prediction being that Akram's men will lift the cup. Australia always plays well in England, and it will have a point or two to prove after being taken down a notch by the West Indies recently. The latter, their pride restored -- and now rid of the over-rated Carl Hooper -- are like a heavyweight boxer. They can be well behind on points but still win with a powerful knockout punch, either from the crafty Walsh and Ambrose or from the sublime Lara. New Zealand is the menacing outsider. Its team resembles, in so many ways, the Indian side of 1983. Kapil's Devils won the cup then, through a mixture of nagging swing bowling, energetic fielding (they dropped only one catch in the entire tournament), and gritty battng from a side packed with all-rounders. The Kiwis, while lacking the panache of a Kapil Dev, could be the iconoclasts of England '99. South Africa should be the lords of Group A. I can't see any batsman -- no, not even Sachin Tendulkar -- taking its attack apart. The South African bowlers are fast, mean and disciplined, its fielding unbelievably accurate. And their batting, normally clinical, has been given new elan by the promotion of Mark Boucher to number 3. India is the only other side in this group capable of going all the way -- if it fires on all cylinders, all the time. That is a monumental "if", but I'll put some money on them. Aside from its main component Tendulkar in its line-up, India's Ganguly, Azhar and Jadeja can all pack a wallop when the mood seizes them. Their bowling should thrive in English conditions, with Venkatesh Prasad, in particular, destined for a stellar run. Their fielding -- for which "atrocious" would be a euphemism -- is their greatest debility. I have already written off Sri Lanka. They cannot win consistently when not playing on the docile strips of the subcontinent. England is pedestrian, with Alec Stewart, its only player who would command a place in the other major sides. As for Zimbabwe -- my heart wants me to say that it will spring a surprise. My head tells me that it will choke, as it has always done, at the gates of the first division.   Related information Stories One-day cricket less popular than tests Multimedia Click here for the latest audio and video Search our site Watch CNN/SI 24 hours a day Sports Illustrated and CNN have combined to form a 24 hour sports news and information channel. To receive CNN/SI at your home call 1-888-53-CNNSI.

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