No more a joke

I am writing this piece with less than a couple of hours to go for the mega final of African IPL. I have a reason to exhibit this urgency and write before the match starts. Both the teams that would be part of this game are so close to me – one being my home team and the other filled with two of my all time favorite players Rahul and Anil. Agreed on all the previous occasions I have supported Bangalore in the encounters between these two teams but today I would definitely not be disappointed with result going either way as long as the game goes down to the wire and we get a chance to see a thrilling encounter for one last time this season more so after these one sided semi finals. This has been great turnaround from the previous edition for the simple reason that the teams with wooden spoon last year are fighting out for the trophy. Last year if one team was seen to be filled with star hitters who could blow away the match out of opposition hands with their hard hitting prowess and may not even stand for 20 overs on a bad day, other team was regarded more suitable for the lengthiest format of the game and was seen to be needing atleast 5 overs more to be alongside the competition. But this year they have proved all their critics wrong. Interestingly, these are the two teams that made a cut into the semifinal during the last day of the league stage.

The two teams also had a contrasting journey. Hyderabad started off with four consecutive wins and seemed to running much ahead of the other teams but then they ensured their level best to have mixed results there on to see that they are the team with least points to enter semis interestingly on the basis of their better NRR. On the contrary after the inaugural success Bangalore looked like repeating their previous year results and end up in the bottom two. However once they got rid of the million dollar baby, our own Jumbo showed why he is one of the greatest fighters in the international cricket. This is one team which started playing knockout when others were still in league stage and register one of the greatest fight backs in the cricketing history.

If last year’s battle between Australian leg spinner and Indian wicket keeper was won by the former now it is time to see who would dominate this year – is it going to be Indian leg spinner or is it going to be Australian wicket keeper? Let’s watch it!

Masterful Beginning

The NRI version of the cricket carnival begins today much to the respite of many like me who are finding it hard to fight the boredom … and what a beginning this is!!! There is absolutely no hangover from previous edition as both the finalists of the first edition were humbled on the very first day by the two great batting maestros of the Indian cricket. So any punters betting based on previous records beware.

Absolutely dream beginning with both Sachin and Rahul winning MoMs to start the tournament. The run feast is there to stay for a month and I hope the Indian youngsters make the most of this ‘special’ opportunity … special because thanks to Chidambaram and general elections in the country – the players have a chance to play on foreign wickets. I wish this time the franchises play more competitive cricket unlike last year where Hyderabad and Bangalore teams were virtually out of contention for semifinal even before the halfway mark of the tournament. If there is anything I can ask for after such a great beginning it is Hyderabad and Bangalore teams making it to the semifinals if not finals … ok jokes apart. I would be surprised if this edition will be as bright as the previous one – courtesy absence of Indian crowds but I can always wish that it provides good exposure to the young players both Indian and foreign and lots and lots and lots of entertainment to the billions of the cricketing fans glued to TV.

Mahi Way

Mahendra Singh Dhoni , not so favorite name for me since he threw the seniors out of the ODI team, but cannot resist myself from writing this post. The player who failed to manage an average of 10 in the world cup last year in spite of entering the tournament as one of the top3 ODI bastmen impressed one and all by regaining his No1 ODI bastman position last week after his performance in the Emerald Isle.

It should be appreciated that as soon as he became captain he made an effort to inculcate the good points of his predecessor, Rahul Dravid - who always lead the team by setting up an example through his master batting. Once known as the swashbuckling hard hitting symbol of Indian cricket, now bats with a purpose and responsibility and controlled aggression slipping into the shoes of his previous captain. (Strike rate as captain is 83.23 compared to 96.26 before being captain of Indian team). He has mastered the art of shifting gears - His batting might not look pretty and neat but it ends up being effective. Cool head has always been a plus point over his predecessor. As a captain over the last one year he averages close to 55 in 36 ODIs which by no means can be belittled and called as fluke as it was done when he saved the Lords Test last year.

Now everything is not over - just like Yuvraj, Kaif and Dhoni were groomed by batting around Dravid ... time has come for Dhoni to take up that role as well to allow young players like Rohit Sharma, Raina and Badrinath to blossom, batting alongside him. It is definitely a great role to be taken up by this young dynamite but then I am sure for a player who had found answer to the mysterious carrom-bowling even with lack of so-called technique, it will be just another challenge and he will find a Mahi way to it!!!

Discounting Toss

India won their first bilateral ODI series in Srilanka, it is heartening that this was achieved with an incomplete team - no Sachin and Sehwag. But if we look at the tour - what we actually did was won the toss 4 times in a row. Nothing to take away from excellent performance of Zaheer, Dhoni and company. But the results were rather sealed as soon as the toss happened- this should be agreed atleast for Premadasa.

This reminded me of some of other grounds where you more or less know whats going to happen as soon as the toss is done - atleast the match is not unbiassed anymore. Let us look at results of day-night matches from some of the grounds during various timeframes in the last decade and a half.

Ground	Time Period	Matches Played	Won batting first	Won batting second
Newlands, Capetown	1992-08	24	19	5
Premadasa, Colombo	2000-08	40	26	11
Kingsmead, Durban	2003-08	14	6	3
PCA,Mohali	1996-07	14	9	5
Gaddafi, Lahore	2007-08	8	8	0
Eden Gardens	1993-03	9	7	2

These results are mainly affected by dew that either helps the bowlers get some swing under the lights and trouble the batsmen. When we have the data to support the argument that the toss plays a very important role in deciding the result of the match is it fair to still play under these conditions.

Of course there are some grounds where the results are just reverse as the weather is relatively dry and dew only results in spin bowlers not being able to find the grip of the ball under lights and the batsmen makes the most out of it

Ground	Time Period	Matches Played	Won batting first	Won batting second
Motera,Ahmedabad	2003-08	7	2	5
SMS, Jaipur	2006-08	7	2	5

A couple of options come to my mind at this point which I think would make these games competitive.

Option1: Each team would play 50 0vers in two splits such that each split is at least for 15 overs. Also there is at least one power play of 5 overs in each split. A vs B goes some thing like this -

The team winning the toss would decide what they want to do and the team batting first say A would declare when they want to split, then team B bats and declares when they want to split so that the team A can continue their innings and complete it following which team B would chase the target.

Option 2: This one flows from the huge success of 20 cricket. A couple of innings of 20/25 overs each where the team winning toss would either choose to bat or bowl in the first innings and team losing toss would decide what they want to do in second innings.

The options sounds crazy is it - but let us wait and watch!!!

300

Yes I have crossed the 300 hurdle last weekend in the game of free cell after losing the very first game of the season - over taking my second best streak of 276 - but this post is not about that and yes this is not a review of the movie 300 either.

India scored a comfortable win against Sri Lanka to secure a spot in Asia Cup final (not sure about the viewer ship of this tournament) and has a chance to go at the title and win the fifth cup playing against the same opponents that they defeated today who also have three titles to their name. In the course of victory India had scored above 300 which is the 300th occurrence in the history of the One Day Internationals.

Way back in 1975 when the ODIs used be a 60 overs a side affair England scored first 300 plus score against India. However West Indies was the first team to achieve the feat in a 50 over game against Australia three years later in 1978. India took the longest time to join the league - in fact it was the last of the top 8 cricket playing teams in the world to do so - in 1996 against the arch rivals Pakistan at Sharjah. From then on in the last ten years India crossed the magic figure 47 times winning 39 of them.

First twenty years i.e, the period between 1975 and 1994 witnessed only 31 instances of 300 plus scores where as last ten years i.e, from July 7 th 1998 to July 4th 2008 the game had 235 such instances. We already have 20 such scores in this year and it is just the half way mark of the calendar year.

Australia has surpassed the score more times(53) than any other team and India has been on the receiving end on most occasions(42). The details are shown in the graph below.

The game also had 43 games so far ( just two games before the 96 world cup) where both the teams playing the match achieved the 300 plus score India tops the list figuring in 18 such games and winning ten of them. More than 25 sides have lost matches after scoring 300 plus in the last four years or so and looking at the trend we might see more such matches and 300 is not a safe total anymore.

Over dosage?

Today was India Pakistan final in a Tri-series and at least from the campus I found that there were very few who were following it and definitely there has been a notable drop in the passion of the viewers. There is a view point saying that there is an over dosage of cricket between these two nations. Lets see how much weight can be given to this view point.

The nations have restored their sporting ties in 2003 after a 3 year break. Since then the nations played 30 ODIs each winning exactly half of them. The following table gives data of number of matches played by India against various oppositions in the last five years.

Team	Played	Won
Pakistan	30	15
Australia	29	7
Srilanka	24	12
England	18	11
South Africa	14	5
West Indies	14	7
New Zealand	12	5
Small Nations	26	24
Total	167	86

No doubt we have played more cricket against them but its just 6 matches per year and if we look back we have played each other 44 times in the last 5 years of the previous decade. Each and every ball was savored by the spectators. So why is the case different today?

Is it the lack of big names - Sachin, Saurav, Rahul, Inzamam, Akthar? Common they cannot play for ever.

One could argue that there is a generation gap between the viewers of 90s to that of todays - the interests and passions are different and may be for this generation the number of matches is over dosage and if that is the case the fact that we have about 7 - 8 matches lined up against each other this year is not a good sign. Wait but then ... less than an year back the whole nation celebrated the success of the India over the arch rivals in the T20 world cup. So is it the beginning of slide down of interest in 50 over cricket after the huge success of the latest 20 -20 format? Time can only tell us that.

It is also important to note that India - Australia encounters are evoking more interest in the nation. Has the Indian team graduated to a new level leaving Pakistan behind and have a clash with the world champions? Not really I guess - we just won one series against Aussies - Thanks to Sachin Tendulkar and the young bowlers.

Any ways it is sad to see one of the greatest encounters of the game losing its charm.

Life after IPL

Today it feels like a calm after a storm. The storm called IPL which has become a part of my routine for the last two months. Today when I switched on TV at 8PM as I do every day, some dreadful movie is being screened at the same channel which telecasted the first edition of this mega event for the last fifty odd days. Even in the wildest of his dreams Mr. Lalit Modi - the man behind the concept would not have thought that it would become such a huge hit. Some thought it was an overdose of cricket but it was definitely not for me. Almost daily you have a cliffhanger- Close to 50 percent of the matches were close finishes what else would I want as a spectator? But Yes - it might have got way too hectic for the players and support staff.

Irrespective of who won the tournament we have seen a good number of emerging players like Niraj Patel, Abhishek Nayyar, Sidharth Trivedi, Manpreet Gony, Yousuf Pathan, Wridhiman Saha, Swapnil Asnodkar, Ashok Dinda, Shikar Dhawan, Amit Mishra, Vijay kumar Yo Mahesh and Virat Kohli.

It was good to see young guns like Gautam Gambhir, Rohit Sharma, Suresh Raina, Piyush Chawla along with the current Indian players like Mahendra Dhoni , Irfan Pathan, Sreeshanth and Virender Sehwag shoulder responsibility for their respective leagues.

It would be incomplete if I don't mention that Saurav Ganguly played with as much zeal as "an youngster performing to find a place in the national team". Another big gun Rahul Dravid seemed to have discovered his lost strokes and shots - it was a heartening effort from him to adjust to a format of game which many thought would least suit his style.

Then we saw some great performances from foreign youngsters and current players like Shaun Marsh, Luke Pommersbach, David Hussey, Shane Watson, Sohail Tanvir and Dale Steyn along with veterans Shane Warne, Sanath Jayasuriya , Muthaiah Muralitharan and Adam Gilchrist.

More importantly we have a good option for a future coach in Shane Warne.

The last few lines might have seemed like a vote of thanks ... but then I think it was a good tournament and the players deserved to be listed by name in this post ... such was the entertainment provided by them during this summer.

Best facing Best

Browsing through and found this interesting piece a couple of weeks back but then waited for this date to post so as to make it more relevant-

Exactly two years back it happened - leading run scorer in tests faced a delivery from leading run wicket taker in test at Adelaide - yes you guessed it right - Brain Lara was leading run scorer who went past Allan Border in the same Adelaide test and he faced Shane Warne who was the leading wicket taker then. I don't know when it happened before that day. Some one said it happened after about 100 years - I have no records about that. However, I can see it happening again in next July-Aug when India tours Srilanka - hope fully our master blaster Sachin who I hope would surpass Brain Lara and face the spin wizard Murali who is a leading wicket taker now.

All hopes down the drain

Carrying a hope of 100 billion fans Indian team started their world cup hunt and I cant believe that the team tipped to get the world cup home lost miserably to Bangladesh in their opening match, virtually putting their progress in this edition at stake. Unlike the previous edition where a team is guaranteed to play 5-6 matches this one is not so - the chance to regroup and getting into form is not allowed in this tournament. The only chance of India going to next round is to beat Srilanka comprehensively this friday and edge over to Super Eights based on the net run rate - the probability of this happening looks bleak given the morale of the team after today's loss. If India does not progress further - March 17th 2007 will remain one of the worst days for the Indian cricket. My gut feel says that we are out of the tournament - please don't blame me for this - for me it is all hopes down the drain after this embarrassing defeat.