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.

Can it get better than this?

A bowling line up comprising of Russel,Roach,Rampaul,Sammy and Sunil Narine with back up from Marlon Samuels.On paper, this looks like the best bowling combination in ODIs.The indian team not having Tendulkar will be in for a good contest.Though India nearly lost a Test,they were clearly favourites in that series.I am not quite sure for this one.
Earlier today, my driver asked when the next match was.I only knew about the Brisbane Test and not about the Cuttack ODI.We were in class I in 1971.The first one day match between two tests had taken place some time during the Winter Break.None of us knew anything about it though there were a few who had heard about the Test series in Australia.One day Cricket keeps coming in and out of consciousness while Test matches remain.1971 turned out to be a glorious year for India in Tests though it was only from the winter vacation of 1972-73,that I started following Test Cricket ball by ball.

Test Matches still cannot be written off

The exciting "Draw" in the Mumbai test where till the penultimate ball all four results were possible,has done a great deal of good for Test Matches.And has again established that Mumbai is the main cricketing centre which their ranji record establishes.Delhi is catching up and the attendance for the first and third tests do not give any cause for worry.

As regards the poor attendance at Kolkata, Mudar Patherya has done an excellent analysis on Cricinfo and his arguments can be supplemented by the fact that till 1982, only New ZeaLand was a weak side and the matches against them presented India an opportunity to win and therefore the matches were well attended.Now we beat most teams at home regularly and draw a considerable amount of Tests, therefore Test Cricket while not out of a knowledgeable fan's radar is not on casual cricket follower's agenda.

However those who can distinguish Doug Bracewell from John Bracewell and remember Floyd Reifer, test Cricket will always remin the real thing.

Get the Distraction out of the way

Media and fans have made a big issue of tendulkar's 100th Hundred.I wonder why the hoopla was missing when Tendulkar became the first player to have scored fifty hundreds.However it would be a great idea if Tendulkar plays all the five ODIs against the West Indies and gets 50 ODI hundreds and 100th 100 as well before the Boxing day Test at the MCG lest the campaign for a first series win in Australia is dwarfed by the 100th 100.Now that every run Tendulkar makes is the first such run made in that format in the history of mankind,We might as well celebrate Tendulkar's last few years in International Cricket and I am sure that will include the world Cup Down under.

Test Matches on Television

Two relatively sparsely populated countries have played a gripping Two test series.One that was followed by cricket followers round the world.SABC 3 was the host boadcaster and channels around the world were showing it.The Time difference was such that at least a session and a half could be viewed in India in the evenings.Which of course has been the reason that I have followed Cummins and Philander more than Yadav and Ashwin ,the local debutants this Indian Winter.And this gives me hope for the future of Test Cricket.Inspite of the naysayers and the dwindling Test audiences, test Cricket will never die.It makes so much of low cost programming available to a not very committed audience worldwide that it offers tremondous flexibility.

One can get up in the morning to a test match in New Zealand or Australia and watch for sometime and come back to the match only the next morning, having kept up with basic details on the Net/news.It would be night time in India for the matches in the West Indies and evenings for those in UK/South Africa .The timings in different zones would vary but what is unique is that the Test Match in one's own country would be the least watched on working days except when school children and school teachers return usually after the Tea session.Hence Test Match of high quality or on certain days of any quality would have a passing interest.To that extent a low turn out is not a worry.Since immediate result is not very relevant spending whole days in front of the Television set is not required.
Moreover,Test matches can be dovetailed with international holidays and in case of India with domestic holidays.Consider a holiday in the hills of Himachal for a week for a thousand families in summer for a Test Match involving India and a top contestant outside the FTP.Test Matches can therefore retain a niche.After all inspite of Chetan Bhagat,Amitabh Ghose is also read.Some readers read both.So with Test Matches and the audience.

Akashvani from Trinidad

Last few years I have rediscovered the Radio.However unlike the sturdy two band or three band radio of old, the radio now is available to me on my mobile phone and my desk Top PC.The range and scope of Radio has greatly improved.I can listen to internet radio streams of various Radio stations.I have now for several years followed Grand stand Commentary of Cricket Matchesfrom Australia's ABC radio, the Test Match special of the BBC on Five live cricket extra for all of England's home matches,lot of New Zealand cricket on Talk Sport and incredibly listened to the last time South Africa played in Pakistan on radio Pakistan.However, Akashvani as in All India Radio remains largely internet unfriendly and therefore though I remember Sushil Doshi and Anant Setalvad who brought the 1979-80 India-Australia live to millions of Indian homes, I hardly remember many Indian commentators of present day.Brian Waddle from New Zealand, Jonathan Agnew from England,Fazeer Mohammed from Trinidad,Neil Manthorp from South Africa, Glenn Mitchell and Jim Maxwell from Australia are more a part of my consciousness.

And beyond cricket there is Five Live's coverage of Wimbledon and extensive news and views.Listening to radio commentary conects you to the place the way TV commentary does not these days.Television commentators are hardly local and Walsh in South Africa or Tony Greig in a sri lanka Pakistan series stick out like aliens on earth.The SABC commentators including Aslam Khota and Natalie Germanos speak with enthusiasm and partisan feeling but are good to the ear especially playing in the background.
The mobile phone has brought back Indian Radio stations to our consciousness including the much maligned All India Radio.The absence of FM radio on Blackberry made me chose Sony Ericsson's Experia Arc and through the Android Market, I downloaded Tune in Radio app.Now I can follow SABC 200fm on the move and listen to Indian music from New Zealand and yes a radio station called Akashvani from Trinidad.
Radio experience has widened and the serendiptous find of a cricket match being covered in Tamil and Gujarati on Short wave radio has been replaced by joys of stumbling on new radio stations on the net.And the reception is much better.

An Exaggerated Fear

Harsha Bhogale read Chemical Engineering followed by a Post Graduate Diploma in Management from IIM(Ahmedabad) and is a gifted writer.He has in a recent article on the strength of a poor attendance at Eden Gardens, bemoaned the lack of interest in Tests.He recalls old times to which one can add the full house gathered in January 1977 to watch England wrap up a match by scoring 16 runs required to win.Much as these are heartwarming instances, one needs to analyse the situation in context.In those days a Hindu vs Stephen's match had up to 20,000 spectators watching.Durand, DCM and Beighton Cup matches in football and Hockey were played to packed houses.A full house for a Test was therefore in keeping with sporting activity of a nation trying to build itself into a modern nation state.
That project is complete and Indians today aspire to various kind of options.A straight case study that analysts like Harsha Bhogale may like to anaalyse with all their IIM expertise is that in 1976, CAB had a few tickets for Bihar Cricket Association and dozens of lucky ticket holders from Jamshedpur,Patna and Ranchi went to Calcutta to watch Tests.Today Bihar with its teeming millions are disenfranchised from First Class Cricket.And while Dhoni may be an icon in Jharkhand, nobody in contemporary Bihar identifies with Saurav Tiwary, even though he is from Bihar and plays for Jharkhand only because Bihar is dienfranchised.But Bihar has found ways to stardom as the three KBC crorepatis can testify.
Even ODIs may not get the kind of attendance seen earlier.More active life, hectic school and coaching schedule, semesters, professional courses have opened avenues for the middle class and left them with less time for Cricket in general and Tests in particular.But Harsha need not despair as the Gangothri Glades Ranji Final in 2010 in Mysore displayed that given the occaison and the weather there can be a full house for a cricket match.It is nothing to despair and Harsha sounds to be making a case for bail out.It is certainly not in terminal decline and Harsha is mistaken about Green Park.Enough support has been there so far and also at New Delhi.However if Test Cricket is really dying may be nothing will help.
But Cricinfo and online streams keep getting audience for Tests as well.Perhaps the news about the decline of Test Matches are greatly exaggerated.

The Indian Batting Scenario.

A spirited West Indies fresh from its victory in Bangladesh did frighten the Indians.However this was the Feroze Sah Kotla and for a changeIndia had the attack which is young and give us hope.When an Indian fast bowler matches the West Indian quick at the speed gun, it is heartening and the dropping of Harbhajan caused no problem at all.

It is the batting that unravelled in the first innings and refused to in the second.The pattern is at once good news in the short time frame with the Australian visit coming up and not so much good news in that the only gen next batsman to feature in this match failed in both innings.That for India to be competitive even against this West Indies side, we need the redoubtable trio of Dravid,Tendulkar and Laxman to bat well means that they are presently indispensable.

They could not save the series in England because selectors had not taken Yadav.Had Yadav with his ninety miles an hour bowling been available in England along with Aswin instead of Harbhajan,the team could have fought in a better way.

Which of course means that an in between generation has to be passed over for Kohli and Pujara to replace the seemingly irreplaceable.Moreover with a reduced work load and little ODI and Ranji Trophy, there is no reason these players may be around for three to four more years.after all army officers and policemen do not teire at forty and the do not do any less strenuous work.They become senior Officers and lead by sheer experience.

1974 Once More

The 3-0 drubbing aginst England in 1974 is fresh in my memory for the reason that as a 9 year old this was the first overseas series that I followed keenly.I had passing knowledge of 1971 victories in England and the West Indies but it was Tony Lewsis's team's visit in 1972-73 that initiated us to Test Cricket.Radio in those days was the medium to follow cricket on and from the city of Kolkata to the Santal Parganas town where our school was located and my village were on the same footing.Medium wave for India matches and short wave for matches played in England and Australia.Alan McGilvray and John Arlott were as familiar to us as Dicky Rutnagar and Jasdev Singh.
Perhaps the last two did the commentary when we were beaten 3-0 with the low of 42 all out after having made more than 350 in the first innings.The current series reminds me of 1974 with only one difference that England went to Australia soon after and were Lilleed and Thommoed 1-4 but this England team has beaten Australia 3-1.
All India Radio is not covering this series and Doordarshan does not show tests. My villlage has no cable and only a few "Dish" connections.We still don't have a Dish and electric supply is generally not available.Test Match Special is not available on World Service any more. So children today in similar situations can only read about the debacle.I hope they soon forget.

Afghanistan in Canadian summer festival

Trinidad & Tobago are full of players who have all kinds of experience across format but they are stuggling against Afghanistan.Twenty overs format is a leveller but this surely is an indicator of a rising crickeing power.The only way T&T can win is by Barath playing at his best.That looks as unlikely as India drawing the edgbaston test.

The Unravelling

The team that beat Australia 3-1 in Australia wer surely the favourites.Come the Nat West Series and India will be the favourites. Afterall, the English lost the ODI series 1-6 to Australia and lost to Ireland in the World Cup.India now represents a stage where the gen next have not arrived in Tests though they have in ODIs.We don't really hear of exciting talents from the four day game.Rajasthan are our National Champions and not a single player from Rahjasthan are in the India set up.This is what is worrying.The Test team do not have an adequate back up.No Broad to take over from Flintoff.Remove the five famous batsmen from the team and we could be competing with Zimbabwe and Bangladesh.After all had Dravid and Laxman not pulled their weight West Indies could have won.If only the West Indies could play with four quicks nad Bishoo they can beat the Indian team this winter.That will be the unravelling of the Indian team made champions at home by Tendulkar and Kumble.

This is just another job

The indian cricketers are centrally contracted and are professional cricketers.Just like so many of us are policeman,scientists and English teachers.Doing essentially an intermittent kind of work,they are playing first class and list a cricket for less than 250 days a year.Harsha Bhogle in a recent article has spoken about poor scheduling.I am sure many of us in India would like to work shorter days in summer and longer in winter.We cannot have it our way and the cricketers cannot have it that way because the Board gets its revenues from eyeballs watching TV and Harsha Bhogale would know that an India- Victoria match however good will not have a TV viewing comparable even to an India Bangladesh ODI. This brings me to the point that amateur cricket can possibly have that kind of sheduling with Railway Ticket collectors and Bank employees given long playing leave as long as they play for India.After the ZEE Telefilms judgement of the Supreme Court, that pssibility also looks remote as it is settled law that the cricketers do not represent India the way the UN delegation does.They play for the BCCI.It is only because of that an iniquitous system where Bihar having 10% of the country's population is not allowed to field a team in Ranji Trophy while Gujarat and Maharashtra have three teams can prevail.BCCI, Mr.Bhogale,knows that it has a brand with a sell by date and has to exploit it as much as they can.If the players really cared they could have stayed away from IPL auctions and used all that time to play cricket in England to their heart contents as free citizens of a functioning democracy.

The King is Dead or atleast Dying

The undisputed Test Number 1 are on the verge of being displaced.The stay there has been shorterthen that of Australia of Taylor and Waugh or the West Indies of Lloyd and Richards and definitely shorter than the Australian Invicibles. Winning two Test Matches should be in the realm of possibility and they can hang on for dear life.However,the series here and in the West Indies have indicated quite clearly that Harbhajan has gone past the sell by date and the Indian Batting without Sehwag will always struggle.Only the medium pacers are on course to improvement.Yuvraj Singh can possibly play for a few matches but Pujara,Raina and Kohli will have to be given an ordeal by fire in Australia, the coming Northern Hemisphere winter.If we are to rebuild, it may be a good place to start.

478 over four sessions.

The Task is cut out in a typical Longewada situation depicted in the film Border, though the consequences are less daunting.The Eleven Indians have to hold on for dear life over eight hours and if they can do that, they can surely seize the mo0mentum with both Sehwag and Zaheer back for the third Test.Like the IAF coming in the morning.

Too early for an Obituary

Several people especially in India are quick to write the obituary of Test matches.Look at number of people viewing test matches, they say.What they do not seem to notice is that even when most of these ODI and 20:20 followers are asleep on 26th of December,thousands of Indians get up to watch what is usually a neutral Test for them.Thousands of Melbourne folks are at the MCG and Test Match is played in its best atmosphere. The next best is perhaps in the UK.It is fitting that these countries boast of the longest Test Tradition.

It is therefore befitting the tradition that India and england are involved in a marquee series that has the potential of anointing a new no.1 in the World Cup Year.India was the defending Test No.1 and a simple victory or a Drawn Series from position of strength would not have the same kind of impact as this one from a match down can have.

This is a series where the Radio coverage is missing on All India Radio.As the test Match special is available only on the net, the vast cricket following class in the rural areas with intermittent electricity and no free to air terrestrial broadcast on TV is generally left out.There was a time when the "away" ODIs were not covered by AIR and Doordarshan and now the away tests are not covered on Doordarshan and crazily enough ECB has chosen to sell Radio rights of a Test series involving India to an agency which do not have any means of broadcasting.As only Akashvani(and not the T&T version)can broadcast live news and, cricket is news legally, speaks poorly of ECB's marketing department.In effect it has shrunk the size of the possible followers of the series.

Centuries by a debutante and a veteran

Two centuries, one by Kirk Edwards in his first Test and one by Chanderpaul,the most capped west Indies player helped the West Indies to draw the third Test. Helped by the weather, the West Indies managed to draw two tests against the Number one side in the World. A drawn series against Pakistan and a hard fought series against India and the impressive crowd in Dominica augur well for the West Indies cricket.The news of their demise were rather exaggerated, just like decline of cricket in England.

West Indies competitive

With responsive and bowling friendly wickets,suddenly the West Indies appear competitive.Had it not been for Dravid and Laxman, India would have been trailing.What it essentially means is that the West Indies have caught up as far as bowling goes.That Andre Russell, Jerome Taylor and Kemar roach cannot get selected means that the West indies have a bowling which can be competitive.This brings into perspective that even in those helmetless days Lloyd's team was great because of Richards,Fredericks, Greenidge,Gomes, Kallicharan, Haynes and Lloyd rather than the bowlers.With batsmen like those Edwards and company can rattle any opposition.They also have Bishoo.So it is up to Bravo, Barath and company to forge pasures new.Moreover, if cricketers will like to live in Miami and play in the West Indies, cricket as a cultural institution gets weakened.It is not an accident that India has become a cricketing superpower in an age in which more Americans work with work permit in india than Indians in the USA.There was a time that players like Uday Joshi and Dilip Doshi would play County championship to make a living.Today even a full ranji season provides for comfortable living.

Well Begun is half done.

Darren Sammy and his team has manged a cricketing rarity by winning a Test Match. In so doing they have ensured that Pakistan would not win a Test series in the west Indies for the first time on this tour.This may not be a new dawn but the West Indies team through the Brian Lara days struggled not on account of their batting but their bowling and it is here that they are showing depth.Even with a weak batting,a good bowling team can off and on produce a good result.If the batting becomes consistent, the team could do even better.In Darren Bravo and Adrian Barath, they have promising youngsters.
It is the bowling which offers hope.Taylor,Edwards,Roach and Russel are genuine quicks and had it been the pre helmet days, the West Indies would have blown several teams away as they blew Bangladesh away in Dhaka during the World Cup.Devendra Bishoo has played only one test and looks a veteran.Sammy swings a few and sandwiched between genuine quicks and an attacking spinner manages to do well.
Inspite of the presence of a genuine all rounder in Shakib ul Hassan and the mercurial Tamim Iqbal, it is Bangladesh and not the west Indies who bring up the rear in Test Cricket.The West Indies did not lose to New Zealand the last time they played and will not lose to Pakistan this time.A consistent record against three teams for a few years will bring them to a feared middling status from where they can launch themselves.The india series coming up will be interesting and bring back the memories of following cricket from the other side of the Time Zone.