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.