???

One of my favorite things about traveling to former British colonies is trying to figure out what the hell cricket is all about. I mean, I realise baseball may be a bit confusing to some, but I find it hard to believe it could be any more confusing than cricket. This is a short example from the Malaysia New Straits Times--I swear I'm not making up a word of this:

Pakistan win by six wickets
KARACHI (Pakistan): Shoaib Malik clobbered 22 runs off five balls to raise his half century and lead Pakistan to a series-leveling six-wicket victory over Sri Lanka on the last day of the Second cricket Test here yesterday.

Pakistan had an early scare yesterday in their 137-run chase off a minimum 50 overs when paceman Chaminda Vaas (2-45) and left-arm spinner Rangana Herath (2-63) had reduced the home team to 65 for four by tea.

Malik (53 off 60 balls) and Abdul Razzaq (35 not out) then combined in a match-winning 82-run partnership in the last session which denied the tourists their hat-trick of series wins on Pakistan soil.

Sri Lanka won the First Test in last week by 201 runs.

Malik hoisted Herath for 4, 4, 6, 4, 4 which proved the last over as Pakistan ended at 139 for four with 13 overs to spare.

Vaas could have dismissed both batsmen but Malik survived a confident lbw shout when he was on 4, while Razzaq was dropped on one by a diving Kumar Sangakkara behind the wickets.

Vaas had earlier defied Pakistan with an unbeaten 32 in a rear-guard innings that took Sri Lanka to 406 in their second innings--an overall lead of 136 runs.

In doing so, he completed a career milestone, reaching his 2,000 test runs--without a century in 82 Test matches--with a cover boundary off Kaneria.

Pakistan, who made 478 in reply to Sri Lanka's first innings of 208, were off to a good start in the case when openers Imran Farhat (19) and Yasir Hameed (15) put on 31 runs.

But the hosts lost four wickets for 26 runs as Vaas had Farhat caught in the slips and captain Marvan Atapattu plucked a splendid catch to dismiss Younis Kahn.