Archive for the ‘Cricket’ Category
I was recently reading a great article on sledging by Harsha Bhogle and it got me thinking what does aggression on the cricket field mean. Aggression on a cricket field has been a hugely misunderstood concept.
Crucial Game for India
Posted on: February 22, 2008
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Sunday’s contest between India and Australia is a very crucial game for both the teams. Its almost certain that India would join Australia in the best of 3 finals after Srilanka’s loss in Melbourne on Friday. Srilanka will be very dissapointed as this is not the first time their batting has let them down against the Aussies in this series. Srilanka though need to win both their matches from here on and hope India loses theirs.
The Indian team though pulled off a crucial win against the Lankans on Tuesday to go up by 6 points on the table. One thing which is common to all the three sides in this series is that their batting has struggled. The bowlers from all the three sides have had great success in this series and the fact that there has been just two 250+ totals in this series is shocking considering the batting strength of the sides.
India would hoping to keep the trend going as I think the best possible scenario would be for India to bat first and post a challenging total on the board. Dhoni who has had pretty ordinary luck with the tosses would want to win one soon. Teams have generally found it difficult to chase as the pitches have been really difficult to bat on. The Australian batsmen except for Clarke and Hussey have found it really hard in this series to get the ball off the square. The Indians would hope to keep it that way. The Indian bowling has been great throughout the tour with Ishant Sharma being the find of this series. Ishant has been getting able support from Sreesanth, Munaf and Irfan and as a unit they have been able to keep the Australian batsmen quiet.
Both the teams have each won one game in their previous three meetings and whoever wins this one will get a slight edge before the finals. India would like to win this one and completely eliminate Srilanka from the picture. All in all this promises to be a great game and we hope that it lives up to the expectation.
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Five years ago when India won the Natwest finals against England, we had unearthed two batting stars in Yuvraj Singh and Mohammed Kaif. All of us thought that those two along with Virender Sehwag would form the crux of Indian batting line up in the future. Almost six years after the Natwest final, Kaif is no longer part of the Indian team, Yuvraj is still inconsistant and Sehwag’s one day average keeps diminishing with every innings he plays.
The Indian team though have found few batsmen for the future in Gambhir, Uthappa, Rohit and the captain himself Dhoni. India’s future after Sachin, Dravid, Sourav and Laxman looks really uncertain. Sachin who is still a part of the one day scheme of things is trying his best to help the youngsters in the team with his valuable inputs and that should do them a world of good. Yuvraj and Sehwag being the two most experianced members in the batting line up after Sachin, should take more responsibilty in guiding these youngsters and making sure that they dont fall out like a few have in the past few years.
When Kaif played that wonderful innings against England in the Natwest trophy he was considered to be a captaincy material and was expected to be a part of the team for a long time. Currently he is not even in the reckoning. The youngsters need to realise to be on the top, the performances need to be consistant over a period of time. I still remember Vijay Bharadwaj, who was man of the match in a series in kenya few years ago and suddenly dissapeared from the scene. We can see so many such instances in Indian cricket over the past few years.
Now that IPL has made sure that these youngsters have become overnight heroes. There is lots of money involved in the game these days and its easy to lose focus of the job in hand. When you consider Ishant Sharma who has had just few matches under his belt being auctioned at $950,000 at IPL, you cant help but wonder is this good for these youngsters. When you have players come into international cricket and have few successful games the hype in India is so much that they become overnight stars and dont know how to handle the same. The reason why Sachin, Dravid and Laxman have been so successful over a period of time is due to the fact that they have both their feet firmly grounded inspite of all the hype and hapoola surrounding the game these days.
With so much money involed in cricket these days its easy for these youngsters to lose focus on the game itself. Thats what we saw with Irfan, Sehwag, Yuvraj and few others who had to be dropped from the team to make them realise that you cant be in the team if you are not performing. I guess India has great talent coming through in both batting and bowling and we need to make sure that the IPL’s and the ICL’s dont ruin it for us. The players are currently made to believe that they are greater than what they are and it will be better for them to realise that what matters the most the their performances on the cricket field.
Ten years down, no one is going to remember how much you were auctioned for in IPL. The reason we kept getting great batsmen over a period of time was due to the fact that, playing cricket was their main focus. Now a days, you just need to be a part of one series win and you dont have to play cricket anymore. I will be very interested in seeing in couple years time, which of these youngsters make it through to become the next Sachin or Laxman or Dravid of Indian cricket.
I have been a fan of Indian cricket and I am very excited looking at these youngsters performing so well in Australia. I just hope that this continues and these youngsters go from strength to Strength rather than being weighed down by this recent media frenzy and the money involved. I want India to be a cricket team which is respected throughout the world for their performances on the cricket field rathen than being the financial powerhouse which they are right now. Cricket is India has become more of a business than a sport which was the case 10-15 years back. Hopefully the game survives and will be still be remembered for your exploits on the cricket ground.
Indian Batsmen need to step up
Posted on: February 18, 2008
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The Indian team lost the last two ODI’s in the ongoing CB series. The Indian batting has failed to fire in this series and has never looked convincing. The batting is lacking experiance in the middle order and the constant failures of Sachin, Sehwag and Yuvraj is causing Dhoni lots of headaches on the eve of their crucial match against the Lankans.
The Indian bowling has been fantastic throughout the series and has been let down by some irresponsible batting. The game against the Australians should have been won by the Indians, if only there was someone who displayed a mature head as Clarke did for the Aussies. Dhoni has been the only batsman in this series who has shown the will to stick it out in the middle and play according to the situation. The rest of the batting has struggled to handle anu sort of pressure.
Sachin has been throwing his wicket away after getting starts in almost all the matches. Being the most senior member in the squad, I guess he needs to be more responsible and guide the youngsters in the team. India is missing the solidity of Rahul Dravid in the middle order. India also needs to stop experimenting with Irfan Pathan at number 3 as Robin Uthappa is getting wasted at number 7. He is an attacking player and needs to be playing in the top order. Irfan can be more effective at number 6 or 7 rather than in the top 3.
Once in a while Pathan can be used at number 3 to surprise the opponents but not everytime. On the positive side the Indian bowling led by Ishant Sharma has performed brilliantly. They had set up the game against Australia, only to be squandered by the batsmen. I wouldnt say that it was a easy target but was definitely gettable. India now face the tough task of winning two of the next 3 games and their next game against the lankans being the most important. India winning this game would put lots of pressure on the Lankans as they would remain in the third spot in the table.
The Indian batsmen need to fire and make a big enough score to give the team an opportunity to put pressure on the Lankans. Well this game is sort of Do or Die scenario for the Indians and hope that they rise up to the occasion.
A Wonderful Test Series
Posted on: January 28, 2008
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The Adelaide draw brings to end one of the most fascinating test series in the recent times. The Indians would be really pleased with the way the came back in the series after two defeats. This series also was the last on the Australian Soil for the big 5. Sachin, laxman and Kumble had a great series but Dravid and Sourav would be ruing missed opportunities.
In a way the last two test matches brought focus back on cricket after the chaotic Sydney game. Both the teams played hard and competitive cricket over the past one month and 1-1 would have been a fair result. Bad preparation cost India the Melbourne game, bad umpiring and some bad shots cost us the Sydney test match.
Australia in the end proved that they are still the number one team in the world but only by a little margin. The Indian team has again proved to the rest of the world that Australia can be beaten in its own den. Brett lee was the best bowler in the series with 20+ wickets and has improved leaps and bounds since India toured Australia in 2003/04. It seems like Australia have found an ideal replacement for Glenn McGrath. The Australians though are finding tough to replace Shane Warne as the experiment with Brad Hogg failed miserably in this series. The fact that both Andrew Symonds and Michael Clarke out-bowled Brad Hogg is an able testimony for his failure in this series. Australia would be hoping that Stuart McGill recovers from his injury really quick to fill the void left by Shane Warne. Adam Gilchrist’s retirement also came as surprise as there were no indications of the same prior to this series.
Matthew Hayden was again their best batsman against the Indians as he was in the prior meetings between the two sides. Andrew “Lucky” Symonds played some important innings for his side in this test series and so did Micheal Hussey and Clarke. Stuart Clarke provided able support to Brett Lee in the fast bowling department and Mitchell Johnson was terribly inconsistent throughout the series. I have never seen a test bowler bowling so many wides as Johnson did in this series.
The Indian team again relied on Sachin Tendulkar for some big runs and to his credit the “Little Master” did not disappoint his captain. Dravid and Sourav had a very inconsistent series but as usual VVS Laxman had a great series against the Australians. Irfan Pathan, who I think should have played since the first test, gave a good account of himself by winning the man of match award contributing handsomely with both bat and ball in India’s win in Perth. Sehwag again one of the players who should have been in India’s playing X1 in both Melbourne and Sydney had a great end to this series by scoring a match saving 150 in the Adelaide test.
The inexperienced bowling attack performed very well against the strong Australian batting line up with Ishant Sharma being the find of the series for India. RP Singh bowled beautifully in the series in patches but lacked consistency. Kumble was once again the star performer for India in the bowling department as he captured 20+ wickets in this series. He captained the team really well during the difficult time after the second test and also made sure that he brought out the best from his team.
Overall India gave a good account of themselves in this test series. India remains the only team to have at least won one test match against Australia in every series they have played with them since the 2001/02 series.
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The Partnership which began about 10 years back is still up and running in fine style. Sourav joined Sachin at the top of the order sometime around 96/97 season when the team was desperately looking for an One-Day opener. Sourav started as a correct batsman with mostly elegant strokes through the offside, even though he was a great player of spin. Sachin was already an established opener in the shorter version of the game and was one of the most feared one at that.
Few years later they became one of most consistent and prolific opening combination in the one-day format of the game. The broke all sorts of records at the top including the highest opening stand of 258 which they made against Kenya at Paarl. Ganguly by then had become the captain of the team and also one of the most dominating batsman in the shorter version of the game. One of his innings in Australia against a strong Pakistani attack, made Wasim Akram (Who was part of the attack which comprised of Shoaib, Waqar, Razzak and Saqlain) admit that he has never seen anybody play so well through the offside. Sachin at that time was already termed as the next only to Don Bradman. He was already breaking all sorts of records in both forms of the game.
Sachin and Sourav have batted together for more than 150 ODI’s and have 25 century partnerships. Both these greats joined at the top of the batting order again in the recent series in England and in Belfast and proved again that they are one of the best opening combinations in the world. Now since Rahul has resigned as captain of the National team there are talks that Sachin or Sourav might be offered the position. I just hope that both of them reject the option as by just concentrating on their batting they might offer much more to the team in the last few years of their illustrious career. Sachin and Sourav have few more years of great one-day batting left in them and when they decide to hang up their boots they might end up as the greatest combination in ODI. Lets just hope that they do not put more pressure on themselves by agreeing to captain the National side and just concentrate on their batting as its very important for India to succeed in the upcoming series against Pakistan and Australia.
India needs ODI strategy rethink
Posted on: August 20, 2007
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The Indian team went 3-1 down in the ongoing one-day series against England. The Indian team was expected to perform better after their exploits in the just concluded test series against the same opposition. The Indian team have struggled in all departments including their much hyped batting line up. After watching the fourth one-day international, the need for a professional coach has become more evident. The Indian team is struggling with fitness and consistency in all forms of the game. The team’s fielding has been very disappointing in this series. The Indian team has never been a great fielding side but at least used to be safe catchers, even that aspect of their game has taken a hit in this series.
The Indian captain seems to have run out of ideas as India lost from a position of strength in the fourth ODI. After having England 7 down of 100 odd runs with 98 runs more required, India managed to lose the game, thanks to some uninspired bowling and fielding performance. The team’s bad fielding performance has been attributed to their aging players as per the media but I tend to disagree with the same. Only few years back we had the oldest players in the team as our best fielders, I am talking about our current fielding coach Robin Singh and the former captain Azhar. Age should not be given as an excuse for bad fielding.
The problem with the Indian team has been their ODI combination which does not look strong neither on paper nor on the field. The decision of Rahul Dravid to play five bowlers is a positive move but that seriously weakens our batting. The bottom half of our batting line up has just been a formality in the first four ODI’s. The only way this combination could work for India is when they find a genuine bowling all rounder, someone in the mold of Kapil Dev. I guess the Indian team will do well to get Irfan back into the team. The Indian team needs to completely rethink their strategy in one-day cricket. They need bowlers who are aggressive and consistent.
I think we need to get Pathan back into the scheme of things at least for the one-dayers. Pathan would lend perfect balance to the team and give Rahul the option of playing 5 bowlers without compromising the team’s batting strength. As we all know Pathan is a good bat at number 6 or 7 in the line up and can follow the opening bowlers as the first change bowler. We need to experiment with the team a little bit and also keep a close eye on the 20-20 tournament which is starting from the 11th of this month. India can identify few good one-day cricketers for the future from this series. I think India should consider giving a chance to Rohit Sharma as he has just been carrying drinks in this one-day series. The worst thing about the selectors is that they would always take a younster for a tour, never give them a chance and drop them for the following series. I guess we need to treat good talents better and give them appropriate chances to prove themselves at this level.
The Indian team can still win this series if their batting fires, even though their bowling and fielding are below the international standards. As I complete this article the Indian team just won the 5th game to keep the series alive, again owing to a good batting display and some great spin bowling. I hope that we carry on this momentum into the 6th game tomorrow and level the series at 3-3.
No more "Paper Tigers" abroad
Posted on: August 3, 2007
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For a long time since I have been watching cricket India has been labeled as poor visitors(Strictly on cricketing terms :)). The famous title given to the Indian team by the media was “Tigers at home and Paper Tigers abroad”. The Indian team in the past have struggled when they toured as they took too long to get acclimatized to the conditions. When they evetually get used to the conditions it would be too late. I remember watching India tour Australia in 1991/92 and later 1999/00, hoping that there will be some resistance from the team but got really dissapointed as we lost badly on both occasions.
In 2000 when Sachin resigned as the captain of the Indian cricket team following bad performaces by both the test and one-day squads. Sourav Ganguly got appointed as the captian of the Indian team in the later part of 2000. It was really a difficult time for all captains in the world due to the match fixing scandal. The game itself needed some faith reinstalled among the fans by the players around the world. India’s first overseas win abroad after 1993 came in Bangladesh when the defeated the home team by 9 wickets. The win in itself was not much to write home about as the team was expected to defeat the latest entrant to test cricket. The Indian team under Sourav did not have a great 2001 losing all the away test series which included a 2-1 loss to Srilanka.
The end of 2001 brought about one of the greatest test series I have ever witnessed on Indian soil when India took on Australia in a three match test series. India emerged victorious by a margin of 2-1. The series will always be remembered for Harbajan’s 32 wickets and also the great partnership between Dravid and Laxman in Eden Gardens where India came back to erase a 272 runs first innings deficit to eventually win the game. That series in India, kind of sparked a turnaround for cricket in India. Australians were the best team in the world and had come to India with a proud record of 15 straight test wins. After that series India had two new stars in Laxman and Harbajan. The Indian team went to Zimbabwe with the hope to win their first test series outside sub-continent for 16 years but lost the second game after the winning the first convincingly to return with a 1-1 draw. Similar fate followed when they toured WestIndies where they again sqandered 1-0 lead to eventually lose the series 2-1.
Even though we were losing all these series the one good thing about them all was that India were winning test matches abroad if not the series. Since I started watching cricket India have never won a test match outside home except for one series in Srilanka in 1993/94. India had good wins in WestIndies and Zimbabwe and had a great world cup in 2003 reaching the finals. I would attribute most of the success prior to worldcup to the Ganguly and Wright combination. The Indian team had a great tour to England where they won the one-day series and drew the test series 1-1. Ganguly was great with the youngsters in the team and he instilled an aggressive intent in team which was lacking when we toured in the past. The Indian team were no more a pushover and also started to believe that they can do more than just play a part. After the world cup India had a good year where they went to Australia and had a great time returning with a draw in the test series. Later in 2004 Ganguly’s team won both test and one-day series in Pakistan.
The Indian team was doing great with emergance of Sehwag, Yuvraj, Dhoni,Zaheer and Pathan. The Indian team had few problems in 2005/06 with the exit of the coah John Wright and the Captain Sourav ganguly almost at the same time. Greg Chappel took over as the coach of the Indian team and Rahul Dravid was named as the captain of the team. The team had a bad 2006(Expect for their first series win abroad since 1986 when the defeated WI 1-0) which carried over in the world cup where they lost in the first round. Since then the team led by Rahul Dravid has been fighting to spark a turnaround with Zaheer returning into the team and the emergence of Sreesanth, Munaf and RP Singh. Greg Chappel resigned after the World Cup debacle but Rahul Dravid still carries on without a coach for the team.
As I write this article the Indian team is in England winning the second test in trent bridge leading the series 1-0 going into the third test in Oval to commence on Aug 9th. The Indian team would want to come home victorious by winning the test series in England which would be their first since 1986. The Indian team has won 16 test matches abroad since 2000, a record only bettered by Australia who are sitting pretty with 26 test wins. The tag of “Paper Tigers” was given by the media in the early and late 90’s and deservedly so as the team struggled to put up even a fighting performance overseas leave alone winning a test match. The tag has been lifted since the new millenieum due to efforts of John Wright, Sourav Ganguly and currently by Rahul Dravid who are making sure that when the seniors in the team retire the Indian team is one of the best in the world. Sachin, Sourav and Rahul derserve to be a part of a good team for their services in the last decade. I hope that this year turns out to be the stepping stone to the same. The Indian team’s first goal would be the series in England and then the home series against Pakistan before the take on the Australians later this year.
I sincerely hope that the Indian team emerges victorious in all their future series and keep adding to the tally of 16. Go India!
India tour England amidst chaos
Posted on: June 1, 2007
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The Indian team prepare for one of the toughest series after the World Cup. Even though they beat Bangladesh in both tests and one-dayers, Rahul Dravid would be the first one to admit that England would be a different proposition altogether. The Indian team is without a coach for this tour also, thanks to the coach hunting fiasco by the BCCI. The board has not made things easy for themselves and the team with a very poorly conducted selection process which caught the attention of the media world over for all the wrong reasons.
Rahul Dravid has already mentioned his concern over touring England without a coach and also regarding the teams preparation. The good thing about this series is that India got to play South Africa in a three match series in Belfast, Ireland in similar conditions to what they would be facing in England. India won the hard fought series 2-1 and registered their first overseas series victory against South Africa. This series should give India the much needed confidence before the all important tour.
The Indian team selection for the English tour had little surprises, Sehwag was dropped from both the one-day and the test squads as expected. The problem with Sehwag was not the lack of runs itself but the way he had been throwing his wicket away after getting promising starts. The recently concluded Afro-Asian cup was an example of the same. Sehwag got to decent starts in the first two games but played atrocious strokes to get himself out. Harbajan Singh and Pathan were the other notable absentees from the Indian touring party, more so due to their lack of bowling form in the past few months.
The Indian team would be relieved to see Sachin scoring some runs in the recently concluded series in Ireland, in the meanwhile crossing yet another milestone. Sachin became the first batsman in One-Day internationals to cross 15000 runs. A great achievement when you consider that he still has a batting average of 44 and a strike rate of 85. The Indian team would take lots of positives from the series against SA, as most of their batsmen made runs and would also be happy with the performance of Zaheer ahead of the test series. Anil Kumble might be the lone spinner in the team with Sreesanth, Zaheer along with another medium pacer would form the bowling combination atleast for the first test.
The Indian batting order might face a few headaches with Yuvraj scoring some valuable runs in the one-day series, making it very difficult for the captain to leave him out of the playing X1 for the first test starting on July 19th.Well all in all the Indian team would want to finish this tour by winning both the Test and the one-day series against England. Captain Rahul Dravid would be hoping that the seniors in the team including himself, can inspire the team to achieve success on this tour.
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I started playing cricket at a very young age but did not have the patience to sit through a entire cricket match on television. The first game I ever watched was a match between India and Pakistan in Sharjah in 1990. India were chasing a total of 250 odd against a strong Pakistani bowling attack and there walked in a young batsman barely 18 years old. He was none other than Sachin Tendulkar. This was my first look at the great player. I did not have too many memories of the game as it was the first game I ever watched. The only thing I remember was that India lost that game and Sachin got out trying to smash Mushtaq Ahmad for the third consecutive time in an over.
Before watching this game I always thought that Sachin Tendulkar was a model who happened to act with Kapil in the Boost ad which was very famous at that time. Sachin played a brand of cricket which was not that prevalent in the early 90’s. He was attacking and also very positive in his strokeplay when he was at the crease batting. Since that Innings in Sharjah I have closely followed Sachin’s career. I guess Sachin will agree with me that the biggest failure so far in his career has been his captaincy. He has captained India on two separate occasions and both the times it was not that great. He has been a great player and great ambassador for Indian cricket over the years.
In recent times his batting has gone downhill, even though he is still one of the major run getters in this period. Sachin’s major problem has been that he has changed his batting style which unfortunately is not his natural one. He has tried to change his batting style according to the team’s needs which is the cause for his inconsistent performance in the last few years. Sachin has always drawn parallel to another contemporary great Brian Charles Lara who retired from International cricket just a month ago after the World Cup. Lara’s success is based on the fact that he never changed his batting style no matter what his role in the team was.
Sachin on the other hand has been confused with his role in the team and has decided to be more circumspect with his batting being one of the senior members in the team. We all know that Sachin can still be the devastating one-day batsman he was couple of years back. The innings he played against Srilanka just before the World Cup further proves my point. For Sachin to get back to one-day team and make a difference he needs to get back to his strength. I remember him as a fearless young boy standing up to the likes of Waqar, Wasim, Donald, Ambrose and few other great bowlers of this era. He is one of the players who took pinch hitting to a different level, where the shots were not mere slogs but pure cricketing strokes. He has been an inspiration to countless number of youngsters who want to follow his path and become like him.
He deserves to have a send off from Indian cricket just like the way Glenn McGrath had after the World Cup. Being the great player that he is, I guess he owes it to himself. As I was writing this article, Sachin scored his 36th test century against Bangladesh in the first match of the series in chittagong. I hope that Sachin continues this form in to the rest of the season ahead against the English team and the Australians later this year. I hope he also makes a comeback into the Indian one-day team and plays the way we all know he can. For a great player like him it does not take too much to get back to his strength give his fans much more to cheer about in the last few years of his wonderful career. I have been an ardent fan of his and will continue to be the same till the end as he was the one who got me interested in this wonderful game and also inspired me to write about the same.
girisopinion
My Thoughts 
