Ranji Trophy

For the first time since I have been reading newspaper in Delhi(More than 30 years), Ranji Trophy is getting a very good coverage. Cricket followers who use ESPNcricinfo are also able to follow session by session highlights on the ranji Trophy Live Blog.Twenty seven teams are playing and except for the disfranchised 100 millions from Bihar, most cricket followers are able to follow their team or teams.The followers will grow into committed Test followers, so the  more people following Ranji Trophy augurs well. for the future.
The followers of First class cricket this season seem to have grown. A decent coverage in the papers and the ESPNCricinfo Live blog has brought Ranji Trophy to the consciousness of serious cricket followers in this country and that itself is a multi million population.

The effect has been that Jiwanjot Singh and Ishwar Pandey are respected names and possibly sending more positive vibrations than several international stars.Indian Cricket has the strength to tide over the current misfortunes and build towards a course correction.

Greying of the Indian Test Followers

Steve Waugh tried to breach the final frontier and failed.Australia was able to win the series in 2004 in India but the series was won only because rain ruined India's chance of winning in Chennai. And after the series normal business was restored in Indian conditions.The team looks so ragged at present and bowling options so limited that it is really good that the BCCI does not invite Bangladesh to tour India because the Bangladesh spinners are way better than ours and we do not have the pace of Roach and Best.

The Indian team needs to rebuild but the problem is of the entire cricketing world.With Hockey, Badminton and football competing for Indian eyeballs, it is difficult to imagine that the IPL alone will be able to keep cricket a major TV draw in India for long if the Indian Test team becomes weak.The elderly and the retired are premium TV audience and with growing prosperity, they are also likely to attract advertisers.However the next few decades will see the generation who grew following  Tests retiring.In sheer terms these numbers will match potential viewers anywhere in the world.They will need a strong Indian test team rather than any IPL franchise.Cricket needs a strong Indian team to remain afloat in the world amidst Basketball, baseball, American football besides football itself.

Where Angels Fear to Tread

This Indian team led by Mahendra Singh Dhoni has gone where no Indian team has gone before.Never before since India played its first Test has India lost eight consecutive tests abroad.They drew a Test against Bradman's australia and even in 1936.It had come to seven in a row against England and Australia in 1967-68 but a victory against Newzealand,incidentally India's first overseas win,stopped further damage.Even when India were poor tourists with mainly amateurs  players being who were often rewarded with  lowly paid clerical jobs in Banks, Indian cricketers held out for some memorable draws.

We have moved from amateur cricketers to another state of economic situation when the BCCI contract is not a major part of the cricketr's earnings.The BCCI has other means but match fees or the Bank job is not dependant on performance in one form alone. Suresh Raina is a celebrity with ordinary  test record and Rohit Sharma is a household name without having played a Test.Limited Overs cricket and club based t20 has the possibility to keep cricketers well paid even without playing a test. Saurav Tiwari earns more by playing cricket than perhaps Cheteshwar Pujara does simply because he has played a few ODIs for India and talented first class performers with reasonable IPL records have their IPL match fees capped at 30 Lakhs.The endorsements for Indian cricketers can come inspite of team performances as their IPL performances will also keep them in public consciousness.

Time has come therefore to move ahead on the Supreme Court decision in Zee Telefilms vs BCCI case.The team playing for BCCI is not a national team in the strict sense and BCCI therefore does not come in the ambit of instrumentality of the state under Article 12 of the Constitution. BCCI and its cricketers can no doubt ply their wares for the consuming public but just like the scenes where actor smokes in fil;ms have to show that smoking is harmful, every broadcast of matches involving India should have a ticker running with the message that the team playing for BCCI is not representing India and is a private team representing a Registered Society.This will therefore distance the atists that the BCCI cricketers really are from the national representatives who may be participating in other sports from Khokho to Wrestling.

"plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose"

The French critic and novelist Jean-Baptiste Alphonso Karr's well known epigram "plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose"loosely translated as"the more it changes, the more they stay the same " has acquired a significance to those of us who were old enough to follow the Eden gardens Test of 1977 involving the same two teams playing the Test  Match this week at the same venue.We were cheering, then for Brijesh Patel when he scored 56 to make England bat again and we were cheering for Ashwin when he ensured that England will bat again.More than 60,000 people came to watch England knock off the 16 runs required to win.Few thousands will no doubt turn up tomorrow morning.Yet, two world Cup and a t20 world cup win, a number 1 ranking in tests, a place at the ICC high table and India's becoming a talked about economy which have happened in the interim have still not impacted on the essential malaise of cricketers not taking cricket seriously enough.The cricketers were essentially amateurs then and remain essentially amateurs now.The difference is that they are substantially wealthier now and make money from endorsements and are in effect models or actors who also play cricket.The consistent performance which is required is not really important to these endorsers and cricket's nature where we can laud Ashwin even in our hour of defeat as we lauded Patel then in 1977. Even a below par performance in the Asia cup got eclipsed by Tendulkar's hundredth hundred.What is even more galling is that in 1976-77, the team had bowlers who could bowl England within 350 regularly.At present, both bowling and batting talents look in short supply and the West Indies Bangladesh fifth ODI will end with a better viewership than some days of this Test match.In spite of a decent run since that series in 1977 till the fateful series in England last year, the Indian team has come to resemble "the tag rag squad of bootleggers masquerading as a team called India" which certainly the Indian team of 1979 who were described as such which lost the series 1-0 and almost chased 230 to win was not.

All the three touring teams playing test matches in South Asia have won matches in the subcontinent. Bangladesh spinners defeated the West Indies at Khulna in an ODI in a form of game the West Indies are expert in and had broken millions of hearts in Bangladesh during the World Cup in Dhaka.This puts the West Indies victory in perspective and also belies home advantage.There can be advantage to bowlers or batsmen or to statistics on a flat surface but home advantage is not a really big factor.It worked when the top cricketers cried off from touring India or Pakistan.That looks so many years ago as we have international cricketers playing for Barisal Burners and UVa Next.There is essentially good teams, not so good teams and poor teams, of course on the days of the match.After that it is anyone's game as it appears to be in Perth.

India is not playing this weekend and timings at Perth are reasonable and this may be a three day test and Indians can watch the Test live and see if home advantage helps the home team, turning track or green tops.

Turning Track

Dhoni wanted a turning track.He was given a low not so turning track in Ahmedabad. England did not play Panesar. India managed a good total. Inspite of Sehwag's run a ball 117, India reached a reasonably safe total because Pujara palyed a patient and long innings. In Mumbai, Dhoni has the pitch more to his liking.Only Pujara stands between collapse and respectability Pujara is perhaps the only batsmen who in recent times has played plenty of Ranji and Duleep Trophy matches. The experience shows. It is a blessing that Pujara has yet to play ODIs and t20i and therefore will be generally available to play for Saurashtra once the Test engagements are over.
Dhoni should look at the team at his disposal before wanting a particular type of pitch.

Joys of Test Match Cricket

For the last two days Test Match cricket has produced thrilling run a ball scenario.Clarke and warner today and Abul Hassan and Mahmudullah yesterday batted with such gay abandon that t20 and ODIs seem passe as the matches are still opening up and we are only in the First Act of the Five Act Play. Infact, the Test Match is designed inherently like a five act play but it actually takes five days to unfold and one does not have to indulge in willing suspension of disbelief with one act in Rome and another in Egypt.In the Test Match arena all you have to do is follow as the game unfolds.

All the three Test Matches being played in South Asia over the last few days produced results.The hosts won at Ahmedabad and Galle and the west Indies showed punk and risk taking abilities to win at Dhaka. The positives inspite of slow and low pitches are that Tests are interesting and watchable. What the Dhaka Test and the opening day at Khulna has also proved is that genuine quick bowlers can be effective on any pitch. Yadav perhaps comes closest South Asian bowler on display to the West Indian quicks  and he proved pretty handful at Motera.

Seeing the discomfiture of Bangladesh batsmen against Best and Edwards, one is reminded of the old days when Indian batsmen, especially lower order ones were literally afraid of fast bowlers from West Indies and Australia. Madanlal at Pert in 1977-78 presented the sight as if he was rabbit facing headlights when batting against Thomson. Madanlal was considerably better in his second coming five years later when helmet had come into vogue and he participated in numerous crucial partnerships in Tests and the 1983 World Cup.Even with the helmets, the Bangladeshis will take time to come to grips against genuine fast bowlers.India took 20 years to win its first Test, that has easily been bettered by Bangladesh who have even won a series against a weakened West Indies in the West Indies.

Mohsin Kamal and Tino Best

As Tino Best scythed through the Bangladesh top order, I was reminded of  Mohsin Kamal doing the same thing more than twenty five years ago,  albeit in a one day match playing for PIA XI against Bangladesh at Dhaka's National Stadium.Bangladesh cricket despite their Test and ODI status acquired since then have yet  to learn the art of holding on in face of high speed bowling.For Bangladesh to become a good test side, they must first learn to play attritional cricket.They must also learn to play to their strength.There is no way they can defeat the West Indies on a batting wicket.What they can hope is to have a turner and then give their spinners adequate time and their batsmen can play Permaul and Narine better than they can play Best. 

On a batting friendly wicket, once runs are scored quick bowling can be dangerous as India found out in 1980-81 against Imran Khan.

Bangladesh deserve credit for putting up a brave fight and Sammy needs to be congratulated for his early declaration which resulted in a close match and a result inspite of the two teams scoring more than Five hundred in the first innings.Bangladesh must learn that scoring at four an over can work against you as that leaves the opposition enough time to change things over the second time.

Test Match cricket appears to  be doing pretty well at the moment.If it had not rained in Brisbane, their would have been a result and England face the prospect of batting over another day and a half to draw and there India's innings must be lesson for Bangladesh. Pujara, Yuvaraj and Aswin were able to slow down the innings so that after scoring 521, prospect of losing becomes remote.

Test Match Time

With so many test matches being played all over the world it looks that the World t20 was played ages ago.The most heartening sight is that of Cheteshwar Pujara strutting his stuff at the Test Match stage with an elan that any thought of him being a Bully of Rajkot is to be dismissed straight away.Pujara coming to Test cricket reminds me of Aishwarya rai at Miss India.She had done commercials with Amir Khan and was a much talked about minor celebrity even before the pageant.She lost to Sushmita Sen, She was the most famous runner up.So was Pujara, well known and talked about when he made his debut and he did not disappoint. INJURY DELAYED HIS FLOWERING BUT THE SECOND COMING has been good.  However, He must be knowing that the real success like the A List success of Aishwarya Rai will only come after scoring runs in South Africa towards the end of next year.Till then he can progress to being a very good batsmen at least in India,not that is not needed.Greatness like Gavaskar, Dravid and Tendulkar can come if he is consistent abroad.If he does so there will perhaps be no 8-0s something which had not happened for almost thirty years.

The home of T20

Psychologist Ashis Nandy once wrote that cricket was an Indian sport accidentally discovered in England.While the jury is still out on that one,the theory can be applied more aptly to t20 format.Like most things in cricket, the twenty20 format was developed in England.So much so that twenty20 with Roman alphabets and Indo Arabic numerals are only used in the UK. But t20 was ingrained into the culture of the various islands of the West Indies by Allan Stanford, an American now in jail for financial misdemeanours. Cricketers from the West Indies play in leagues as afar as Zimbabwe and Newzealand.  Cricketers from the West Indies are widely popular in cricket playing world and several of them make millions from cricket across the World. T20 does appear to be a West Indian format accidentally discovered in England.

Rally Round the West Indies

""One People, One Team, One Goal" said Darren Sammy throughout the World Twenty 20.His team rallied around him and the vanquishing of Australia to dust and a more old fashioned victory over Sri Lanka have once again brought the West Indies at the place where they were in 1975 when Lloyd lifted the World Cup in 1975. It was a hard fought 17 run win over Australia.They were talked of as favourite before the tournament but nearly lost to Pakistan in the group game when a resolute last wicket stand saw them through. They went on to lose disastrously in Australia later that year but by the time of the next World Cup were unanimous favourites and continued in 1983 as well when India spoiled their party.

West Indies can build on this victory or fritter it away.As people keep saying cricket needs West Indies.With them on board the cricket World has more than 20 nations playing serious cricket.Twenty Twenty offers the boys in the Carribean opportunity far greater than the NBA.And it offers an opportunity to Darren Bravo as well as Narine.The East Indian West Indian as Naipaul called them are as much integral to the West Indies Team as the Afro Carribeans.

If nothing else, this victory has established that the decline of the West Indies Cricket has at least been arrested if not reversed.

Top Eight in Decent Health

After the Bangalore Test,it can safely be said that NewZealand can put up a fight.The second Test against the West Indies was also similar after a heavy defeat in the first test.They can put up a brave fight and as their drawn series against Australia proved, they cannot be taken lightly.
England fought back after a massive defeat in the first Test against South Africa.The teams are matched up depending on where you play.In India India will be a formidable opponents to England and Australia.Test Matches therefore will be competitive i9n the near future.Only South Africa appear to be matched home and away and their place at the top of the table looks secure.

Two cheers for Akashvani

On the morning of the match at Hyderabad All India Radio came up with an off the tube broadcast where the commentators were describing the weather in Delhi which was humid and had rain written all over it and comparing it with the sunny weather in Hyderabad.Even then as the morning peak audience driving all over the country were aghast with a  home test match being done off the tube some who could accessed live coverage of the Test from the ground with Brian Waddle on NewZealand's Radio Sport Network.

However sometime after that morning better sense prevailed and AIR Hyderabad did broadcast live from the ground with a more enthusiastic bunch of commentators.This was thoughtful as the  provincial ITM Cup kept Brian Waddle off air for long periods.AIR could also make for more engaging commentary by providing  their commentary box with a Television monitor.

Small But Thriving community

New Zealand's resounding defeat at Hyderabad coming on the heals of defeat across formats in the West Indies may on the surface look as if the number eight Test team is in a decline as unlike Bangladesh they do not have a large population and cricket playing pool from which to choose their cricketers. However the other result from Townsville where India defeated Australia to win the under 19 World Cup is an encouraging one if we look at the whole tournament.

NewZealand made it to the semis and the West Indies were the only team to beat the Indian side which eventually won the tournament.The basic talent pool is there which will serve the major countries/regions for well over a decade.The small cricket community of ten full members are in safe hands and will continue to have more teams like afghanistan and Ireland who will want to join the high table.

Indeed British Empire has bequeathed a "common wealth" to the Commonwealth of nations and Cricket more than the English language signifies today the bond which brings the commonwealth together.

Afghanistan is the one big example of inroads made by cricket in a completely post colonial setting with little influence of expats.The team that represents Afghanistan has the core who picked up the game in Peshawar but the joy cricket brings to the troubled nation has virtually reinforced nationhood.That Afghans can take on Australia at almost equal level in an ODI is better than they can do in any other sphere.Cricket has provided Afghanistan with an avenue to find joy and camaraderie within the nation and engage with a larger cricket world on terms which are centered on mutual respect.

Deserving Winner of the mace

South Africa won comprehensively and thereby have become the new Test No.1.This is a commendable experience and also announces the arrival of the new South African Nation to the international arena.Their team is a mix of race and colour and the team selection has moved beyond Affirmative action.The South African bowling combination proved far superior to the West Indies.May be if the West Indies had played with three or four quicks, England would have been challenged even earlier this summer.

The most heartening aspect of the series was that Test matches still have a wide following.Even with the Olympics being played large crowd watched the three Tests.Test Cricket as spectacle has not been diminished even a little.The value has gone up in the manner of Vintage wine.

Narayan! Narayan! Rather Narine! Narine!

Narayan! Narayan! chanted the sage Narada.Narayan looks after the well being of the universe. Now Sammy and the West Indies have three Narayans to look up to.Shivnaraine Chanderpaul,Narsingh Deonarine and Sunil Narine. With these three the West Indies rolled over NewZeaLand the old fashioned way, a clean sweep though in a two test series. A better assessment of the series will be had after New Zealand India series where the batting performance of the visitors will be again tested on slow pitches.If they perform better than in the Carribean  one can agree with Harsha Bhogale that the Indian bowling cupboard is indeed bare.

Reclaiming their spot on the High Table

After a convincing victory over New Zealand, the West Indies can a tleast reclaim their place on the high Table of test Match teams.Only the West Indies have been beaten in a Test series by Bangladesh among the first eight full members,although with a depleted side. Subsequently they have won in Bangladesh and blown them to smithereens at Dhaka in the World Cup.This 2-0 win which has followed convincing wins in t20 and ODIs have established the fact that the West Indies are at least a fighting unit across formats.They climb to number 7 position in the ICC Test rankings and have a few years in which to find a few top class batsmen.Bowlers, they already have both pace and spin.With the riches in spin in the West Indies, may be we have applicants for Indian  citizenship from  T&T and Guyana as a place in the Indian team for a spinner may be easier. 

The Wasted Years

Through the seventies India had a reasonably good cricket side.They won series away in the West Indies and England in 1971 and played a close series against Australia albeit Packer depleted in 1978.They also played a few memorable series at home winning against England in 1972-73 and running West Indies close in 1974-75.Players like Gavaskar, Vishwanath, Mohinder Amarnath, Mansoor Ali Khan,Prasanna, Chandrasekhar, Bedi, Venkatraghavan,Engineer and Kirmani formed the core.They were good and performed well and India lost more often than not.All the while everyone was looking for a fast bowler.Till Kapil Dev arrived in 1978, the search was always on.Generally one medium pacer was picked and a batsman who could bowl opened with him. Even though the seventies did not witness the ridiculous incident of a wicketkeeper sharing the new ball, things were bad.Solkar often opened the bowling and even Gavaskar bowled afew overs with the new ball.

The Indian side was often comprising of three spinners if not four and a medium pacer like Abid Ali who could bat.All these Years India had two competent medium pacers: Madan Lal and Karsan Ghavri.However in deference to our famed spin quartet, they never played together for any length of time. Medium pacers who opened with Andy Roberts in the 1974-75 series between West Indies and India in India included Julien and Boyce who have fewer wickets than either Ghavri and Madan Lal.Hoever in that series the two played only two tests together.India  won both of those tests,though they bowled less than 15 overs between them without taking wickets in the fourt test when India drew level.They had bowled with spunk and taken five wickets at Calcutta in the test before this one.

Madan Lal and Ghavri alternated against England in 1975-76 at home and in Australia in 1977-78.In Australia, the left armer Ghavri took eleven wickets in three and Madan Lal took nine in two including a five for.The series was close and if two spinners and two medium pacers backed by Amarnath had played,the team would have been more balanced and could have possibly won five zero, so close were the three  tests that India lost.The seventies, therefore were wasted years when Indian selectors kept looking for Lillee and Thomson ignoring their own versions of Walker and Gilmour.

The overall performance would have been better.

Four teams from two hemispheres

Teams from the two hemispheres are again pitted against each other in the Northern hemisphere at Leeds and Kingston,Hedingley and Sabina Park to be more precise.Even as the world is caught up in the Olympics, cricketers are playing for the top slot at hedingley and perhaps the bottom one at Kingston leaving Zimbabwe and Bangladesh out of the equation.
Poor performance at international level has dogged the West Indies for some time.However, what is surprising is not that the West Indies have remained the bottom team for so long but how the West Indies sank to the abyss with a team that had Ambrose, Walsh,Lara, Chanderpaul, Sarwan and Hooper.The problem was something more than cricket. West Indies now appear to have atleast gone beyond the fear of cricket losing popularity and NBA attracting talented youngsters and has already launched an offensive by playing a home t20 series in the USA.Newzealand Cricket has a stake in that enterprise and cricket is trying to enter a bigger market. IPL and the Indian eyeballs have seen to it that not only will cricket not become irrelevant in the West Indies but anywhere in the World.
Cricket will make some noise at Hedingley, even as London 2012 grabs more attention at the Olympic Games.

Steyn and Roach

Steyn and Roach in two recent tests at the Oval and North Sound have resoundingly proved why fast bowling is so vital to cricket. Newzealand and England earlier had some hopes of drawing the tests but Steyn and Roach had other ideas. The West Indies were at their best and it must have been after a long time that they had a double century first wicket stand. In Narine, they have a very aggressive spinner but it is their third seamer spot which leaves a lot to be desired.Sammy may be a good captain but he is hardly in Brearly class and even if he is he should play as a batsman who can bowl. After all unless he is better than  Taylor,Edwards and Russell, there can be little justification for him in the bowling line up. Russell as a bowling all rounder will bring more value to the attack., 

Another Challenge

Last year when the series in England promised a cracker,all we got was one where India were pummeled 4-0, from which they are still to recover.South Africa England test series promises to be a competitive one to attract some attention even with the Olympics round the corner. Whoever will win  the series will be ICC No.1 and listeners and viewers in India have a prime time evening viewing of at least an hour or so each evening to look forward to.
The two other formats of cricket on TV or radio can never match this: prime time soap live on TV with contours changing from day one to Five.

the t20 specialists

The West Indies Cricket Team have amidst all despondent comments about them performed creditably in limited overs game more so in t20.They were combative even on the English team, displaying a fighting skill greater than perhaps even than the Australians who are currently touring England.Now they have beaten New Zealand to pulp in the USA.It is an early pointer to the t20 World Cup.This form of cricket is flourishing in the Carribean.The shortest format is actually the game's oldest format except restrictions on number of overs bowled.If t20 keeps West Indian players in business so be it.If Test matches cannot be marketed, it would still be better than say Kabddi in terms of following.May be Test matches could become an amateur pursuit where individuals with jobs other than cricket can play over a short period taking leave of absence.May be in India's case there is a need of state and National association for cricket outside the BCCI and ICC regime.BCCI selects its own team and so is comfortable with the fact that while Gujarat has three teams playing in Ranji Trophy,Chattisgarh and even more populous Bihar has none.This kind of  inequity can only be followed when pleasure of playing is not the main purpose of sport.There is very little evidence of BCCI having done anything at all for those who want to play cricket for fun.An alternate platform for participative and non commercial cricket could be a way out with the Test Cricket set up being handed over to this body as the crown jewel.

What do they know of cricket, who only cricket know?

I have been reminded of C L R James' question every time I read that Test Match Cricket needs to be protected and made attractive and so on.While a Test Match played over five days in the peak working hours especially in India does pose a problem, what really surprised me was Harsha Bhogle's distinction between those who follow Test cricket and those who watch it.Those who follow Test cricket are generally the universe from which will emerge those who will watch Test cricket.That universe may be small but is surely as big as the following of Golf or Tennis.Test Match cricket has been around for over a century and thirty years and has been adapting with the times.Mukul Kesavan recently wrote about the Test Match lovers being put on notice by the band of writers and commentators who are benefitting from IPL ant T20 formats.However,Test Matches have little or no competition to flourish as a minority sport but it is the Formats of cricket which require attention span ranging 4 to 8 hours that are at the peril of the TV driven popularity.

And the notice coming loud and clear from Poland and Ukraine and the TV watching kids is that India will soon be a football loving and following country.IPL and the ODIs will have to compete for the same eye balls.I would shudder what would happen to our mediocre cricket team if our foot ball team breaks into the top 50 or so. Leagues like IPL will not know what hit them when the I league starts attracting some of the leading players.Imagine Rooney or a Ronaldo, even five years from now plying their ware at Yuba Bharti Krirangan. would Eden Gardens be able to get a full house for IPL? A test match will still attract 10000 or so and that would be enough for the Test Match economy. Those who follow will follow it on the Smartphone or in the news and some will venture to the ground as well.

Things will change to the extent that a cricketer playing Test matches may be paid significantly less.May be none at all.May be Test Matches will make it  a sport for Universty Cricketers who are gainfully employed in occupations ranging from Finance to Medicene and  will take a few weeks off to play test Cricket.May be a three Day First Class structure with matches beginning only on Saturdays or Fridays will be needed.Those who fear for Tests need to be reminded that Test Cricket has survived two World wars, the decline and fall of the largest empire of all times and will survive the onslaught of limited overs cricket as well.

Rally round the WEST INDIES.

As the west Indies make another attempt to retain the respect gained in AUSTRALIA in 1960_61,it looks like a lost cause.I have been following them giving the IPL A MISS BUT Shannon Gabriel disinterested with hands in pockets as the bowler is bowling is hardly inspiring.The work ethic has all gone.A debutant at Lord's on the second morning should be perked up. It does not lok to be inconsistent why a host of players are in India when they should be in ENGLAND.The commitment is missing and it is convenientthat IPL is available to them.Playing for the regional team is hardly a priority for many as they hardly bring in money or make them a brand which the selection for the Indoan team does ad in India.So much so that not havong played for Indoa keeps ypu as journeymsn in the IPL. The saving grace is that the IPL and smaller t20 leagues will keep people playing cricket in the Wesy Indies.

Cricket in Kabul

Afghanistan has not only beaten Netherlands in an ODI sson after I thought they needed more ODIs, they also defeated them in a First Class match.Afghanistan are perhaps the only team to have little British heritage or presence of expats from cricket playing countries and yet become a decent cricket team.Of course, they learnt their cricket from Pakistanis in Pakistan and have brought the game back to their homeland.Still Cricket is richer by this accident and it lends to delightful fancy where NRI kids living in Europe can lead India into a footballing era.

Exceptional Overseas Performance

South Africa seems to be the exception to the rule.They drew with Pakistan in the UAE and won in New Zealand.It will be good if England fight to draw the series.Otherwise,English victory against any team in England will not really advance their reputation.Just as England are discovering that cricket is little different outside the UK, Afghanistan are also discovering that t20 and ODIs are different sport.The Netherlands have been playing ODIs for much longer and it will be some time before Afghanistan can be considered as a regular ODI side.

Overseas Win

The travails of English and Indian cricketers in overseas tours makes the South African victory in Newzealand a creditable one.While following the Test Match at the Basin reserve,on the last day, the radio sport commentary team and their impassioned description highlighted why the TV commentary cannot match up.The cricket follower is wiser as he gets a more informed view.The summariser is privileged ex cricketer and gives his view as if talking to the uninitiated not one expert talking to other expert.
Kane Williamson set up a fighting draw and South Africa should have declared earlier and keeping him company for much of the way was Kruger van Wyk, a blue blooded South African.Gayle cannot be accused of being the only mercenary cricketer.

The winner comes second.

Five thousand Englishmen and women are in Sri Lanka for the test series.Test Matches appear to be alive in the UK at least.And the smiling and jumping West Indies supporters at Gros Islet on.Friday also are good tidings for the game.So is Bangladesh's spirited Asia Cup Campaign where the winner actually came second.
The t20 qualifier established Afghanistan as an up and coming t20 team.The Associates are playing cricket of high quality and popularity is.on the rise.The Afghans have aem with no expats and soon cricket will be a majot sport itrhete.r. sport

No Free Lunch

If he Indian cricketers thought Sr Lanka will toil to get them through to the Asia Cup Finals, they were befooling themselves.They simply failed to realise that as per the playing condition,the Bangladesh match was a must win because Bangladesh were playing the last match and they merely needed to win.So India inspite of defeating Pakistan for which the media went gaga,find themslves knocked out after having beaten both Sri Lanka and Pakistan.
The obsession of the media and fans with Pakistan needs to be put into perspective.An India Pakistan match up should be given just the mileage it deserves.Pakistan has been doing well in Tests but are struggling in ODIs under Misbah and it would be in fitness of things if Bangladesh win the Asia Cup.

Waiting for the 50th ODI 50

Now that Tendulkar has reached his hundredth international hundred,albeit in a match which was more about young Bangladeshis batting their way to glory, the Indian media more than its fan can rest easy.The dedicated cricket follower can heave a sigh of relief.The hectic cricket across so many continents means that few matches register for long.However Bangladesh defeating India coincided with Sachin's hundredth Hundred and we will cherish the match.From pure cricketing point of view it has thrown the Asia Cup wide open.Any of the three teams can join Pakistan for the finals.

However, there is a milestone Sachin's 50th ODI hundred to look forward to.It will be the beginning of a fresh count, ten more,may be twenty, who knows what the count will be by the time Sachin has played his last match.It will be really replicate the record for oldest ODI player.Maharaj Singh was 72 and Governor of Bombay,it will be fitting if Sachin is a governor of an I.ndian state when he goes past this record.

Sachin in a Raj Bhavan will be a greater thing than a Bharat Ratna.

Regional Carribean Cricket and Asia Cup

The two regional matches between T&T and Jamaica and Guyana and Barbados finished mid way through the last day.The West Indies batting will continue to be in an unsettled position as the best bet yet appears to be Chanderpaul.However with the changing nature of wickets the spinners will be more than handful for the Australians.

Gautam Gambhir has been an India regular for some time now but has played many more List A and First class matches in proportion to ODIs and Tests.This is a good trait.One that is evident in Ganguly's penchant to lead Bengal quite some time after having retired from international cricket.Playing for Bengal when he could easily do cushy commentary is what marks out genuine cricket lovers from only the players.

Into Hey nonny, nonny. Into Hey Nonny,Nonny

"Converting all your sounds of woe
Into. Hey nonny, nonny."
That's how "Much Ado About Nothing" ends and we are perhaps in a similar situation when a troubled tour to Australia has been converted into a comedy, with Kohli and Raina playing deftly at Hobart.so much so that the eventual failure of India to make it to the finals was hardly noticed.Viewers have moved on to Live election Coverage which will be followed by Holi and the Asia Cup.

Which will mean that for sometime now the spectre of away matches does not loom on the horizon.India can rebuild and even though it might be some time before India could push to the No.1status in Tests,the future will depend on how good we are at home.That was what launched decent performance abroad.If India is not good at home,they can hardly be good overseas.For that to happen our spinners have to be good, keeping has to be good (Remember Mongia keeping to Kumble) and of course batting has to be good.

So with Asia Cup and one off ODI in South Africa notwithstanding, it is the English visit that we must look forward to.Redemption must start from there.

Joy in Hobart

Irrespective of the qualification for the CB Series Final, the win with a Bonus point has served the purpose that sport ultimately is all about.The participants and those watching should be filled with joy.Sri Lanka batted well but clearly Kohli and Raina were enjoying their game.This was the element missing in Australia earlier.Belief in oneself and a pivot of the team are necessary.In Kohli India has found that crucial playmaker.

Joy in Hobart

Irrespective of the qualification for the CB Series Final, the win with a Bonus point has served the purpose that sport ultimately is all about.The participants and those watching should be filled with joy.Sri Lanka batted well but clearly Kohli and Raina were enjoying their game.This was the element missing in Australia earlier.Belief in oneself and a pivot of the team are necessary.In Kohli India has found that crucial playmaker.

Et tu Brute! Done in the ODIs as well!

Something must be rotten in the BCCI world,as the World Champion team has been playing sub par cricket in CB Series and have quickly managed to get itself eliminated.England rallied from a 3-0 whitewash to win the ODI series in the UAE, however Indians have gone from one defeat to another with such aplomb that it is difficult to appreciate that this indeed is the World Cup winning team.Only Yuvraj singh is missing from the Team that won the World Cup and the team is playing poor cricket all round.

Several myths appear to have gone bust.One is something that is not borne by sustained set of convincing data about Sehwag being a good one day opening batsman,his 219 notwithstanding.Even at the World Cup, his ordinariness was covered by Gambhir.He may be scoring at a quicker pace but Saurabh Ganguly and Sachin Tendulkar outpace him by miles in matter of partnerships and winning matches.Another is that the young players are good enough to carry on on their own in ODIs.They will do well at home but struggle against good teams on sporting surfaces.Only Kohli looks to be a genuine prospect and settles one middle order slot for sometime.Sehwag has lost the plot by thinking that natural game and genius that he possesses is siuted to ODIs.He is best suited for tests.It will not be for the first time that he will lose his Test place because of continued failure in ODIs.

Ranji Trophy is played in the best season in this country for outdoors.BCCI can make it a spectacle.Imagine a Bengal vs railways Match in Central delhi with a bengali Food Festival for four days.Ticket Prices could include a buffet.there could be some music as well.Two of the days could be weekends.It is not as desperate as it sounds.
Television does not necessarily make an event a success.India vs France was low quality hockey with medium or low TRP but 15000 people in the stadium madefor a festival atmosphere.Cricket should learn.With so many children playing Tennis and Football and following various leagues around Europe, it is matter of time that cricket will face competition to generate eyeballs.

The generation now in their forties have all been weaned on diet of well attended domestic matches and ALL India Radio providing them ball by ball coverage.This generation will retire in over a decade but live for at least three decades thereafter.several of them will be well healed pensioners.Cricket could build on this generation like in England.The grand children they take to the matches Tests and Domestic would make for the future generation of cricketers.

Certainly better than the Team of 1983 in ODIs

The current Indian Team is the ODI World Champion.The Indian Team has had troubled times in tests.But in ODIs, they are still rather good.They first defeated the west Indies and then They lost fighting to England, pummeled them 5-0 and then easily beat the West Indies.And now they have after dropping a game to the No.1 ranked side, defeated the World Cup runners up and the World No.1 back to back in tough matches.The same cannot be said of Kapil's team which was thrashed so badly by the West Indies in ODIs that Kapil was no longer the captain when India won the World Championship in Australia in 1985.
It must be said of KapilDev and his core team that they remained a competitive Test Team and in 1986 won a series in England 2-0 in 1986.That is the biggest margin by which an Indian team has won a Test series away outside of Bangladesh.They had won 3-1 against Newzealand in 1968 but there was one loss, though the margin remains the same.
Gambhir,Kohli, Ashwin and Yadav can be the core of the team which can win by a bigger margin abroad and achieve the first Test series win in Australia and South Africa.India can build a team which can be good across the two formats like the Australians till recently.

Ranji Final epitomises the Indian Test scenario

For the past several months, the Indian Cricket team does not seem to be doing anything right in Test matches overseas.Cricket followers younger than fifty are trying to remember any similar bad patch overseas.The 3-0, defeat in England was followed by a 2-1 defeat in the West Indies, so it has been better for last 40 years or so.And here the Ranji Final won on the basis of first innings offers the epitome of the situation.

Tamil nadu was packed with recent India discards.Vijay,Mukund,Badrinath and Karthik besides Balaji.They missed Ashwin but they still were a stronger batting side playing on home surface.They lost the toss and lost the plot.That has been happening to India so often, a big partnership and they fall back.A batting team so strong collapsed for 295.How often has this happened on the Tours by India recently.And when Ganguly had led his team to Australia they were not fazed by 600 runs at Adelaide and went on to win a match.When Gavaskar led his team in 1980-81,they lost the first test but came back to draw the second test and win the third when Australia needed just around 150 runs to win the match.Those teams were not dominating World beaters of Australia from 1996-2009 or the West Indies in late seventies and early eighties.However, they were not the ones to be cowed down.And no one dared to talk down to either Gavaskar or Ganguly in their playing days.

Inspite of a commanding lead and no realistic chance of losing, rajasthan did not enforce the follow on.If India has not been going for wins,We know where the attitude comes from.There is a case for a six or seven day Ranji Final and no trophy on first innings lead.Rajasthan's victory though creditible is diminished by the lack of desire to win outright.Cricket matches are played to be won.To fight and draw is all right.To settle for a draw with more than a day's play remaining and 326 runs lead shows disrespect to the game.No wonder very few people turned up for the match.Just two finals back in 2010, Mysore had a full house for a Ranji Final.I hope Akash Chopra will write a book on this next.

The Indian batting colllapses so easily facing big totals that one looks back longingly to the days when Gavaskar could bat for a day for close to hundred and on benign pitches nobody ever got him out cheaply. Throughout the seventies and eighties India used the grinding ability to draw matches at Home.Then came Kumble and the rest is history.Losing at home became a rarity.From there they went on to build a team that could fight well overseas.

We have come back many steps and the next two years will be a time when India can rebuild at home.What India can do is to send a strong India A side whenever Visitors come to play Pakistan in the UAE and play a couple of build up matches..They can at least be familiar with conditions similar to home.

The scenario as it unfolds,Indfia has a bigger hole in bowling to fill after Kumble and Harbhajan than the batting.Any four of Raina, Rohit Sharma, Kohli, Pujara, Rahane can make up for the batsmen retiring but Bowling?Only Ashwin among the spinners took wickets in the Indian winter amongst spinners in first class cricket and he hardly bowled to the flat track bullies.We need to regroup and quickly as October comes with little first class cricket in between.Give our spinners "Turners", I say and hope for the Best.

From the BBC in London the TMS on the smartphone

Even as the World's second best team is fighting back at Dubai I have been able to listen to TMS on Five Live Sports Extra on my smart phone.This is the first time in more than thirty five years of following cricket on the radio that I have been able to listen to TMS for an overseas match.Even when TMS was available on the World Service till the eighties overseas Tests were not broadcast on the World Service, though snatches could be heard on the Sports Round Up and Saturday Special which later transformed itself into Sportsworld.
There are rights restriction for International IP addresses on Sports Extra Website.Maybe the rightholders will realise that there is a market out there using phone applications and using internet radio to by pass these restrictions and block these streams.May be it would be a better idea for the BBC to acquire international rights and take their English into what will soon be the largest English speaking community in the World.They will not be able to compete with the American TV and Movies but to a large population on the move in South Asia and further who follow English Football and Cricket, English is the natural language to follow in and what better medium than the BBC.
The English Language as spoken and evolving in the UK will then be in a closer relationship with the "Coommonwealth",whose common wealth it has really become.It will also pave the way for a post colonial impact in a way which would be at once new and unconventional.

The Best Indian Team to visit Australia

Ever since the miserable condition that this Indian team has landed itself in 2011-12 and particularly against a side which was playing at par with New Zealand little over two weeks back, I have been wondering which was the best Indian team to have toured Australia and for that matter the West Indies.I will go into a detailed analysis later on.However the Indian team to tour Australia in 1977-78 appears to be the best indian side ever to tour Australia.Forget the loss and also the fact that this team was playing a side wekened by packer exodus.Forget also that a team comprising the bulk lost to Pakistan later that year, managed to lose all its World Cup engagements and also lose 1-0 to England before going on to defeat Australia at home.The only competition this side has is with the 1980-81 tourists.This was the series with full strength Australia and India drew the series by bowling out Australia for 83 at the MCG.

The difference between the two teams was simply of selection or India could have had a 5-0 result in 1978.We lost three close matches, the decider on the sixth day. India refused to play ghavri and Madan Lal together though between them they took 20 wickets.Doshi and Shiv Lal Yadav in a team which had Ghavri bowling with Kapil and Patil as the fifth bowler perhaps the best team ever.