Google Doodle Celebrates Cricket Tournament

Google Doodle Celebrates Cricket Tournament

This is What’s Trending Today.

The National Basketball Association season came to an end on Monday night. The Golden State Warriors defeated the Cleveland Cavaliers for the NBA championship.

But sports fans around the world have something else to cheer about this week. The 2017 International Cricket Council Champions Trophy tournament is taking place in the United Kingdom.

Eight countries started the event on June 1. Four teams remain. On Wednesday, England plays Pakistan in one semifinal. In the second semifinal on Thursday, Bangladesh plays India.

India won the last tournament, in 2013.

The semifinal winners meet for the championship on Sunday at the cricket ground known as The Oval in London.

To celebrate the competition, the search engine Google launched an interactive cricket “doodle” on its homepage. While it was seen in many countries earlier this month, the doodle first appeared on the U.S. homepage on Tuesday. [Note: Click here to continue playing the game.]

Google's doodle on June 13 celebrated the International Cricket Council Champions Trophy tournament.

Internet users can click on the doodle to play a cricket game between crickets and snails. The crickets are at bat and the snails are fielding and bowling.

Players control the batsman with a computer mouse. The ball may go straight to the snails in the field, or in the air and past the boundary for six runs. The game congratulates players every time they score 50 runs or hit a six.

People seem to be enjoying the doodle. Some even wrote on Twitter that they cannot stop playing the game. One person called the game “addictive,” and another said she was “obsessed.”

Others said the doodle helped them understand the rules of cricket.

In a statement Tuesday, Google said that the cricket game was its smallest interactive doodle ever. It works well even in places with slower mobile networks.

And that’s What’s Trending Today.

I’m Dan Friedell.

Dan Friedell wrote this story for VOA Learning English. Ashley Thompson was the editor.

What is your highest score in the Google cricket match? We want to know. Write to us in the Comments Section or on our Facebook page.

Words in This Story

tournament – n. a sports competition or series of contests that involves many players or teams and that usually continues for at least several days

doodle – v. to draw something without thinking about what you are doing

interactive – adj. designed to respond to the actions, commands, etc., of a user

homepage – n. the part of a Web site that is seen first and that usually contains links to other parts of the site

bat – v. to try to hit a ball with a bat in baseball, cricket, or a similar game

field – v. to catch or stop and throw a ball

bowl – v. to throw (a ball) to the batsman

boundary – n. something (such as a river, a fence, or an imaginary line) that shows where an area ends and another area begins

addictive – adj. very enjoyable in a way that makes you want to do or have something again

obsess – v. to be the only thing that someone thinks or talks about