Although Dhoni dint agree with this statement after losing the toss as he also wanted to field first on this ground, I am sure it could have been difficult to chase 300 under pressure. Before moving any further with the description of the match, here is one funny conversation which happened just after the toss. Ravi Shastri questioned Dhoni “So, What’s the team composition?” Dhoni replied, “4 guys are not playing, viz, Ashwin, Raina, Chawla and one other guy.” How can he forget someone who has got the best bowling figures for India in World Cup?
India started off well with Sachin and Sehwag opening the batting and both were looking comfortable at the crease with ball coming nicely onto the bat, until Sachin unfortunately got run out on 28. Gambhir also dint last long on a pitch, which was supposed to be a batting paradise and went to the pavilion after making just 39. Then came Kohli, who was playing his first World Cup game against an opposition, which is not well known for its bowling. He got the opportunity he was looking for and went on to make his 5th ODI century in just 40 odd games. He was well supported by Sehwag at the other end, who was committed to play 50 overs but fell short of 2.3 overs, and left the field with his career best score of 175. At once, it looked like he will break the 200 barrier and will become the second player in the ODI history to reach that score, but destiny had other plans for him. India finished off at a mammoth score of 370, which Bangladesh couldn’t have chased even in their dreams.
Tamim Iqbal and Keyes also started off well but then one good over in these circumstances can build huge pressure. As soon as Munaf Patel was given the bowl, the run rate started dipping and pressure started building up, which led to the fall of Keyes. But Tamim Iqbal continued his good show with the bat and put up decent partnerships with Siddique and the skipper Shakibal. Bangladesh soon surrendered themselves to Patel and Co and finished off at 283 for 9, letting India win the game by 87 runs.
There are a few takeaways for India from this match. First of which is “Sreesanth doesn’t deserve a place in the playing 11”. He went for more than 10 runs an over against an opponent, which is still a minnow. In his place, India should consider playing Nehra or Chawla according to the conditions. Second, in my opinion, India should try to bat in every match just as we did in T20 WC tournament in 2007 because given the conditions in India and the bowling strength we have, if we put our opposition into bat, they will surely set a huge target for us. But this is one factor which is not in our control since everything depends on the toss. Last but not the least; keep losing the toss Mr. Skipper :P
PS: The Other Guy is Ashish Nehra ;) (Source: cricinfo)
Saturday, February 19, 2011
Saturday, March 13, 2010
IPL is back...
The IPL is back and that too with a bang, more so because it's happening in India this time. So, whats new in this edition of IPL? First, two strategic timeouts instead of one; second, mid over advertisements which features Akshay Kumar, laughing like a donkey and Gibbs, with a cell phone on his ears from Karbonn and third, defending champions, the Deccan Chargers, despite the IPL taking place in India, are not playing in front of their home crowd. Lets see whether Gilchrist's boys will be able to defend their title or will it be the Daredevils, who lost in the semifinal in both the previous editions?
Three matches have taken place till now and there was no clear winner in any of those matches. But needless to say, in just two days, we have seen a hundred from an Indian and that too the fastest of the IPL; two totals beyond 200; more than 30 sixes. And yes, IPL 3 is just 2 days old. There is surely gonna be a lot of entertainment and thrill as we move ahead.
Ami tomake Bhalo bashi Dada...
Dada is back as the captian and so is his team. After making a modest total of 161 on a flat batting pitch, defending it was a tough task, but with Dada as the captian, nothing seems to be tough. Although he dint score a single run in the match, he dint took a single wicket in the match, it was just his presence on the field and his way of leading the team, which made the day for the riders yesterday. Who would have thought that after being 99 for 1 after 10 overs, the Chargers will go down as the losers. But hats off to Dada and his team for not succumbing to pressure and emerging as the winners of the very first game of the tournament. I hope they do well and make a mark in this edition.
Pathan is the man for Royals...
Sidhu and Warne consider it the best of the knocks they have seen in their entire career. No, it isnt Sachin's 200, its Yusuf Pathan's 100 off just 37 balls against the Mumbai Indians and this time Sachin was at the receiving end. Royals needed 213 for victory and they were down and dusted by the Mumbai bowlers and were struggling at 66 for 4 in the 10th over. Then a storm came, stayed until the 18th over and completely shifted the momentum of the game from the Indians to the Royals. During his short 9 over stay at the crease, he hit 9 fours and 8 sixes, with his 6 fours and 5 sixes coming off 11 consecutive balls. As soon as he left, Dogra took charge and hit a couple of sixes and a four off Satish's over, after which the Royals required just 19 off the last 2 overs. But, Zaheer and Malinga spoiled the party for Warne's men and took Mumbai Indians home in front off their home crowd.
Three matches have taken place till now and there was no clear winner in any of those matches. But needless to say, in just two days, we have seen a hundred from an Indian and that too the fastest of the IPL; two totals beyond 200; more than 30 sixes. And yes, IPL 3 is just 2 days old. There is surely gonna be a lot of entertainment and thrill as we move ahead.
Ami tomake Bhalo bashi Dada...
Dada is back as the captian and so is his team. After making a modest total of 161 on a flat batting pitch, defending it was a tough task, but with Dada as the captian, nothing seems to be tough. Although he dint score a single run in the match, he dint took a single wicket in the match, it was just his presence on the field and his way of leading the team, which made the day for the riders yesterday. Who would have thought that after being 99 for 1 after 10 overs, the Chargers will go down as the losers. But hats off to Dada and his team for not succumbing to pressure and emerging as the winners of the very first game of the tournament. I hope they do well and make a mark in this edition.
Pathan is the man for Royals...
Sidhu and Warne consider it the best of the knocks they have seen in their entire career. No, it isnt Sachin's 200, its Yusuf Pathan's 100 off just 37 balls against the Mumbai Indians and this time Sachin was at the receiving end. Royals needed 213 for victory and they were down and dusted by the Mumbai bowlers and were struggling at 66 for 4 in the 10th over. Then a storm came, stayed until the 18th over and completely shifted the momentum of the game from the Indians to the Royals. During his short 9 over stay at the crease, he hit 9 fours and 8 sixes, with his 6 fours and 5 sixes coming off 11 consecutive balls. As soon as he left, Dogra took charge and hit a couple of sixes and a four off Satish's over, after which the Royals required just 19 off the last 2 overs. But, Zaheer and Malinga spoiled the party for Warne's men and took Mumbai Indians home in front off their home crowd.
Australia finally got a competitor this season...
With two back to back clean sweeps against Pakistan and WI in the test, ODIs as well as the T20s, Australia was looking like the best team in all forms of the game, until they faced New Zealand, who beat them in the T20s but went down 2-3 in the ODIs but it could have been 3-2 in NZ's favor easily. The first two games were very close and the team which held its nerve won it in the end. But to say the least, there are teams in the international arena which can beat the mighty Aussies.
NZ won the one sided match today by 50 odd runs, helped by Bond and Southee, both of whom took 4 wickets a piece. The first two games of the series were close encounters as I mentioned earlier and both the teams came out with flying colors once. The 3rd and 4th games were gifted to the Aussies by the Kiwis.
In 5 days time, they will test each other in the longer format of the game and I would be more than happy to see NZ giving Aussies the taste of their own medicine.
NZ won the one sided match today by 50 odd runs, helped by Bond and Southee, both of whom took 4 wickets a piece. The first two games of the series were close encounters as I mentioned earlier and both the teams came out with flying colors once. The 3rd and 4th games were gifted to the Aussies by the Kiwis.
In 5 days time, they will test each other in the longer format of the game and I would be more than happy to see NZ giving Aussies the taste of their own medicine.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
This is what you can do when you are in Love...
After almost 4 decades and 2961 matches since the start of One Day Internationals, someone scored a 200 and this someone is none other than the Superman of Indian Cricket, the Master Blaster, The God of World Cricket, Sachin Tendulkar. No adjective is enough today to describe the master. A new record got a worthy achiever and this can happen only when you are in Love with what you do. A very few people can come close to what Sachin has achieved in his 20 year old career, with a wooden stick. Hats off to the Master. A true Sachin fan would have shed a few tears down his cheeks when he had seen Sachin reached the Holy score of 200 off the 3rd ball of the last over. I was not the lucky one to see it but listening to FM radio was no different. One could hear the roar of the audience coming from the headphones connected to the radio.
It was simply amazing and I, myself, being a cricket fan, consider myself lucky enough to be born at a time, when I can see Sachin batting Live. It seems like 2010 is the year Sachin was waiting for, to break rest of the records. India has played 4 tests so far this year and Sachin has scored 4 centuries, with one in each of the four tests, thereby equalling Gavaskar's and Dravid's record of 4 consecutive tons in tests and one short of Gambhir, who has 5 and with the form he is in, he will definitely break Sir Don Bradman's record of 6 consecutive tons. Today, I am falling short of words to describe his knock of 200.
These kinds of innings also help nations to come close together. Former Pak greats Miandad, Aamir Sohail and the previous record holder for highest score in ODIs, Saeed Anwar were all praising Sachin on his wonderful knock. Australian legend Warne consider himself lucky as he was not bowling to Sachin today.
Now, as records are meant to be broken, a question arises in my mind. Which batsman can break this record or is anyone out there who dare to do it? Lets leave this question open to discussion as of now. I will definitely come back to it sometime later.
Talking about the match today, it was a crucial one for both the teams. India would have sealed the series after winning this one and SA were in a desperate need for a comeback after a close call in Jaipur. But, after Sachin's 200, the competition proved out to be a dead rubber. SA lost it by a huge margin of 153 runs.
Well, apart from Sachin; Karthick, Dhoni and Pathan also played decently and helped India retain their No. 2 spot in the ODIs with this win.
It was simply amazing and I, myself, being a cricket fan, consider myself lucky enough to be born at a time, when I can see Sachin batting Live. It seems like 2010 is the year Sachin was waiting for, to break rest of the records. India has played 4 tests so far this year and Sachin has scored 4 centuries, with one in each of the four tests, thereby equalling Gavaskar's and Dravid's record of 4 consecutive tons in tests and one short of Gambhir, who has 5 and with the form he is in, he will definitely break Sir Don Bradman's record of 6 consecutive tons. Today, I am falling short of words to describe his knock of 200.
These kinds of innings also help nations to come close together. Former Pak greats Miandad, Aamir Sohail and the previous record holder for highest score in ODIs, Saeed Anwar were all praising Sachin on his wonderful knock. Australian legend Warne consider himself lucky as he was not bowling to Sachin today.
Now, as records are meant to be broken, a question arises in my mind. Which batsman can break this record or is anyone out there who dare to do it? Lets leave this question open to discussion as of now. I will definitely come back to it sometime later.
Talking about the match today, it was a crucial one for both the teams. India would have sealed the series after winning this one and SA were in a desperate need for a comeback after a close call in Jaipur. But, after Sachin's 200, the competition proved out to be a dead rubber. SA lost it by a huge margin of 153 runs.
Well, apart from Sachin; Karthick, Dhoni and Pathan also played decently and helped India retain their No. 2 spot in the ODIs with this win.
Sunday, February 21, 2010
So near... yet so far...
It is rightly said by someone: "Statistics are like bikinis. What they reveal is suggestive, but what they conceal is vital". So, after a few years from now, when you will look at the statistics of the 2010 series between India and SA, you will just see that India drew the Test series 1-1 and won the first of the 3 ODIs at Jaipur, but you will not remember that how close Proteas were from drawing the second test and winning the first ODI.
They were just 9 balls away from drawing the test match and regaining their no 1 Test spot, but Bhajji had other plans. He got Morkel leg before wicket and helped India retain their no. 1 spot. But Morkel almost did an Onions. He was about to do the same to India, what Onions did to them in their home series. Enough said and done, All Izz Well now... :)
But talking about today's match, had that penultimate ball been given a boundary, India would have lost this one. A desperate dive from Sachin would have gone into vain. But our very own Third umpire ,Mr. Hazare, was not sure even after looking at the replay for about 10 minutes and that too from every possible angle. This is what will be called so near yet so far for the South Africans.
Now talking about the shortcomings about India today... well there are lots. India again fail to capitalize in the last 10 overs making just 60 odd runs. With 9 batsmen in the team, India should have scored atleast 80 in the last 10 overs. Yusuf Pathan did not learn the lesson even after being thrown out of the team. He still wants to hit every ball out of the park, though he was successful a couple of times, but he should learn that every ball is not supposed to be hit out of the park. Suresh Raina once again, after getting to his 50, got out in the slog overs.
There is nothing much to be talked about the Indian bowling. With all 3 regular bowlers in the team going for runs, India should consider themselves lucky today that they ended up winning the game. Shreesanth was looking awry with no control over his line and length, so too Nehra. Parveen bowled well in patches, but we need a bowler, who is consistent with his performance. Lets see, whether India will be able to find out a suitable successor to Zaheer and Anil kumble before the world cup or they will rely on their batting to win the matches. Its still one year to go for the World cup, lets see now how India will fare in the next game.
They were just 9 balls away from drawing the test match and regaining their no 1 Test spot, but Bhajji had other plans. He got Morkel leg before wicket and helped India retain their no. 1 spot. But Morkel almost did an Onions. He was about to do the same to India, what Onions did to them in their home series. Enough said and done, All Izz Well now... :)
But talking about today's match, had that penultimate ball been given a boundary, India would have lost this one. A desperate dive from Sachin would have gone into vain. But our very own Third umpire ,Mr. Hazare, was not sure even after looking at the replay for about 10 minutes and that too from every possible angle. This is what will be called so near yet so far for the South Africans.
Now talking about the shortcomings about India today... well there are lots. India again fail to capitalize in the last 10 overs making just 60 odd runs. With 9 batsmen in the team, India should have scored atleast 80 in the last 10 overs. Yusuf Pathan did not learn the lesson even after being thrown out of the team. He still wants to hit every ball out of the park, though he was successful a couple of times, but he should learn that every ball is not supposed to be hit out of the park. Suresh Raina once again, after getting to his 50, got out in the slog overs.
There is nothing much to be talked about the Indian bowling. With all 3 regular bowlers in the team going for runs, India should consider themselves lucky today that they ended up winning the game. Shreesanth was looking awry with no control over his line and length, so too Nehra. Parveen bowled well in patches, but we need a bowler, who is consistent with his performance. Lets see, whether India will be able to find out a suitable successor to Zaheer and Anil kumble before the world cup or they will rely on their batting to win the matches. Its still one year to go for the World cup, lets see now how India will fare in the next game.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Proteas had a good tea, Indians will have a good dinner...
The way Amla and the debutant, Peterson were batting today, it looked like SA will again post a total in excess of 500 and the matter became worse when Laxman dropped a sitter of Amla off Harbhajan, but then destiny had something else in store for the Indians. SA went into tea with 2 down for 228 and would have been thinking of ending the day on a good note. But they forgot, its Eden Gardens, a ground where the post tea session has always been a mystery and most of the times, Bhajji was a part of it. This time also, Bhajji played his part and SA were reduced from 251 for 3 to 266 for the loss of 9 wickets, making just 38 runs in 25 overs bowled after Tea.
Laxman compensated for his dropped catch by taking a blinder to dismiss Kallis off the bowling off Harbhajan. After that, Bhajji had 2 consecutive LBWs to dismiss Prince and Duminy, but he missed out on a Hat-trick. Nevermind, India finished off the day way ahead of her fan's expectations. Now, India have to dismiss the last SA batsman tomorrow in the first half hour and have to score a mammoth total in the first innings to win this one. But one thing is for sure, Indians are gonna have a good dinner tonight after a dissapointing lunch and tea. :-)
Laxman compensated for his dropped catch by taking a blinder to dismiss Kallis off the bowling off Harbhajan. After that, Bhajji had 2 consecutive LBWs to dismiss Prince and Duminy, but he missed out on a Hat-trick. Nevermind, India finished off the day way ahead of her fan's expectations. Now, India have to dismiss the last SA batsman tomorrow in the first half hour and have to score a mammoth total in the first innings to win this one. But one thing is for sure, Indians are gonna have a good dinner tonight after a dissapointing lunch and tea. :-)
Poor Gayle...
This is the fourth time in four matches this series that he has won the toss, but once again he misread the pitch and put Aus into bat on a flat wicket. Watson and Paine started off well, but Hinds took a blinder to send Watson to the pavilion. Then Ponting took charge and score his 29th century to help Australia reach 324 along with decent contributions from White and Hopes.
This time Gayle started off watchfully and it looked like he will take the game away from the Aussies but Gayle again came to the rescue of Bollinger, who dismissed Gayle for the 3rd time in the series. Then WI kept on losing regular wickets until Deonarine showed some resistance. Also, Pollard and Smith tried to up the ante for WI but all was in vain.
Now, what poor Gayle will say after this defeat. Now the series has been lost and he cannot take his words back, so it will be either 3-1 or 4-0 in favour of the Aussies. It is rightly said by someone "jo baukhte hain... woh kaatate nhi..." (those who bark, do not bite...) ;-) Also, it has been said that "Actions speak louder than words..." but Gayle's actions led him and his team down.
This time Gayle started off watchfully and it looked like he will take the game away from the Aussies but Gayle again came to the rescue of Bollinger, who dismissed Gayle for the 3rd time in the series. Then WI kept on losing regular wickets until Deonarine showed some resistance. Also, Pollard and Smith tried to up the ante for WI but all was in vain.
Now, what poor Gayle will say after this defeat. Now the series has been lost and he cannot take his words back, so it will be either 3-1 or 4-0 in favour of the Aussies. It is rightly said by someone "jo baukhte hain... woh kaatate nhi..." (those who bark, do not bite...) ;-) Also, it has been said that "Actions speak louder than words..." but Gayle's actions led him and his team down.
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