Pen The Game

Sad demise of Indian Cricket?

2012-01-04T19:24:00.003+05:30

We are the Champions?

The World Champions?

Also, one of the best Test Teams in the world?

Is it? Obviously Yes! We are. But is it true only for our soil?

Do we fail anywhere outside? Do we fail miserably in our 'tests' on foreign soil?

It hasn't really been the case to this extreme until the recent past.

I was very disappointed when my team, which made me and every Indian proud by lifting The World Cup last year after 28 yrs, was thrashed and could do nothing but submit in England. There is anyways some not-so-soft-corner somewhere inside me for the English, for they ruled us and did what not (according to the History Books I studied in school). And whatever happened in England last year hurt me deep inside.

I was so eagerly waiting to see my favourtie cricketer, The God of Cricket, The Sachin Tendulkar to score The Special Century right there, at The Mecca of Cricket, The Lord's. Sadly, that didn't happen. I told myself, if not first, then it will be in second innings, and likewise, if not this match, then the next. The wait just continued. In any case, I agree, it is just a number. But I still wanted it in Lord's, his first there, if it would have been.

Nonetheless, it is OK, that it did not happen. But what really bruised me was our dismal batting performance. The Batting performance of The Team with not only a strong batting lineup, but applaudable bench strength as well (possibly for the first time ever since I have started watching cricket). And to rub it in, was the constantly publicised, omnipresent fact, that my team had failed to score more than 300 even once! One man stood tall, The Wall, but all he could see from the other end, was one after the other wicket fall.

All over Facebook, Twitter, News Channels, News Papers, and Real World almost everyone was criticising almost everything about my team but honestly, I still believed that they would do better in the next innings and the next, maybe the next after next but that did not happen. This sad chapter is still lying inside me in a corner that I did not wish to visit anymore.

Sadly, I did today. What made me do that is perhaps a pessimist view of the near future when, hope-not, we fail that bad or even worse, again. Everything now seems to be exactly the same - My expectation of The Master to score The Special Century at the MCG, then if not in first innings then maybe the next, then maybe the next match, and here I stand in the present. Another batting collapse in the first innings at the SCG, where The Cricket God averaged 221 before this match (making me all the more excited in anticipation of witnessing history being written).

You ask me again, and I will again say, it is not the failure to reach that magical figure by The Sachin that is bothering me. I will be brutally honest, it is what is happening, the collapse. OK, I can accept Sehwag doing only what he has managed to do, I can accept Gambhir going through a bad phase perhaps, but it is very very hard for me to hear, see, digest the failure of The Wall and The Very Very Special Man in Australia.

How are we managing a batting collapse yet again? Bad pitch, unfavourable conditions maybe, but then how does one of the weakest Australian side in 15 years pile up runs on the scorecard, that including a century and a maiden test double hundred. It is frustrating, upsetting, disappointing to say the least.

Well of course, there are positives that even I see in this series like our Captain always does. For one, The Master looks in good touch. And then, Ashwin knows how to use the bat.

But isn't it time to seek answers to reasons for failure overseas and do something about it, rather than just keep "looking at positives" and "not being bothered about a loss or two". Of course, I believe my team is already doing that and are perhaps also trying out things but after seeing today's play there are bad visuals haunting me.

Someone like Ponting who was going through, perhaps, the worst phase of his batting career quite recently, is standing strong, playing better and better and better in every knock, while I sit and see The Wall not having reached even 100 in the 3 innings and The Laxman who has a history of giving sleepless nights to all Australians, having played a prank on them thrice, scoring a total of 5 in this series till date.

I hate myself today for even accepting that we are good, perhaps the best, only on our soil and that I accept defeat already. "Hate" because, after all I should support my country, patriotism, etc. But then, of course this is the outcome of what has happened since the England Tour. It is the heart vs. mind game, wherein my heart overruled all that my mind said during the England series. Of course, the outcome of that series has subdued my heart to an extent that it is not even contesting and standing up against what my mind is saying now.

And now for the icing on the cake (read: rubbing salt into wounds), one of my friends who is in Australia gave me an account of what he is going through - being mocked at on the streets. Not only this, he says, at times when he calls up his manager at work to say "application is down" he gets a reply saying "wall is down.. so is tendulkar" (sic).

Sigh, let me try and end this frustration and disappointment initiated chain reaction of blabbering with my Heartadramus prediction - The Heroes will Rise, it will get better, this match ends in a draw and it improves exponentially from there on.

Sorry to break it for your hearts, I am laughing at what I wrote in the last line. We are all set to lose this one.

And yes, maybe I am taking all this too seriously and making a big deal out of this, but well if you don't, I am sorry you wasted your time reading this, it wasn't for you.

Arsenal in 2011

2012-01-02T03:38:00.000+05:30

1) Arshavin's winner against Barcelona. When Nasri cut back, the Russian caressed the ball into the bottom corner to send the Emirates into ruptures. Lately, Arshavin has been blamed for being "disinterested" by a lot of Arsenal fans. To me he has always been a player who has given you that impression but capable of moments of brilliance. Yes, the frequency of those moments of brilliance is getting lesser. But, a fully confident Arshavin still has a lot to offer to Arsenal. Wenger has said many times that he is a player who "takes a lot of risks". So obviously Arshavin is looking for more than the obvious simple pass. I hope he extends his spell.

2) WZCZ and Koscielny's coming of age. It wont be wrong to say that a certain moment between these two probably cost Arsenal the chance to get a trophy and more importantly add some belief in the squad. But, the two have gone from strength to strength since that horrible moment. If there is a feel good factor about the current Arsenal team, then Kosh and the big Pole play a huge part.

WZCZ
Has a commanding presence and organizes the defense
Reads the game superbly and is always there to charge the striker on one-on-ones. The most . recent one was the one against QPR in the first 10 minutes.
Handles the long-balls and set pieces with great confidence calmness.
Has exceptional shot-stopping capabilities
He is only 21 and is huge Arsenal fan

3) RVP's wonder strike against Everton and WZCZ's foot-worship of RVP.
Well RVP's strike was awesome, but it was not as if it was unexpected. More importantly it helped us another 1-0 win over a superb Everton (my 2nd favorite team) side. I think David Moyes' team has been one of the most under-rated teams considering the funds they have. Players like Rooney, Graveson (Remember him? He went to Madrid in about 2004 or '05), Lescott, Arteta, Yakubu have had to be sold. Tim Cahill (5' 8''??) has played as a lone-striker for them at times. And yet, they remain one of the most consistent teams in the most difficult league in the world. Arteta's attitude behavior ever since he came to us (towards Everton and of course in Arsenal) has been immaculate.
WZCZ has been criticized by many for "worshiping a human." But do we care for them? It was one of those wonderful "I cant thank you enough" kind of a thing from WZCZ to our captain. It represented most Arsenal fans' sentiments. And it came from someone who is arguably our 2nd most important player (Song is the other one in contention for number 2) this year.

4) Influx of Benayoun and Arteta.

Obviously the OX, BFG and Gervinho signings have been awesome.

Arteta has been immense and his contribution has been there to see. (Probably only player who has started all games apart from WZCZ this season??). But, Benayoun's commitment has been ever-so-impressive. He has never been one to sulk or complain. He scored a screamer against Olympiakos and performed consistently in the Carling cup games. When we needed ever so desperately, he came up with the winner against Villa.

Oh and why does Arteta raise both his arms before taking any set piece???
I thought it was an Everton thing, but he does it here also.

5) Getting rid of Nasri and Bendtner. I dont dislike people like Chamakh and Arshavin. Yes, they find it tough due to lack of confidence, or talent or technical ability.
But, certainly Nasri and Bendtner's comments since they left Arsenal convince me that both of them were "GOOD RIDDANCE."
Cesc's loss hurt us. But, Nasri's??? Not really. Yes, he was a technically gifted players and one that Wenger would have liked to hang on to. Yes, he had 3 or 4 good months in Arsenal. But to me, that was that. His performance in the second half of last season was above average at best.

Bendtner, again not as bad as he people think and not as good as he thinks of himself. But, only if he dint talk could I stand him.

6) Henry's return.
Wenger has said that Henry "will not tarnish his reputation" after fears from Arsenal fans that he might be embarrassed. Obviously his presence will only be beneficial to people like Walcott and Ox on and off the pitch. Arsene has known him as 17 year old and probably knows more about "Henry-the footballer" than the man himself.
Welcome back Thierry Henry! Legend!

Come on the Arsenal!!

The Carlos Tevez saga continues

2011-11-14T05:04:00.000+05:30

John Carlin, a New York Times writer said he was “shocked” at Manchester City striker Carlos Tevez’s refusal to come onto the football pitch against Bayern Munich in their Champions league match at the Allianz Arena, Munich. Tevez has been unhappy with life in Manchester had publicly stated in the summer that he wanted to leave Manchester City to be closer to his family.
Manchester City was trailing Bayern Munich 0-2 when manager Roberto Mancini asked the Argentinian striker Carlos Tevez to warm-up to get onto the pitch around the 59th minute of the match. Tevez refused to obey the manager’s orders. “He will never play for me again.” said a disgusted Mancini in the post-match conference. “He is finished.” Tevez followed that by saying he was not in the “right frame of mind” to play.
“Footballers get paid such a ridiculous amount of money.” said British football journalist Sean Mullan. “That compounds the problem.” Tevez earns an estimated £250,000 a week.
Two days after the incident, Tevez said that there was a gap in communication and he had “refused to warm up, but not refused to play.”
“I don’t know if Tevez is right and there was a misunderstanding.” said Carlin. “I doubt it. Mancini was so angry that he seemed genuine”. Mullan said that Tevez’s refusal was a spontaneous decision and not something he planned.

After enquiry and trial, Tevez was found guilty of five serious breaches of contract. He was suspended for a fortnight and fined two weeks' wages. He was ordered to train by himself and then with the reserves. Tevez’s problems compounded in November when he left for Argentina and failed to appear at the training sessions.

Dario Weitz called the 27-year old Tevez as the “player of the people” because he “never forgot where he came from.” Weitz, who lives in Rosario, Argentina and is a fan of Boca Juniors said Tevez was “born in the slums” in the “dangerous” neighborhood of Fort Apache. “His life, like other people in Apache, should go in misery, except for football.” said Weitz.
Mullan said that the Brazilian club Corinthians had made an offer of €40 million but Manchester City wanted €56 million and €16.5 million in a first installment to release Tevez from his contract. “Corinthians wanted to wait till 2012 when they get their new television rights and hence the deal did not go through.” he said.

“Can the Corinthians pay £250,000 a week?” said Carlin. “How many teams can pay even two-thirds of his salary? He bought himself out of the market.”

“I read an article by an Argentine journalist who called Tevez his ‘own worst enemy’. His own national coach does not want him.” said Carlin, who recently co-authored with Raphael Nadal on “Rafa: My Story” and spent over two years covering football and politics in Argentina. “I sometimes feel sorry for him. He has made a mess of his life. Some players come from extreme poverty and violence in childhood. But then so do players from Africa, some of whom are so well-behaved.”

Both Carlin and Mullan wanted a salary-cap to be enforced in football but could not see it happening.

Did Serena get away?

2011-09-30T09:36:00.000+05:30

“It is a joke” said tennis referee Charles Granville referring to the $2000 fine imposed on Serena Williams for lashing out at a chair umpire in the recently concluded US Open. Mr. Granville, father of American professional tennis player Laura Granville, said that suspending players rather than fining them would make the tennis players behave themselves on court. French newspaper journalist, Cecile Soler said that unless a player goes physical or swears at the officials, he or she should not be suspended. Soler said: “Taking the point away is the biggest thing and that was what the umpire did.”

Williams was down 30-40 in the first game of the second set against Australian Sam Stosur in the final match of the US Open. She then hit a crunching forehand and yelled “come on” before the ninth–seeded Stosur dived at the shot. Chair umpire Eva Asderaki assessed Williams a code violation and a point penalty that gave the game to Stosur. During the changeover, Williams called Asderaki a “hater”, a “loser” and “unattractive inside” saying: “you’re giving me a code violation because I expressed who I am? We’re in America, last I checked.”

Armand Diab, another tennis referee based in Chicago, said that suspension is the ideal punishment. However, he also said that suspension would not be a practical solution as that would mean incurring “lot of revenue loss” for the tournament. Diab said: “It (the fine) is not right or wrong, it’s business”. Diab then said that he had seen cases where men said a lot worse things and have got away with it.
Williams earned $900,000 for her runner-up finish in New York and $500,000 for winning the summer's Olympus US Open Series. Armand Diab described the $2000 fine as a “slap on the wrist” for Williams. Williams was on probation after she had threatened a line judge saying she was going to “shove a ball down her throat” in a semi-final match at the US Open in 2009. ITF president Francesco Ricci Bitti said “I don't think [suspending Williams] would make much sense because it would penalize the people handing out the punishment."

“What has happened in cricket has not happened in Tennis.” said Granville. Cricket, another British-originated sport, gives the ultimate authority to the on-field umpire. Cricketers are suspended if they don’t respect the officials. Granville then compared the incident to the “two-year ban on first violation” imposed on players who are tested positive for using illegal substances. Granville then likened the incident it to the time taken by players between points. “Do Nadal and Djokovic follow the 20-second rule between points? The importance of players has had a corrupting effect (on the tennis authority).”

Soler, who has been writing on Tennis for Le Figaro for 20 years, called the umpires to be “brave and make the right calls”. Diab, on the other hand, said: “I read the recent article on New York Times which said how poorly the umpires are paid at the US Open”. He said that the tennis officiating profession could be under threat.

Arsenal 0 -2 Liverpool. But there is still hope!

2011-08-21T02:00:00.000+05:30

After a summer of unrest, Cesc finally leaving for Barca, Nasri on the verge of going to Man City, the Gunners had a lot of questions to answer. Over the summer, the struggling Denilson and the effervescent, versatile Eboue had also departed. Wilshere, Rosicky, Gibbs were out injured. Song and new signing, Gervinho were serving suspensions. As if that was not enough, the improved Koscielny injured his back 10 minutes in the game. There was no lack of effort from Arsenal. Theo Walcott, Arshavin tried to make runs, but could not quite penetrate. Nasri starting the game was surprising to me. But, Wenger did say that "Samir has been 100% committed ever since he joined the club". I don't think the fans should berate players looking for a transfer. Would you not go to another employer if he offered you twice of what you are earning? "Part of our job" is how Wenger described the Nasri situation. Can Wenger convince Samir to stay just like the United gaffer did last year with Rooney? Unlikely, but possible.

Happy times ahead?

Back to the game. Frimpong came in for Song and had a decent game considering that it was his debut and he is not even 20 yet. Carl Jenkisnon and Ignasi Miquel, another couple of teenagers had impressive games and would definitely be good backups to Kosh and Gibbs (although Jenkinson is a right-back). Arsenal competed well with a really depleted team for 70 minutes before they lost Frimpong, who got a deserved red card. (another red card on debut for a gunner after Gervinho and Kosh). With 10 tired men on the pitch, Arsenal finally went down to a freak own goal from Ramsey. 'Rambo' certainly did not have a good game and the own goal summed up a bad day for him. Looking for an equalizer the Gunners committed men forward and were punished by Suarez. The gunners lost 2-0.

Arsenal's best player on the pitch was Vermaelen. The Belgian was a ROCK and kept Carrol ( and the Liverpool attack) quiet for the most part. Along with Sagna and a fit Gibbs, and an improving Kosh, Arsenal seem to have a solid back four. Schzeny has been stable. With Wilshere coming in, I believe there is still light at the end of this tunnel. With the current squad of players (assuming everyone is fit and Nasri and Bendtner leave), our starting eleven would be:
Schzeny
Gibbs
Sagna
Vermaelen
Koscielny
Song
Wilshere
Rosicky/Ramsey
Arshavin/ Walcott
Van Persie
Gervinho

on the bench:
Jenkinson
Squilacci
Miquel
Arshavin/ Walcott
Rosicky/Ramsey
Ryo Miyachi
Chamberlain
Chamakh

I think this is definitely a top 4 team. If Wenger can pull out a creative midfielder or convince Nasri to stay, we will be right in the mix for a push for the title.

I would still urge all the gunners to get behind our team. Wenger said before the game. "You can question my decisions for the club, but not my loyalty towards the club"

With some caution I say, "Bring on Udinese"

French Open Final 2011: Federer poetic, but Nadal is the unstoppable warhorse

2011-06-06T05:57:00.000+05:30

It was another amazing match between two athletes who have brought out the best in each other and played some unbelievable matches over the last 5 years. It is not for no reason that Nadal is considered to be the best on clay. His record is 40-1. (Won 40, lost 1). If ever there was anything that was going to stop this unrelenting Mallorca man, it was Federer. The last time these two met at the French Open final was in 2008, when Nadal won 6-1,6-3,6-0, one of the most lopsided games in the history of French open finals. Several had written Federer off. But the Swiss king came back to life. He hired Paul Annacone as his coach, tweaked his game a little and indeed, came back to win the French Open the next year, in 2009. If ever there was anything missing from the Federer resume, it was to beat Nadal on clay at a Slam.

So, Nadal started slowly and Federer broke the Spaniard in his first service game and raced to a 3-0 lead. He was well and truly in control of the first set and got a set point at 5-2. His audacious drop shot missed the line by inches and Nadal fought back to 5-3, still a break down. Federer then seemed to hit one of the troughs and lost his confidence completely as Nadal took the first set 7-5, winning 5 consecutive games. 1st set Nadal, but what a confidence-breaker for Federer, having had a set point.

Nadal continued his strong momentum. Most players would have mentally been disintegrated against the inspired world number 1. But, Federer continued to fight and just managed to stay in the set. There were some unbelievable exchanges. Shots that would have been "sliced" or "floated" in by others were turned into offensive shots by these two. Federer, with his amazing athleticism and smoothness. Nadal, with his whippy, loopy top-spin into the Federer backhand. Despite Federer's fightback, Nadal got to set point serving at 5-4. He lost the set point and to add to the drama, the skies opened up and there was a 9-minute delay. Nadal had said before the game that he would not want it to rain and have the conditions dry for that would favor his top-spin game better. The players came back with Nadal serving at 5-4, 40-40. Inevitably his first serve was a top-spun serve high into the Federer back-hand and he earned himself another set point. Tribute to Federer, he fought back, broke back and the 2nd set went to a tie-break. Fortunes continued to swing. After the path the first set took, where Federer lost a set point, you could not help but get a feeling that this would go Federer's way (with Nadal having dropped set points). But, that indeed, was not the case. Nadal took the tie-breaker. Potentially, another huge blow to the Federer psyche.

Only one-time has Nadal lost a game having won the first two sets. That was way back in 2005 in Miami. The opponent? Surpise surprise - ROGER FEDERER. But that was when Nadal was a 17-yr old and Fed was on top pf the world. A totally different cup of tea now!

Nadal again raced to a 4-2 lead in the 3rd and just when you thought "that was it", Federer played some unbelievable drop shots and made some volleys out-of-this world. He made more unforced errors but came up with more winners and took the 3rd set 7-5.

Nadal was consistent. After the first 2 games of the match, he played the whole match at an (80/100) level. Federer, on the other hand, played some points at (50/100) and some at a godly level, more like 150/100. Nadal would run-down every ball. It was upto Federer to come up with the drops, the volleys, the approaches, the slice and all the variations.

Nadal came out in the 4th set and was under the pump and 0-40 on his serve. From there on, he managed to rise and what a rise. He came back to win the game and took the 4th set 6-1 and won the match 7-5, 7-6, 5-7, 6-1.

An unbelievable match. Some rallies and exchanges were out of this world. The final score may be a bit flattering for Nadal for he knew he was in a dog-fight for the best part of 3 hrs and 50 minutes.

The Federer-Nadal rivalry may be reaching its twilight. But if the history is anything to go by, we are in for another final between these two. For every time they have made it to the French open final, they have also made it to the Wimbledon finals!

French Open, IPL and AF bans a journalist

2011-05-25T06:56:00.000+05:30

Interesting news at the French open?

Disappointment for the fans as Ana Ivanovic lost to unknown Swede Larsson, 7-6, 0-6, 6-2. Bizzare score that. More disappointment as Somdev Devvarman lost to Ivan Ljubicic in straight sets. Finally some good news as Sania Mirza won her 1st round singles and doubles match. She is paired up with Ukraine-born Russian Vesnina. Nadal survived a major scare from the 7-foot American, John Isner as he had to dig deep to come back from 2 sets to 1 down to win in 5 sets. The others have gone through fairly comfortably, including Federer, Soderling, Djokovic and Murray. Roddick has withdrawn from the FO and no one seems to care! :(..... Can he do a Goran'01 in 2011?!

The best match of IPL - qualifier 1. Why? Most of my favorites were on show - Dhoni, Zaheer, Gayle, Vettori, Bravo, Ashwin! And what a game it turned out to be. Terrific performance by all these guys. Gayle 4-0-19-0 with the ball. Dhoni 29 off 19. Zaheer got Hussey and Vijay and finished with 4-0-31-2 and Ashwin got Gayle cheaply, so it does not matter what he did after that. Vettori was the only one who had an off day :( Dont care too much for the result, oh ya Chennai won in the last over. For some reason it is always fun to see the owner of the losing team's faces (especially Shilpa Shetty), this time it was Vijay Mallaya. So, probably I did support Chennai, coz their owner does not try to come to the limelight. Who is their owner btw?

Alex Fergusson banned one of the journalist's from attending the pre-match conference. The journalist had asked about the absence of Ryan Giggs from training despite being told before the conference to not talk about it. HEres the full story:
http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/24052011/58/champions-league-ferguson-bans-journalist-mentioning-giggs.html

Some pictures from today's game:

Going down! Kohli and Pomersbach.........in a nasty collision

Albie, its the pitch not your pool!......Morkel Dives to the crease without a bat!

Calypso joy!.......Bravo celebrates with team mates

India - Pakistan World cup history

2011-03-29T23:03:00.001+05:30

Pakistan's overall ODI record is superior to India in the head-to-heads. However, in the last 8 years or so, since that blitzkreig 98 off 75 balls from Sachin in World Cup'03. India and Pakistan have played 35 ODIs, 17 India has won, Pak has won 17 and 1 abandoned.

In world cups, India have a hundred percent 4-0 over Pakistan!

1) 1992 - India was all but out of the world cup by the time they faced Pakistan. Pakistan on the other hand were clutching on by the finger nails. Famously bowled out for 74 by England before rain came to their rescue to keep their world cup hopes alive! India won the toss and put up a fighting 216 on the board. The top scorer? .......surprise surprise......SACHN TENDULKAR! Amazing that, I randomly pick out a match some 20 years back, look for the top scorer......and there he is again! Unbelievable......Pakistan were bowled out for 173.....this being the highlight

......yeh dil maange (monkey?) more (kiran?)

2) 1996 - A high-voltage encounter. India won the toss and decided to bat at the Chinnaswamy stadium in Banglore. There was already some controversy to this game even before it started. Akram declaring himself "unfit". India rode on Sidhu's 93, and Jadeja's blitzkrieg 45 off 25 to lift India to 288, last 3 overs yielding almost 50 runs. Pakistani openers was looking to make lightwork of the target. Anwar and Sohail were unstoppable. The highlight?

3) 1999
The circumstances were similar to the 1992. Pakistan was almost through to the semis and India was all but out. But the stakes were high. Edgbaston was full off people waving the tri-color and indeed the Paki flag. India made 227. Pakistan was bowled out for 170 odd, Prasad picking five wickets again. The highlight - Sachin's pull off Shoaib(prabably at his fastest at that time) through mid-wicket for a boundary!

4) 2003
India was through to the super 6 this time and Pakistan had to beat India to stay alive. They made 274, India's nemesis Anwar scoring another century. The atmosphere at Centurion was electric and Pakistan were charged. But so was another certain Tendulkar for India. (who admitted later he had some sleepless nights preparing for this game). Sachin cut Shoaib for 6, then clipped him through square leg for 4 and then played his signature on-drive for 4 to remove Shoaib from the attack after just one over. This set the tone for India's innings and reached the target with ease in the end. Sachin scored 98 off 75 balls......

5) 2011?

Got this forward.......

AFRIDI :- Hum Sachin ko kisi bhi haal me century ki century nahi banane denge.
SHOAIB :- Magar hum use rokenge kaise..?? Wo to Gajab ki form main hai....
…
…
…
…
…
…
…
…
…
AFRIDI :- Hum 100 ke andar All Out ho jayenge....!!

Almost the perfect recipe

2011-03-25T00:10:00.002+05:30

250-260 pitch
2 spinners
Ashwin in
Raina in
......that was almost the perfect recipe for India. It is our home ground. So, it is not, by any means, illegal or unsporting to make pitches that suit us. Featherbeds donot suit us, neither do green tops. I am not saying we cant win on those pitches. But the Mortera wicket was ideal for us against Australia. It is the ideal wicket for us to play against most teams except for may be SriLanka. Should we meet the islanders in Mumbai, a green top may be the order of the day for us.

Indian bowling is badly exposed on featherbeds and this was brilliant from the Indian thinktank (if indeed they asked the curator to prepare this kind of wicket). Playing 2 spinners, playing Raina for Yusuf(as we were not able to bat 50 overs in previous games) were again good decisions. The only worry now for India is Munaf Patel. Did we really need him? I guess, the answer was no today.

But looking ahead to the Pak game, the Mohali pitch has traditionally has had something in it for the quicks and we will need Munaf there (though there is still some doubt if he qualifies as a 'quick'!!) Quite ironic, if you think that a few years back he was India's fastest bowler!! (http://www.canadiandesi.com/read.php?TID=736)
The reason Munaf is playing is that he is more economical than Sreesanth and Nehra. He was our 4 bowler today, bowled 7 overs for 44 runs without picking up a wicket. In the Windies game he was our fifth bowler, and bowled 5 overs. Now I would assume that the logic behind not playing Sreesanth is that we can't rely on him completing his 10 overs, given his erratic nature (of bowling!). But between these, Sreesanth is definitely more of a wicket taker. He is more likely to produce the 'magic ball' to give us the break through. So, if Munaf is only bowling 5 over spells, why not play Sreesanth?? That is something for Kirsten, Dhoni and co to think about.

Everything else looks good for us. I cannot see Pakistan defeating us. I know the "cricket...game.....glorious.....uncertainities" but Paki batting is too weak.

Kamran Akmal, Hafeez, Asad Shafiq, Younis Khan, Misbah, Umar Akmal, Afridi, Razzaq. I really cant see this batting line-up score more than 250 consistently. Umar Gul is their only bowler that will really concern India. I cannot see Afridi picking easy wickets against our batting the way he has against the likes of WIndies, Canada and Kenya.

Unless something dramatic happens, India should beat Pakistan pretty comfortably........

When Wallace was the menace

2011-03-22T21:59:00.001+05:30

The last time Pakistan and West Indies played in a major trophy in Bangladesh was way back in 1998, in the champions trophy quarter final.

Pakistan were the favorites. But there was a West Indian batsman who had some plans of his own. Nope, it was not Lara. It was the burly West Indies opener Philo Wallace. The Barbadian went barbaric and smashed the likes of Wasim Akram, Azhar Mahmood and Saqlain all over the park after Lara won the toss and elected to bat. By the time he was run out, he had scored 79 off 58 balls and West Indies' run-rate was over 7 after 20 overs. Despite a mini-collapse, Shiv (the only member from that game in the current squad) made sure that West Indies reach a more than respectable 289. A total which could have been much more, given the start. Pakistan were never in the hunt even though the margin of victory was only 30 runs for the Windies.

Philo Wallace then smashed India in the semi-final for a quickfire 50 starting with a first-ball six of Srinath. In the final, he hit South Africa for a 103 off 102 balls. Quite ironic that he just disappeared from the international scene after that and hence not many remember him.

West Indies will want Gayle to do a Wallace and pray to Shiv to provide the calming influence he did some 13 years back!

CRicket World Cup 2011 and India

2011-03-14T22:53:00.000+05:30

Well, the India-South Africa match a classic for a neutral, but for an Indian fan it was a horrible memory which needs to be erased with a good performance against WI.

One of the best things about the match from the Indian perspective was the message from the skipper to his team at the post-match conference. He said it twice.

We should play for the country and not for the crowds

Which is why Dhoni's 12 off 21 balls may have received a lot of flak from a lot of crowd, but that was what was required at the time. To not bat 50 overs was criminal. And had India won the game from there, it would have put paper on lot of cracks. So, even though there is a slight chance of India being knocked out before the qrtrs, I think this is a good kick on the backside of this Indian team and I am hopeful they will revive their performance against the West Indies.

1) One HUGE question is when the batting powerplay needs to be taken? and more importantly how we approach it?
a) Take it from overs 16-20, especially in the situation that we were in the SA match. Sehwag and Sachin were butchering the SA attack. So why not
b) Second option is take it from overs 46-50. So even if we commit hara-kiri like the SA match it would not ahve as drastic as effect as it did when we took at around the 38 over mark.

But most importantly, its not when you take it, but how you bat in the PP.
It does not matter when you take it, 5 overs 29 for 4 is not something we can afford in any 5-over period of a 50 over game.

2) 2nd seamer and 3rd bowler
India would be better off preparing spin-friendly pitches and going in with 2 seamer + 2 spinner combo. (Nehra + Munaf) is a very weak combination. We cannot play both in the same match. Both are decent bowlers, who have performed reasonably well over the last few months. But both are ordinary fielders a can barely hold the bat. We do not have the bowling attack which can restrict batsmen on featherbeds like the one in Nagpur. So why dont we take the home advantage? Lets prepare 250-260 wickets and get our spinners into action.

The WIndies are loaded with lefties (Gayle, Devon Smith, Chanderpaul and the "Lara-clone" Dwayne Bravo). I am almost certain that Aswhin will play this game, which would mean either Nehra or Munaf will make way.

While India are top of the pool and almost assured of a place in the qrters, there is still a chance that they can go out.

These are the games that remain in our pool:

1) West Indies vs England
2) Ire VS SA
3) Ban vs SA
4) India vs West Indies

Ind are on 7 points from 5 games (1 to play)
WI are on 6 points from 4 games (2 to play)
SA are on 6 points from 4 games (2 to play)
Ban are on 6 points from 5 games(1 to play)
Eng are on 5 points from 54 games(1 to play)

For India to go out, the following has to happen

WI loses to Eng
SA beats Ireland (which is a given)
Ban beats SA
India loses to WI

Point to note is that when SA plays Ban they would have already qualified (assuming they would have beaten Ireland by then). So there is a good chance they will give the likes of Kallis and Steyn a break. That gives Ban all the more opportunity to cause an upset with the crowd behind them.

By the time, India plays WI, all the other matches would have been played.
Either way, they must have all bases covered, "Be Men" and "Do the right things"!!

Arspective: Why Arsenal will beat Barcelona

2011-02-16T11:26:00.000+05:30

Biggest game of the season for us. It is an absolutely mouth-watering contest. Compared to the last time,

1) We have a better goal keeper. Yes, Almunia almost single-handedly kept us in the first half with some amazing saves. But goal keeping is not only about shot-stopping. It is about being able to collect balls of corners and free-kicks, about distribution, about leadership, about communicating with your defenders. For all the criticism the Spaniard receives, I do believe Almunia is a good shot-stopper. But, Wojicech ticks more boxes than the Spaniard when it comes to all the aspects of goalkeeping I just mentioned.

2) Better central defenders. Last time we had to play Sol Campbell and Sylvestre over the course of the two games. Gallas got injured in the first game. And then Song had to drop back, which in turn disturbed our midfield, since we had to get Denilson in there.

3) Better mid field.
Like I said, we will have Song in the midfield.

Fabregas missed the second leg last time and hopefully he will be there for us over both legs.
If Nasri plays (latest news, that he has been passed fit), then again we will have hugely improved Nasri in the midfield compared to the last season.
This time we will have the quick-feet'ed wonder boy, Wilshere compared to the sometimes-laboring Abou Diaby. The Frenchman, no doubt, is a talented player. But the English prodigy is that- a prodigy.

4) A much improve Theo Walcott. He always had the pace. He setup that Adebayor goal in the champions league 2 years back against Liverpoool. He tormented Barcelona last year.But he was not a great finisher. He has added that aspect of the game, and the English winger looks a more complete player now.

5) Van Persie for Bendtner. The Big Dane has his critics. But he is not as bad as he looks sometimes. But Rockin' Robin is again a class above rest, never mind the Nick.

Overall, we are more mature, a more solid looking unit. I know its a cliche for those who listen to Arsene's press conferences, but I think that is true. We will have Arshavin, Diaby, Rosicky, Squilacci, Denilson, Nick and Chamakh on the bench.

Last time was a 2-2 draw. With all the improvements, mathematically, it should be a 3-1 to Arsenal!!

So there you go.........

Come on Arsenal!!

World Cups and Champions Trophies

2011-02-07T10:30:00.001+05:30

World Cup
England, 1975
In the first edition of the ICC cricket World Cup, the 'Black Cat' and his men were unstoppable. In fact, it was Clive Lloyd, whose counter-attacking 102 off 85 balls set West Indies on the way in the final to 291 in 60 overs. A young Viv Richards scored three run-outs to derail the Australian retort and the West Indies won by seventeen runs to win the first World Cup.

World Cup
England, 1979
It was the West Indies again, who clinched the second edition of World Cup. The unstoppable Vivan Richards hit an unbeaten 138 as the West Indies posted 286. Geoff Boycott and Bearley took almost 40 overs for their opening wicket partnership of 129. Joel 'Big Bird' Garner took five as England folded out for 194.

World Cup
England, 1983
One of the upsets of cricketing history, if not the sporting history. Rank outsiders, India were bowled out for 183 in the final by a West Indian bowling line-up, which consisted of Andy Roberts, Malcom Marshall, Joel Garner and Michael Holding. Looking at the pace quartet, Kapil and India would have taken 183. In a 'nothing to lose' situation, Kapil's Devils bowled the West Indies out for 140 to put India on the cricketing map.

World Cup
India, 1987
For the first time, the World cup moved outside England and the number of overs were reduced from 60 to 50. World champions, World Series champions, hosts and hot favorites, India, went out in the semis to England. Chasing Australia's 253 in the final , Mike Gatting's infamous reverse sweep triggered a collapse as they lost to the Kangaross by seven runs.

World Cup
Australia/New Zealand, 1992
The tournament saw colored clothing and day-night games for the first time. Pakistan would have gone out had rain not intervened in the 13th match of the tournament against England. As history has it, they went on to beat England in the final by 22 runs. Young Wasim Akram came round the wicket to pick two in two to seal England's fate to another defeat in a World Cup Final.

World Cup
India, 1996
Sri Lanka shocked the world, first with their '15-over tactics' and then going on to win the world cup. Jayasuriya and Kaluwitharna set the tone and typified Sri Lanka's apprach in the world cup- fearless, aggresive and nothing-to-lose. Ashanka Gurusinha, Aravinda De Silva, Arjuna Ranatunga, Hashan Tillakratne and Roshan Mahanama gave the middle order more than just a solid look. If Jayasuriya and Kalu failed, as they did in the semi-final against India, Aravinda would counter-attack and the rest would play around him. Vaas, Wickramasinghe, Murali and Dharmasena, supported by the likes of Jayasuriya and Aravinda formed pretty much the ideal bowling line-up for the sub-continent conditions. They went on to beat Australia in the final by seven wickets, the first time a team batting second won the final of a world cup.

Champions Trophy
Bangladesh, 1998
In the first "non-world-cup" ICC tournament, Jacques Kallis inspired South Africa to a five-wicket win over the West Indies in the final. The young all-rounder from Cape town took five for 30 and then scored 37 to set the Proteas on the way to victory after Philo Wallace had scored a blazing 103 off 102 balls. Earlier, in South Africa's semi-final encounter against Sri Lanka, Kallis smashed 113 (5x4, 5x6) off 100 balls. Murali was hit for 48 runs in six overs.

World Cup
England, 1999
Lance Klusener was unstopabble for South Africa. With three genuine all-rounders (Klusener, Pollock and Kallis), the Proteas were ideally suited to the English conditions. They seemed to be cruising in the tournament, but a Steve Waugh-inspired Australia had other plans. Pakistan, another team with three quality all-rounders (Abdur Razzaq, Azhar Mahmood and Wasim Akram), also had a wily spinner in Saqlain and an express tearaway in Shoaib Akhtar. But Mcgrath, Warne, Waugh and Co. proved to too hot to handle for the men in green. The final turned out to be an anti-climax as Australia steam-rolled Pakistan, winning by eight wickets.

Champions Trophy
Kenya, 2000
A young Indian team, led by a new captain, Saurav Ganguly, comprised of little known, but fearless players like Yuvraj Singh and Zaheer Khan. India was the team to watch with an ideal blend of young and experienced players (Sachin, Saurav and Kumble). They shocked Australia and then humbled South Africa in the semi-final. They were running away with the game in the final before they were hit by this thing called Chris Cairns. The burly, curly-haired all-rounder first bowled a frugal spell of 10-2-40-0 when the Indian openers were running away with the game. He then walked in at the fall of the third wicket and scored a belligerent unbeaten 102 to take the Black Caps to an unlikely victory.

Champions Trophy
Sri Lanka, 2002
Shoaib Malik became the first player to be give out LBW by the third umpire in the inaugural game against Sri Lanka.
By this time, India were on a roll. An aggressive skipper (Ganguly), a stable yet explosive batting line-up (Sachin, Saurav, Sehwag, Dravid) at the top,a young middle-order(Yuvraj, Kaif), quality spinners (Harbhajan, Kumble) and a good attack led by Zaheer. They had most things of what a good team should have. They were on the back of an amazing Natwest series win in England, where they beat the hosts by two wickets chasing 326. They were well and truly on the way to victory in the final after restricting Sri Lanka to under 250. Rain gods smiled on the hosts and saved their day. Ironically, the exact same thing happened the next day in the replay and India had to share the series with Sri Lanka.

World Cup
South Africa, 2003
The World cup moved to the African continent for the first time. Only two teams could have stopped the Aussie juggernaut in the eight edition of the World cup. One was Pakistan (because they are Pakistan!) and the other was India, with its wealthy batting line-up. Pakistan, being Pakistan, were knocked out in the first round! The impressive Indian sprint was halted by the Aussies in the final. Ponting and Martyn made the most of a nervous Indian bowling line-up to post a mammoth 359 after India put Australia in to bat! Even desperate Indian prayers for rain, which was their last hope, were not answered and India was bowled out for 234.

Champions Trophy
England, 2004
When Ian Bradshaw strode out to the center in the final, England had reduced West Indies to 147-8. By the time he came out, he and wicket-keeper Browne had put on 70 runs and West Indies surpassed Englands' 217. An amazing victory, which unfortunately, turned out to be a flash in the pan rather than a West Indies revival.

Champions Trophy
India, 2006
Contrary to expectation, this tournament was marked by low totals (forerunner to this world cup?). Teams defended scores of around 200 successfully. In one of the preliminary games, Jerome Taylor took a hat-trick, when the Aussies were chasing 225 for victory, to bowl West Indies to victory. Unfortunately for them, there was no such drama in the final. Australia bowled West Indies out for 116 and chased it down. The final will also be remembered for Ponting pushing the Indian chief guest off the stage during the presentation ceremony.

World Cup
West Indies, 2007
The first World cup in the Carribean will, unfortunately, be remembered for the death of Bob Woolmer. India's exit from the World cup in the first round meant that the viewership reduced drastically. None of this affected the Australians. They went on to hammer Sri Lanka in the final, thanks to a whirlwind 149 off 104 balls from Gilchrist. Ponting, Gilchrist and McGrath completed a hat-trick of World cups.

T20 World Cup
South Africa, 2007
India and Pakistan had a chance to revive themselves after first round exits in the World cup earlier that year. Revive themselves, they certainly did. In the first round encounter between the two teams, India won in a bowl-out after the two teams had tied. The final seemed to be heading to a similar result. Chasing 157 to win, Pakistan needed 12 to win off the last over. When the equation got down to six off four, Misbah attempted a 'Marillier' over short-fine-leg. He forgot that there is a Mallu in every corner of the world. Sreesanth took the catch and India won by five runs to send the nation into delirium.

T20 World Cup
England, 2009
Pakistan was surrounded by all sorts of off-field controversies. Change of captains, players being threatened, match-fixing allegations, terrorist attacks on touring teams. It was typical of them to go on to win the second edition of the T20 World cup in such circumstances. Afridi was the hero for Pakistan, both with bat and the ball. The all-rounder hit an unbeaten half-century in the final to take them to an easy eight-wicket win over Sri Lanka.

Champions Trophy
South Africa, 2009
Ponting and Watson inspired Australia to yet another major trophy. Australia made a mockery of England's 258 in the semi-final, winning by nine wickets. Watson and Ponting scored centuries to take their team home after England recovered through Tim Bresnan's 80 to take them to 258. In the other semi-final, New Zealand beat Pakistan. Watson scored another century in the final to guide them to a six-wicket victory.

T20 World Cup
West Indies, 2009
Mike Hussey reminded everyone of the 'Australianism' to pull off an amazing come-from-behind victory in the semi-final over Pakistan. He hit Saeed Ajmal for 19 in the last over of the match to take the Aussies home. But, it was Collingwood's England who had the last laugh, winning their first major trophy after beating Australia in the final. Man of the Series, Kevin Pieterson was in fine form. His 47 off 31 balls in the final helped England overhaul Australia's 147.

source: cricketweb.net

OZ open and Wozniacki

2011-01-26T11:04:00.000+05:30

This Wozniacki press conference was quite interesting. The 20-yr old world number 1's press conferences were termed "boring" by the south american media. So she comes out and starts talking. She does not give the journalists any chance to ask questions for about 6 or 7 minutes. Was quite funny.......

Some excerpts:
(No questions asked)
They say I am boring and I answer the same things. But, if the journalists ask the same questions, I will obviously answer the same answers.....
my Racquet feels good......
I deserve to be number 1......I feel I am playing great
(she is number 1 and not won any slams)

How was your cricket yday?
2) I had a good time playing cricket yesterday with Flinch and Peter Siddle!

What do you think about Kelly Danlglish, the new Liverpool manager?
3) Hope it changes things and the lads play well

What will you say to Andy Murray if you meet him
4) Talk to him about football, as he is an Arsenal fan (now I think Murray is my favorite tennis player!!) and I am a Liverpool fan, so will have a few things to talk about.

Here it is.......

In some other(maybe old) news,

Roddick was blown away by wawrinka in straight sets, who in turn was given a tennis lesson by compatriot, Federer

Kuznetsova and Schiavonne played the longest (4 hr and 43 mins) women's tennis match in a slam. The 30-yr old Italian prevailed in the 3rd set, winning by 16-14.
Schiavonne then played Wozniacki, who spent half the time as much as her on the courts.Surprisingly, the Italian won the first set 6-3. Playing against the Dane who was 10 years younger to her, she was looking good in the 2nd set. Many long ralleys were played, and the Dane eventually prevailed in the set and in the match.

Djokovic blew away Berdych in straight sets and he will face Federer.

Winner of Nadal/Ferrer will most probably face Andy Murray who is on the way beating the unorthodox Dolgopolov from Ukraine, who has been the surprise package this tournament. The Ukrainian had earlier beaten Soderling in the round of 16.

India's World cup squad and the Australian open- Fighting Sania loses to Henin

2011-01-18T12:34:00.000+05:30

So, here is the world cup squad for the world cup for India

MS Dhoni (capt & wk) -
Icy Cold Captain. I like the way he does not celebrate after we pick up a crucial wicket, or even after victories. Accused of trying to include CSK players, though I think that's rubbish. With a weakish bowling line-up, his captaincy will be tested again.

Sachin Tendulkar - His last World cup and surely there is a world cup written in his fate........Surely that is why the final is in Wankhede and (not in Kolkata).....An unbeaten century from the little master in the final to take India to a victory........
Man of the series of 2003 WC. Was asked to retire by many, (most famously by Ian Chappel and his 'mirror mirror on the wall' statement). Quite amazingly, has enjoyed his best years of cricket since then.
Is definitely going to retire from ODIs after the world cup

Virender Sehwag - Not much to say. There is only one way he plays.

Gautam Gambhir - He gives us that extra bit of steel. Not one to back off or hold back with the bat and also with his mouth. Plays the short ball well (unlike a few others in our line-up), got a good temperament in big chases.

Yuvraj Singh - Some question marks about his selection. But, I do feel we need him. Has the art of Pacing the innings. Will be an integral part coming in at 4/5 as India will try to maintain the lefty/righty combinations. His bowling could be more than a bonus.

Suresh Raina - Ideally he should come in after the 30th over, as then it will be like a T20 game for him! I don't think he should be as automatic a selection as he is since his ability to play long innings is yet to be proven.

Virat Kohli - Another one who can pace his innings. So that makes it Sachin, Dhoni, Gambhir, Yuvraj and him who can pace their innings in chases.
With a weak bowling line-up and flat pitches, bowling first could well be our mantra for the world cup.

Yusuf Pathan - He will battle for a place in the team with Raina. To be fair to him, Raina is as inconsistent as him. His bowling is better than Raina's. But, overall a tough call between the two. I do prefer Baroda man as he gives us the X-Factor.

Harbhajan Singh -

Praveen Kumar - Can swing the ball both ways. The last significant ODI trophy we won was the VB series in Australia 2007-08. He was instrumental in us winning the two VB series finals. His batting comes handy down the order. If fit, will be an automatic selection

Zaheer Khan - His form will be one of the keys for us. Except for the 2003 World Cup, the world cup winner has had the highest wicket taker. I dont think any of our bowlers will end up with the highest wickets (I hope I am wrong), but his form will be vital.

Ashish Nehra & Munaf Patel
Dont inspire a great deal of confidence, both Nehra and Patel. Both are sloppy fielders, and both cant really hold a bat. Since they are very similar, only one of them should have been in the squad. Which one? I dont know.

Piyush Chawla - Is he our wild card? I would think so. I do like his attitude. Has also been the stand out performer for Kings XI Punjab. But he has not played for 2 and a half years. Maybe, that might work in our favour. Will he be in the XI, a lot depends on the wicket we will play on. Interesting selection, and one that I am in favor of.

R Ashwin - Another interesting selection. Might play if the opposition is stacked with lefties. Could also be used by Dhoni in the opening overs since our fast bowlers leak too many runs in the first fifteen. Another selection that I do approve, since he has a lot of variations in his pace and flight.

Australian Open' 11

The raw power of Sania Mirza lost to the efficiency, deft touch, one-handed back hand and the fitness of Henin in the first round of the first grand slam of 2011. The 141st ranked India, who was the most googled-for tennis player last year (after her marriage with Shoaib Malik), won the first set 7-5. It was pretty neck and neck in the second before she lost 6-3. She ran out of steam completely in the third to lose 6-1. She has, unluckily, been pitted against the top players in a lot of these slams. I remember the 2005 Wimbledon when she lost to Kuznetsova.

Elsewhere the top seeds went through easily- including Federer, Berdych, Roddick, Del Potro, Nadal and Murray. Soderling is also on his way to a win.

Arsenal vs Ipswich, SA vs India, Rahul Dravid, Arsene -the best coach of the decade

2011-01-12T11:20:00.002+05:30

So, Arsenal go to Ipswich to play the first of the Carling Cup semi-final ties (2nd one will be at home after 2 weeks). They got a real kick up their arse, drawing 1-1 at home to Leeds.

On Vermaelen, Wenger says

Vermaelen is out for another setback, which could keep him out for another month

On Squilacci,

Squilacci is out for minimum two weeks and maximum three weeks

He has mentioned that he is on the look out for a defender. It is not often that Wenger comes out in public and says he is looking for someone. So, if he has said it, then rest assured, he really does mean it.

On Ignasi Miquel, the young Spanish center back, Wenger said

He will be, at minimum, on the bench

Young Gunner- Ignasi Miquel

So, we can expect a mix of the our "first" and "second" teams, a mix of the team we played against Wigan and the one that played Chelsea/Birmingham. Ipswich were hammered by Chelsea 7-0. But that is hardly any good news for us. We had hammered Newcastle in their home in Carling cup only to lose to them at home in the premier league game. So, nothing is done till it is done. We have a great chance to get home a trophy and we can not relax till we put it in the cabinet.

India take on South Africa in one of the more "meaningful" ODIs of the recent times. Like Vettori said recently, there are far too many non-meaningful ODIs. This one is important for both teams as they prepare for the world cup. I know the conditions over there will be totally different to the one that will be there in the world cup. But, for India it will be a test of character. Nothing better than a win against a strong team, as far as building the confidence in concerned. With injuries to Sehwag and Gambhir, the team almost picks itself. At least the batting order.

I would play Sachin, Kohli, Yuvraj, Rohit Sharma, Dhoni, Raina, Y Pathan, Zaheer, Ishant/ Munaf, Harbhajan and Nehra

The reason I will not play Vijay (despite him being a natural opener) is that with Gambhir and Sehwag returning to the squad, I do not see Vijay making it into the team for the world cup. It will also give Kohli the opportunity to play the new ball, which he might have to if he comes in at the fall of two early wickets (batting at four in the world cup). We still need a second spinner for the world cup and the tussle is between Ashwin, Ojha and Chawla. From what we have seen in the IPL, Ashwin seems to have the variations needed for the limited-over format. However, with the likes of Yuvraj, Pathan, Raina, Rohit in the side, I do not see a need for a second spinner, unless he is a top notch one. So, maybe he might be replaced by Harbhajan. I also think that we need to keep faith in Yusuf Pathan. As inconsistent as he maybe, he gives us the X factor, as we saw in the 4th ODI against NZ. Especially in the sub-continent, he can turn the game on its head in the space of five overs. For South Africa, there is talk that they might play two spinners (World cup in mind again!!!), Plessis and Pakistani born Imran Tahir. I do think that only one of them will play. If Tahir does make his debut, he will be the second Pakistani born to play for another country in the space of 10 days (Usman Khawaja, the other). Stein-Tendulkar contest promises to be another cracker! As does the Zaheer- Smith contest, this one only for the Indians! Praveen Kumar's injury must be a concern for the Indians. Not only can he swing the ball both ways, he is very handy with the bat down the order and a safe fielder. Munaf/Ishant do not really inspire too much confidence in most Indian supporters.

Talking about confidence, on 11th Jan Dravid celebrated his 38th birthday. Just like his batting, this one went unnoticed. Here's a toast to the one-and-only Jammy!

Oh, and to those who doubt our gaffer's credentials, here is something for you:
http://www.espnstar.com/home/news/detail/item561747/Wenger:-World-Coach-of-the-Decade/

Arsene Wenger has been named the best coach of the decade, beating Alex Ferguson and the rusty little twat coach of Real Madrid.

Overall, I believe Wenger is the best!!

Ryan Babel has been fined/reproached by the FA for putting this picture up on his twitter:

The ref gave soft penalty to Man U and sent off Gerard in the FA cup game between Liverpool and Man U.

Top 10 of 2010

2011-01-03T11:09:00.003+05:30

January 3-6, 2010
Pakistan's spectacular loss to Australia
It was the 2nd test in Sydney. Mohd Asif destroyed Australia's top order as the hosts crumbled for 127. Pakistan replied with 333. They took, what looked like, a match-winning lead of 206 runs. Australians were 257 for 8 in reply. Mohd. Yusuf then put all men on the boundary for a struggling Hussey and let the Aussies back into the game as Australia recovered to 381. Chasing 176, the men in green were rolled over for 139 in the fourth innings. That is why I said, Pakistan's spectacular loss to Australia, not Australia's win over Pakistan!

2-6 February, 2010
Yusuf Pathan's 210 against South Zone. Click here for video
Yusuf Pathan smashed an unbeaten match-winning 210 to secure a record-breaking chase in first-class cricket. In the Duleep Trophy Final, West Zone were chasing an improbable 541 for victory. West Zone were 239/3 when the elder of the Pathan brothers strode in. He smashed 19 fours and 10 sixes to complete the record-breaking chase.

27th Feb, 2010
Arsenal's 3-1 wins against Stoke
When Stoke City's Ryan Shawcross rammed into Aaron Ramsey's ankles to give him a double-fracture, many of us feared a repeat of Eduardo-Birmingham episode a couple of years ago. The Gunners came back instead to complete a 3-1 victory of Stoke at the Brittania Stadium. It was a sign of how the young gunners had grown. Come on Arsenal!.

28th Feb, 2010
2nd T20
Australia had blitzed New Zealand in the first T20. The Kiwis needed something special in the second game. Boy did McCullum deliver something special. His 116 off 56 balls set them on the way to huge total, which they eventually won in the super over.

14th May 2010
Australianism
Michael Hussey strode in with Australia at 105/5 in the 13th over. Chasing 192 to win for a place in the T20 World cup final, Hussey smashed six 6's to complete an amazing win. There was, after all, still some Australianism left in the current lot.

Sachin Tendulkar
If Australianism was back alive, Sachinism continued from where it left and kept going.

First man to score 200 in ODI,
Match-winning 214 against Australia in the Bangalore test, and
the 50th test century in the second innings of the first test, which began India's fightback in the series

are three of many Sachinist moments for the year 2010.

VVS Laxman
Someone on Cricinfo commented:

"Though Tendulkar is the god, it is Laxman who answers our prayers"

While it is easy to overlook Sachin's contribution sometimes because of the number of times he gets us out of trouble, there is no doubting that Laxman's knocks were timely and came under intense pressure.
His match-winning knocks of:

103 not out against SL, chasing 267 in the fourth innings
73 not out against Australia at Mohali, chasing 216,again in the fourth innings
96 against SA in the recent test at Durban

were all amazing rescue acts.
Many of us get so intrigued by his wristy stroke play, that we forget the steely resolve that this man posses underneath. We all got to see the 'other side' of Laxman when he gave young Ojha a piece of his mind, when the young left-arm spinner was "wandering" during their last wicket partnership.

Keep going VVS!!

Sept 11, 2010
Djokovic's comeback win against Federer
The Serb staved off two match points to complete an amazing comeback in the semi-final of the US Open 2010. He won 5-7, 6-1, 5-7, 6-2, 7-5 against the Swiss Ace. Later in December, in the Davis cup final, he inspired Serbia to a 3-2 win over France.

October 3-14, 2010
Commonwealth Games
Before the games, there were a multitude of concerns including:
likelihood of floods in Delhi due to heavy monsoon rains,
poor living conditions at the Commonwealth Games Village,
delays in construction of the main Games' venues,
possibility of a terrorist attack by militants.
But all this was put to bed as Delhi/India recovered to stage the games in a grand fashion. Not only were the games a huge success, but also this was the best performance by host nation. They finished with 101 medals, second only to Australia. Lord Sebastian Coe, former Olympic Champion and chairman of the 2012 London Olympics Organising Committee, described it as "potentially the moment that could change the course of athletics in Asia, the moment that could inspire thousands of people who'd never even seen an athletics track before to get involved."
It also prompted an article in New York, whose headline was

"A technology called Jugaad"

November 14, 2010
Amazing last day victory by Sebastian Vettel
Going into the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, the 23-yr old German had only an outside chance to win the championship. Going into the final day of the season, Ferrari's Alonso was leading the charts, closely followed by team mate Webber. Vettel's chances of winning the Championship were very slim. As history has it, Alonso finished seventh and Webber eighth. Vettel finished first to win help Red Bull to their first Championship.

Nov 29, 2010
Barcelona's annihilation of Maurinho
With the La Liga increasingly becoming a two-horse race, the El Classico was going a long way to determine the Spanish championship. Earlier in the season, when Real Madrid went for their champions league tie with AC Milan, he churlishly pointed three fingers to the crowd (for three Scudettos). When Barcelona rubbed in five goals on the Real Madrid, the Portugese's face was a sight to see.

No finger pointing this time!

Dec 27, 2010
Arsenal 3-1 Chelsea
Arsenal's young men were being questioned with their ability to win "Big Games". They answered the critics with a thumping win over Chelsea. Carlo Ancelotti's men were thumped and dumped to a 3-1 loss. Admittedly, the men in Blue were on a bad run of form, but the character and spirit shown by the Gunners was there to be seen. Now, are they ready to take the next step? Come on you Gunners!

Arspective: Arsenal Vs Chelsea, Boxing day tests (Ind- SA and the Ashes)

2010-12-25T23:22:00.005+05:30

It is that time of the year. Feast of football and feast of test match cricket. Boxing day test in MCG has been a long living tradition. (Sehwag's 195 comes to mind immediately). Unfortunately, it turned out to be in a lost cause.

sehwag's 195 at MCG

So the 4th Ashes test could not have been poised better. Going in at 1-1, it promises to be a cracker. Hugely important tests for both teams. I will not really read into the fact the momentum is with the Aussies. In the last Ashes series, there were change of fortunes. In Cardiff in the first test, England just manage to draw the test. They, then convincingly won at Lords, lost by an innings at Headingly and came back to win the final test at Oval.

So, both teams have some thinking to do before the test.

1) Do England move Bell up the order? This is a move suggested by many. If it does happen, then Trott will move down to number 6. The big question for England would be how Trott responds to the demotion. Does he respond to the situation in the Dravid kind of way? (Kolkata) or Will it affect his confidence? On his debut at Lords, he did score century batting at number 5. Looking at Bell's confidence, his scores, I would definitely move him up to 3.

2) Steven Finn? Looks like he is going to be rested and Bresnan will come in. Bresnan has been in good form. Finn went for over 5 an over in the last test. According to Ian Chappell, he has been made to hit-the-pitch. Rather than pitch the ball up and let it seam/swing. So, the lad has lost confidence.

3) Should they drop Collingwood. I would say no. If he does get dropped then Eoin Morgen will come in for him. I am inclined to sticking with Collingwood, as he is a brilliant slipper.

There is no reason for England to panic. The rest of the line-up looks ok.

Australia?
1) Ponting looks fine after his injury scare. So he should play

Down, but not out. Ponting will be back for MCG

2) Australia's bowling Johnson, Siddle, Hilfenhaus, Harris and Steve Smith is a worry. I definitely dont think they will play four quicks in Melbourne. So, who do they drop? Definitely not Johnson and Harris after their 6-fors, not Siddle either (he has been very consistent this series). So, it looks like Hilfenhaus will be dropped. But, he was their most economical bowler and helped Johnson and Harris pick up those wickets by bottling one end up. Dropping Helfenhaus seems to be the easy option, but not necessarily the correct one.

3) Who will be the spinner? Steve Smith did not bowl a ball in the 3rd test at Perth. While Perth is one of the fastest pitches in the world, it does assist the spinners. Vettori's six-for against the Aussies in 2001, a period in which their dominance was at a peak, comes to mind. So, since Smith does not have the vote of confidence, and neither doesBeer. So what will be their bowling line-up? Will they play four quicks? or Play a low-on-confidence spinner?

Their batting looks reasonably settled. So, I expect Hughes, Watson, Ponting, Clarke, Hussey, Haddin to be in the line-up.

Australia have the momentum, but England, I think, have the class. I see them winning at least one of the next two tests to take home the Ashes.

Meanwhile, India take on SA in the second test at Kingsmead, Durban, One of the faster pitches in the country. 14 years ago India got blown away for 100 and 66 and lost by over 300 runs. 10 years on, a much improved performance by the tourists, but yet lost by a 174 runs.

Zak - Spearheading the attack

For India, Zaheer will come in for Unadkat. I would love to see Harbhajan sit out and make way for Ojha. If the Indian think tank is considering Singh's batting skills then definitely is not the right way to go. We struggled to pick 4 wickets in the last test. Picking 20 looks a far way off. Batting, it is obvious that they should have never played Raina in the first place. By doing so,
a) It probably cost us the test. Some support for Sachin in the second innings and who knows what might have happened.
b) If he continues to play tests, Raina the ODI and T20 player will lose confidence, just like he did 4 years ago and with the world cup coming up, this is a move fraught with (double) danger.

Rest of the batting looks fine for me. Pujara in for Raina is a straight and simple swap. Indeed, one that could/should have been avoided by having Pujara play in the first test.

India have their task cut out. I expect our batting to fair much better this time. Bowling is a big worry. We ahve seen them bounce back in the past. So I do think they can bounce back

Arsenal welcome(or do they) Chelsea. This has got to be it for them. If ever there was a time to play Chelsea, this was it. They are low on confidence, short of victories,a perfect time for us to start winning the 'big games'. Fabregas, RVP, Diaby are back. Bendtner will return to the time as a 'father'.

One of the comments on the Dane I read:

Nick has become a father in recent days at least proves he’s not shooting blanks off the pitch

Unfortunately, Fab(lap)ianski is back for us. So Wojicech, who was impressive against ManU will go back to the bench.

Excerpts from Pre-Chelsea Wenger's conference:

Q) team's injury status......
A) We cannot complain about the injuries right now. Compared to the recent years.
diaby, RVP, Fab, Bend are back. We play many games in Janurary (FA Cup, Carling, Premiership)

Our home form is going to be decisive (aganst Chelsea, Manu, man city and liverpool) We played these teams away.

Q) Have the current off the field problems destabilized chelsea?
A) No, any team can go through what chelsea have.

Q) Are you surprised Lost 5 games and yet we are 2 points off the top?
A) Surprised that we lost 5 games. Home form in the second part is going to be deciding.

Q) Nani says there are only two teams and Arsenal is not going to be one of them.
A) I have managed 1600 games. If Nani knows who is going to win the he must be 1600 times better than me.

Q) Baloteli dint hear of Jack Wilshere. what do you think.
A) Wilshere is going to be a great player. If he keep right attitude he will do great

Q) Is this the best time to play chelsea?
A) They have less confidence than October. To win the game will be down to us. 3 years ago we won big games and dint win small games and did not win the championship.

Q) On Lampard's return.....
A) Player I like but would not necessarily like to see him return against us.

Q) What do you think needs to change to win the 'big' games?
A) Belief, commitment and determination against the big teams.

Q) Can Thomas Vermaelen be back before the end of season?
Should be back by end of Jan.

Pretty much what we expected. Isn't there too much interesting there. It will be much more interesting to hear from him after victory over Chelsea. So we saw what Man Utd did to us. They really stifled us and did not allow us to play. We can expect that from Chelsea too. Expected line-up:

Theo on the run.......But will he play?

F***ianski
Clichy
Koscienly
Squilacci
Sagna
Song
Wilshere
Fabregas
Nasri
Walcott
Chamakh

After the ManU game it is clear that we need the pace of Walcott up front. I think Wenger might take the punt and play the young England winger on the right. So, RVP, Bendtner and Arshavin wil be on the bench along with Djourou.

Arsenal Vs Partizan, Need for Given, S'up'erbia in Davis Cup!,

2010-12-08T10:05:00.006+05:30

So, we did manage to beat Fulham. But it was not without a few scares. Our defense was shaky again, Flapianski flapped once but got lucky, Nasri was brilliant, and it was a typical Arsenal performance in every sense. Brilliant going forward, trying to walk into the opposition goal, but scoring only twice after a million chance defensively shaky, but just managed to scrape through.

(Thanks to Vind!)

Song was moving up the pitch a little too often. Arseblog makes a detailed analysis of how the Cameroonian has been asked by Wenger to push forward. While Song has pushed into the opposition half more often than last season, when Cesc was playing he would drop back to cover Song. In our skipper's absence, either Rosicky or Nasri would have to take up that role. Or we have to ask Song to sit back and not go up-front, which is difficult for our type of football. With Nasri's current form, it is better for us not to speak a word to him and ask him what to do. So, Wenger should probably have Rosicky sit back whenever Song bombs forward.

Looking ahead to the game tomorrow:

Koscielny has been declared fit to play and will play tomorrow.

We lose Djourou because we are a bit cautious with him. He could have played with a risk, but we did not want to take a risk.

“Emmanuel Eboue comes back into the squad; the rest will be the same against Fulham.”

On Van Persie, Wenger said

“He is getting better and better and ready to start,” he said. “He was ready to start two weeks ago if you ask him.”

It is quite a surprise (not a pleasant one) that we are in a must-win situation after seemingly cruising half way through the group stage. But then, this is Arsenal. Nothing is easy and nothing is quite so comfortable.

Asked about the defensive deficiency, Arsene said

We have the best away record in the premier league, which says that we are defensively solid

Best away record?........yes......defensively solid?.........I would say NO.

Transfer rumors, unfortunately, links us with Shay Given of Citeh. Unfortunate, because we never sign a player with who the transfer rumors link us! I really hope this one is an exception and we manage to get Given. If think I would get Given, offload Almunia and Fabianski, and let Wojicech be our number two. But then, it does not matter what I think!

In the Davis cup final, Serbia beat Francein a see-saw affair, winning 3-2. Troicki smashed a back-hand winner against Llodra to complete an amazing victory. In the first game, Monfils strolled past Tipsarevic. Serbia levelled it to 1-1 as Djokovic beat Simon comfortably. Then, France came from 2-0 down in the doubles game to beat Serbia. Going into the last day, France were clear favorites, needing to win just one game. But Djokovic won against Monfils and then in the final game Troicki beat Llodra. For a player who is ranked number 3 in the world and achieved so much in his career it was a very nice sight to see Djokovic celebrate to profusely, and also goes on to say how important Davis cup is for these players.

Arspective: Preview to Arsenal- Fulham, the Ashes 2nd test

2010-12-03T04:08:00.007+05:30

Wow!......what a turn arround week for the gunners. We beat Villa away (ok, agreed that our home record this season has been worse than our away record) , Chelsea drop two points and then we win the Carling cup quarters and also get a favorable draw for the semis. Not trying to be cocky, but we should beat Ipswich (despite the Roy Keane factor) over two legs. More good news, as Eboue made a 'miracle' recovery. He was to be out for "four weeks" according to Wenger. While he did struggle against the teenaged left-winger of Wigan, his return is vital as he is one who is willing to play in any position (left-back, right-back, left-wing, right-wing).

.......mircaulous recovery but not quite "he-man"ual against Wigan

17-yr old Brazilian starlet Wellington Da Silva will be joining in January. We had actually signed the youngster some time back, but he has been biding his time in Brazil as he could not get his work permit in Europe until he turned 18!!

Looking ahead to the Fulham game, it is a home game. The good thing is, after our horron performances at home, there is no chance of there being any complancency in our locker room. Fabiansky (I still dont trust him :( )will start. TV is, worryingly, still injured The last time we heard anything about him, Wenger said

"We have to be patient. We know a lot medically nowadays but there are some mysteries that we do not know about. At the moment we have no rational explanation for his pain. That means there is no reason to have surgery and there is no logical explanation for his pain. We have to be patient and just hope it will go. That means rest at the moment."

So, Koscielny and Squilacci along with Clichy and Sagna complete the French back four again. Wilshere and Song in front of them. Nasri should be back after picking up a "knock". The boss went on to say:

“It is a knee problem but he should be alright"

It looks like the Frenchman will play on the left, Rosicky in the "Cesc" role and RVP on the right. The Dutchman had, fingers crosses, a good (more importantly healthy and injury-free) return against the Lactics with the Moroccan up-front.

The 2nd test gets underway at Adelaide today. The Aussies are under the kind of pressure they have never been before and the English fans must be delighted. England do look more and more favorites to retain the 'urn'. Mind you, the original urn is always held in the MCC. From wiki

"The urn is erroneously believed by some to be the trophy of the Ashes series, but it has never been formally adopted as such and Bligh always considered it to be a personal gift.[1] Replicas of the urn are often held aloft by victorious teams as a symbol of their victory in an Ashes series, but the actual urn has never been presented or displayed as a trophy in this way. Whichever side holds the Ashes, the urn normally remains in the Marylebone Cricket Club Museum at Lord's since being presented to the MCC by Bligh's widow upon his death"

England have pretty much a settled side and there should not be any changes.
Potential Weaknesses?

Complancency in the dressing room. While they are better than the Aussies at the moment, it is because of the fact that they have lost great players and have become weaker rather than England becoming stronger over the years.

Swann?? Is he over-rated?? All the English commentators go gaga over the 31-yr old Northampton man and call him the best-spinner in the world. Well, may be he is the best, but that again is due to lack of quality spinners around and not down to him alone. He enjoyed success against a weak Paki betting.....err batting line-up. He has picked up a wicket in his first over some 21 times. But, I dont think he has been tested against quality batting yet. He dint seem to have too many answers when Michael Hussey counter-attacked him at the Gabba. Lets see.....

Collingwood and Prior's lack of time in the middle. Their middle-order (as Siddle showed) could be brittle due to lack of match-practice.

Strengths are obviously, high-on-confidence, Anderson's form with the ball, Cook's form, Pieterson's form (though he made only 43 in the 1st test, he was looking in ominous touch) and Bell's form.

As for the Aussies, well they would love to win the toss and make first use of the wicket (kind of a cliche I know). Ponting loves the ground and is the highest scorer at Adelaide. Katich and Watson looked reasonably assured in the 1st test. Clarke's form will be a worry for the Aussies. Mitch Johnson is out and looks like Dougie the Bollinger will replace him. Bollinger has been one of the top bowlers in the last 2 years and his exclusion in the 1st test was surprising. So Johnson's bad form could be blessing in disguise for them. Bollinger, Doerthy, Siddle and Hilfenhaus is not going to make the English batsmen lose sleep. Wonder what happened to Jason Krezja, who picked up 8 against India on his debut at Nagpur. Wonder why Shaun Tait does not play? Tait, Bolinger, Siddle and Krejza sounds more potent to me.......

Anyway, the news is that :

Australia won the toss and elected to bat........so there you go

Gunners collapse, Ind-NZ review. Ind-SA preview,

2010-11-24T23:42:00.002+05:30

The week has gone from bad to worse for the gunners. I was not able to watch the game against Braga. It seems there was a stone-wall penalty not given to us and we had to play with 10 men for last 15 odd minutes as Eboue got injured and we already used our 3 subs. As I said, this week has been a horrible one. But, if you look at it from a different angle, we are in the carling and FA cup (having beaten the likes of Tottenham and Newcastle). We are two points behind the top of EPL. We are one home win away from qualification against a side which has 0 points so far in the group. No excuses for yesterdays loss, but things are not as bad as they seem. Ramsey's return to the pitch for the first time since Feb is another piece of news to make your week better if you are a gunner's fan.

Aaram sey Aaron Ramsey!

Finally, we saw some 'mission domination' in the Ind-NZ test. Looking back at the series, there was too little expectation from NZ and too much from India. People expected us to dominate the kiwis because of our No.1 status and NZ's number eight status and also because of the black caps' capitulation in Bangladesh (they call it 'Banglawash'). With our limited bowling attack, I dont think we can "dominate" an opposition on the same level as the Aussies used to in their golden days. It is our awesome batting line-up, ability to fight in difficult situations (tail-end batting and Dhoni's captaincy) that makes us the number 1 team. Except for the 1st test, 2nd innings, we performed to the expectations. Looking ahead to the tour of South Africa, most part of the team picks itself. Obviously, the major worry for us is the no. 6. I would pick Pujara or Vijay for that spot. They may not be "natural no. 6" batters, but Raina looked totaly out of sorts against the NZ fast bowling attack on docile Indian pitchesh. Very soon Chris Martins and Tim Southees will morph into Steyns and Morkels. And we will be playing on green tops in Centurion/Durban/Cape Town instead of Nagpur/Ahmedabad. I really cant see him turn the corner within 3 weeks. I think too much was being made of Dhoni's form, or the lack of it. SEVEN innings without a fifty!! Thats ridiculous. Here is a list of his scores in the last few innings before this 98:
14,10,30,14,15,76,33,132*

It is not the most consistent, but for someone who bats at no. seven, I dont realy see too much wrong with that. He performs when it is needed.
He came in at 281/5, when India was up against Pakistan's 588 in one of his earlier matches. His 148 saved our asses

The much-valued away series win in England in 2007 would not have been possible without the 76* at Lords when one wicket seperated England from going one up.

And how about this 92, when he walked in at 326/6 to push our score to 469 at Mohali.

Most of his failures have come when we have been looking to up the scoring rate.

So, we have:
Sehwag, Gambhir, Dravid, Sachin, Laxman, Pujara/Vijay, Dhoni.

Bowling, is our weakness.
Zaheer has been our best overseas bowler for sometime now. Added bonus, Graeme Smith has been is bunny. The proteas skipper has struggled against Zak among the many left-handers including Hayden, Lara and Andy Flower. I am assuming he will be back for the tour to SA.

Our second seamer will be Sreesanth. The eccentric Kerela man had a good tour to SA when we went there in 2006. His five-for in
Jo'burg helped us record a famous win and earned him the MOM. The fact that he has already toured SA will come in handy.

Ishant Sharma has had a roller-coaster ride in international cricket. But, he is on the up again and was instrumental in our win in the third test. The Delhi paceman is close to his best and will be our third choice.

Between Harbhajan and Ojha, I will pick Ojha. I know that the offie was the MOS against the Kiwis, but who is the the better bowler between the two right now??.....the answer is Ojha.

Arspective : Preview to Arsenal Vs Tottenham, Ind-NZ 3rd test and the ATP world tour in London

2010-11-20T03:00:00.005+05:30

So, India take on NZ starting tonight (for us or the US!) in Nagpur. Yes, a draw would be a "defeat" for India. The bowlers, and more importantly the curator, needs to get their act together.

Ryding High!

I think, drawn tests, like the one in Hyderabad and the recently concluded test in SL (where Gayle hit the triple) need to be looked at very seriously by the boards and the ICC. There are far too many drawn tests. Ok, those like the one in Ahmedabad are "acceptable", with some bad NZ catching costing them. Maybe the one in SL could have had a result had the weather not intervened. But, with dwindling crowds in tests, I would go as far as saying that even weather should be taken into account before scheduling a test. At the very minimum, the pitches must produce a result. In fact, I would rather see a mine-field, with the test match ending in 3 or 4 days, than a dull draw. The Nagpur pitch seems to be ok from the result point of view. Only two tests have been played here, and both have had results. Having said that, the Indian bowling is a major worry. With the ageing batting line-up, our bowlers need to start delivering now. Harbhajan's bowling is becoming as predictable as the improvement in his batting. His ability to pick wickets in test relies heavily on the pitch. Zaheer's injury means our bowling is further weakened. Considering Harbhajan's form with the bat, I would be tempted to drop Raina and play Amit Mishra instead. From NZ point of view, they dont need to do anything different. They came in here with zero expectations and thats how they need to continue. I would expect India to nick this one and take the series 1-0 (Sachin gets hits 50th century?!!??!!). Stranger things have happenned though!

The much criticized international break has finished and players are back with their respective clubs. For Arsenal, RVP is not injured, is the big news (fingers crossed!)Arshavin, Rosicky, Nasri, Sagna, Gibbs, Chamakh, Cesc were all involved and have come out unscathed. For tomorrow's game, I wont be surprised if Arshavin is given a rest. Wilshere has a late
fitness test and he will be replaced by the "impressive-against-Everton" Denilson. Vermaelen, worryingly, is still injured and there is apparently no
logical explanation behind his injuries. Reminds me of the Rosicky injury :(. We desperately need his leadership at the back.

Expected line up

F(lap)abianski??
Sagna, Squilacci, Djourou and Clichy
Denilson/Wilshere Song
Walcott Cesc Nasri
Chamakh

subs: Arshavin, RVP, Bendtner, Wilshere/Denilson, Eboue, Gibbs

Bale, obviously, will the player to watch out for and it is just as good that Sagna is up against him. The French full-back has been in really good form and says he is ready for the challenge against the Welshman. Needless to say, this is A HUGE game for us and a win would let us take a peak at the top spot, albeit for a few hrs and put the pressure on Chelsea.

The groups for the ATP world tour tournament in London are as follows:
Group A
Nadal
Djokovic
Roddick
Berdych

Group B
Federer
Murray
Soderling
Ferrer

We also have Bhupati/ Mirnyi and the Paes/Dloughy combinations in the doubles.

Here is the order of play for the first 2 days:
SUNDAY, 21 NOVEMBER 2010

CENTRE COURT Start At 12:15 PM
[1] B Bryan (USA) / M Bryan (USA) vs [8] J Melzer (AUT) / P Petzschner (GER)
Not Before 2:00 PM
[4] R Soderling (SWE) vs [5] A Murray (GBR)
Start At 6:15 PM
[4] L DLouhy (CZE) / L Paes (IND) vs [6] M Fyrstenberg (POL) / M Matkowski (POL)
Not Before 8:00 PM
[2] R Federer (SUI) vs [7] D Ferrer (ESP)

MONDAY, 22 NOVEMBER 2010

CENTRE COURT Start At 12:15 PM
[3] M Bhupathi (IND) / M Mirnyi (BLR) vs [5] L Kubot (POL) / O Marach (AUT)
Not Before 2:00 PM
[3] N Djokovic (SRB) vs [6] T Berdych (CZE)
Start At 6:15 PM
[2] D Nestor (CAN) / N Zimonjic (SRB) vs [7] W Moodie (RSA) / D Norman (BEL)
Not Before 8:00 PM
[1] R Nadal (ESP) vs [8] A Roddick (USA)

Happy weekend!

Arspective: Post Everton, IND-NZ 2nd test and Roddick's into the ATP finals

2010-11-12T22:03:00.005+05:30

We, as Arsenal fans, have complained so many times that we deserved to win and yet lost the match. That was the case against Chelsea. Against New Castle we hit the woodwork three times and had about six or seven shots on target compared to NewCastle's one when they beat us at the Grove. But, against Wolves, for once, the story was the complete opposite. We won a game which, honestly I think, we were lucky to get three points.

Against Everton, we were much better defensively. Fabianski fails to convince me still. While he, admittedly, produced a match-winning performance against Wolves, in the Everton game he was very lucky when he flapped at a deep corner and the linesman adjudged that the ball had gone out when it had actually not. He flapped, missed and the ball bounced off him before he could do anything. Denilson and Djourou had particularly good games, while Nasri, Cesc, Song, Chamakh and Wilshere just continued from where they left and did what was expected of them. Arshavin continues to perform short of expectations. I do feel, however, that a 'magic' performance from him is not far away, when he will single-handedly win a game for us. come on Arsha!

Against Everton, we performed well over-all. Sagna rifled home at the 35 minute mark after Nasri had cut-in and unleashed a fierceful left-footed shot at Tim Howard. Arshavin reacted first to the lose ball and played it to Sagna. The Everton defence were either a little slow or did not expect Sagna to shoot. By the time Sagna let go, it was too let for Everton's defence and the American keeper had no chance. Fabregas doubled the lead about three minutes into the second half, when Denilson drove upfield, played to Cesc, who had a neat interchange (not exactly a one-two) with Chamakh before he let go into the bottom corner across Tim Howard. Then the Moroccan could have put the game to bed, but somehow pulled off an 'Adeb' and missed from inside the 6-yard box. Then Cahill pulled one back for Everton, but we hung on nervily for a well-deserved, HUGE, VITAL three points which sees us go past Man Utd and within two points of Chelsea, whose shock/meek surrender to Sunderland was music to our ears. It magnified their over-dependence on Essien, in whose absence they were, yet again, ordinary.

India, in the 2nd test, have seemingly taken control after a second consecutive century from Harbhajan. He seems to be following the Irfan Pathan pattern. Unfortunately, his bowling average is increasing along with his batting average. Nevertheless, his century was crucial, given the context of the game and helped India take control of the test. While draw seems to be a highly likely outcome, India do have a chance to force home the issue. Dhoni achieved the feat of taking the max. number of catches as keeper-captain in NZ's first innings. He went past Gerry Alexander of the West Indies. He once, famously stopped
Roy Gilchrist from bowling as the Jamaican was hurling beamers in Pakistan.
Three intersting facts about him from the wiki:
1) Gilchrist is considered to be one of only four bowlers ever, to have actually hit the sightscreen after first bounce on the pitch, on the full.
2)While playing in the Lancashire League (after being banned by the West Indies Cricket), he removed a stump from the playing arena and hit an opposition batsman in the head.
3) Gilchrist deliberately overstepped the bowling mark by six metres after being taunted by Kripal Singh of India and delivered a bouncer which hit the Sikh batsman in the head and dislodged his turban.

Anyway, so Mccullum's century sees NZ about 100 runs ahead with 6 wickets in hand. India may be without Zak again on the final day, who is nursing his groin injury.

Roddick, meanwhile has qualified into the top eight of the london ATP world tour finals to be held from Nov. 21 to 28. Wimbledon finalist, Thomas Berdych and the Spaniard Devid Ferrer also join Nadal, Federer, Djokovic, Soderling and Murray who had all already qualified. This was after No.9 Verdasco lost to Mofils in the third round of the Paris open (which Soderling went on to win, beating Monfils in two sets) and Roddick beat Ernest Gulbis of Lativa.

Arsenal review-preview, Ashes preview, Dementieva and F-1 news

2010-11-01T23:34:00.004+05:30

Arsenal left it late to round off three points against a dogged West Ham side which looked like anything but a team placed at the bottom of the league. The win keeps the gunners in sight of league leaders Chelski (5 points adrift). The gunners hardly got out of second gear in the first half. Arshavin has been the most disappointing player for us this season.Arseblog makes a detailed analysis of how Arshavin has performed this season. I dont know if he needs some Vodka before the match, but if he does not step up his game, Walcott could soon replace him from the starting line-up. Our only decent chance in the first half was when Sagna pulled away from the West Ham left back and centred a cross from a Song-thru-ball. The strike from Cesc was also good, but Rob Green pulled off a really good save to deny us. (Wasn't this the keeper whose howler against US gifted thema point in the WC) We were much better in the second half, showed a lot more urgency. Nasri rattled the crossbar with a free-kick which surprised one and all in the ground. It was a superbly disguised free-kick from him with only a two-step run-up. Green was beaten but the crossbar denied Arsenal. Then, Theo was released by another beautifully weighted ball from Nasri and his shot across the goalie hit the post and came back straight to Rob Green. We looked destined for a draw when Clichy cut in from the left and dinked a delightful ball for Song to head and send the Emirates to ruptures. It was not a typical Arsenal-performance but most importantly we got 3 vital points to keep up with the league leaders.

Wilshere, meanwhile, has signed a new contract. This was, although expected, vital for us as he and Ramsey are very much the future for us (especially considering that Cesc could leave us anytime). Against Shakhtar, looks like Cesc and Song are sidelined with injuries (minor injuries, hopefully!!). So, Wilshere will be back in place of Song. And either Diaby or Rosicky will come in for Fabregas with the posibility of Nasri taking the position of Cesc. Also, as mentioned earlier Walcott could come in place of Arshavin. The rest of the team, I would expect it to be the same.

In the lead up to the Ashes, Kevin Pieterson, following his poor form, has been, surprise surprise, targeted by many Aussies. He has not responded to them, but instead, he has come out trying to shift the attention, saying that he
empathises with Rooney, likening his own situation with the United centre forward. He refused to comment back to Ponting's comments that there was a big "question mark" over his form. Rooney's is probably a much worse situation than his, for he has been involved in sex-scandals and obviously the contract issues with Man-yoo.

Elena Dementieva has announced retirement from Tennis. She is considered to be the one who revolutionised and inspired women's tennis in Russia. Her sudden and emotional
announcement after her loss to Schiavonne in Doha surprised a lot people. She was considered to be one of the "nicest people" in the tour and the pessimist in me says that could be the reason for her not to a single Grand Slam!!

Former FIA President Max Mosley said that a title win for Fernando Alonso by less than seven points would
devalue his F1 title. He won the Korean grand prix in controversial circumstances and was "allowed" to win. Massa was leading the race, when Ferrari ordered him to allow Alonso to race past him and win the race as the Spaniard is leading the F1 charts. The Ferrari team was charged $100,000 by FIA. If you really want to hurt a team, sportsman then fines are not really the answer. The only way to hurt a team is by docking points or not allowing the offender to participate in the next match/race.

Arspective: Post Manchester City, Pre NewCastle

2010-10-28T01:54:00.003+05:30

A good performance against City. But defensively, we were not great. We need TV back ASAP. Djourou can be a backup, but we cannot have him play week in week out. The way he went tackling into to Tevez in the opening minute of the match showed his inexperience. Koscienly should be back today against Newcastle. Signing two defenders in the transfer period (Squilacci and Koscielny) seems to have been another master stroke from Wenger. People were calling him to sign midfielders but that was not the case. The goalie situation seems to have eased a little, but I will still wait. Fabianski has been good in the last few matched. But, he still hasnt done enough to convince me (and a lot of gunners) that he is "world-class"

Wenger's attitude towards Carling cup is much different this time as compared to the previous years. We saw an almost senior team against the sp*rs and Wenger said that will be the case again. Players like Bendtner, Walcott and Koscielny, who are short of match practice will be tested against a New Castle side which beat Chelsea in the last round and look to be rejuvenated after coming back into the premiership this season.

There will be probably a couple of young faces (Lansbury and Jay Emmanuel Thomas). It was interesting listening to AW talk about Jay Emmanuel Thomas. I have never seen Wenger praise so much. He says that JET can go on to become a "great player". JET is terrific in front of the goal, "left-foot", "right-foot", power, pace, he has it all, according to AW. That is really good to hear. We do have Chamakh now, and Bendtner is a decent squad player, but JET seems to be "The Man" and the next AW product to look forward to.

Speaking of Nasri , Wenger says has "matured". Seven goals this season and counting. Nasri has been in really good form. To me, there is still a cause for concern, not with Nasri, but with our mid-field. When Cesc was injured for a few games in between our performance was not great. We drew with Sunderland (admittedly with 10 men), lost to WBA at home and then lost to Chelsea. Cesc comes back and we win Man City away and give Shakhtar a pasting at home. Coincidence?..... I hope it is.....

Test cricket, India Vs Australia

2010-10-06T02:22:00.004+05:30

Wow! What a Frenetic end to a fabulous test match. Australia held all the aces at lunch on day 5 if they dint already the beginning of the day. But India had the joker of the pack to turn the game on its head. Unbelievable scenes at Mohali when Ojha turned the ball to fine leg two most crucial runs he did not score in his life (they were leg byes!!) There were a paltry 15000 spectators to witness one of the best test matches in India. Nowhere near the the massive crowds drawn by IPL. Ian Chappell, for once, seems to be correct.

He said "People say India is a cricket-crazy nation. India is not a
cricket-crazy nation. They are a star-crazy nation"

Laxman, meanwhile, continues to amaze us. It is hardly surprising that in a nation that is more "star-crazy" than "cricket-crazy" that his efforts are so much undermined. He was determined and fired up, yet calm and composed except for one moment when young Ojha went for a "walk in the park". Yet another half-century under pressure, yet another gem against the Aussies, yet another battling effort with the tail. Ishant Sharma, what a turn around for him. Started the test match the worst possible manner and forced off the field. Comes back, picks up three crucial wickets and scores 31 crucial runs.

Ponting still waits for the first win on Indian soil. He injured himself in 2004 when Gilchrist led them to a series victory. In 2008, India bt Australia in a four-test series.

What a shame that this is only a two-test series. In fact, originally we were supposed to have seven ODIs and no tests before the BCCI realized that India could lose the number one position in test cricket and made it a 2-test, 3 ODI tour. The timing of the visit is also questionable. On the one hand, we have the biggest sporting event held in Indian history going on in Delhi (the common wealth games). Ad then, here you are, with the biggest test series of the modern era going on at the same time. BCCI is such an idiot! They are also an idiotic bully! They say no to UDRS and ICC has no option but to not have it. India almost paid the price with the Ishant Sharma dismissal. While the UDRS is not always correct and conclusive, there is no doubt that there are fewer incorrect decisions with the UDRS.

Enough of that. Lets enjoy the Indian victory for the moment!!

Champions League cricket

2010-09-28T21:43:00.001+05:30

So, Chennai romped home, beating the Warriors in the Champions League T20 final game. Indeed, they have been the team to beat ever. They have been the most consistent team since the dawn the T20/IPL/CL era. The reached the final of IPL 2008, semi final on IPL 2009. winners of IPL 2010 and now CL 2010 winners. I don’t care if people call Dhoni lucky, over-optimistic, talks-too-much captain. To me, he has delivered, he has won matches, as captain of the India and as the captain of CSK. So, congrats to MSD and congrats to CSK.

Coming to the popularity of the CL T20, or the lack of it, I think it would be unfair and makes no sense to compare it with Champions League Football. The CL football has a long, rich history (started in 1955). The Champions League Final, football, is the most watched annual event, drawing more than 100 million viewers. To compare an event more than 50 years old with one that is hardly two or three years old is, as I said, wasteful.

So, what can be done to increase its popularity and make it more meaningful?

Well, for starters, we cannot have new auctions every 3 or 4 years. I am talking about IPL here. There is, as you might know, going to be a new auction window before the next IPL, which would see all the teams being re-shuffled. While, Sachin and Dhoni have stated that they want to hold on to as many players as possible, only time will tell how successful they can be. Even so, the idea of having fresh auctions every 3 years is not a great idea. One of the things that makes Champions League football and club football in general so special is the traditions of the clubs, the rivalries between clubs, the “animosity” between the fans. A player has to think a million times before he makes a switch from Real Madrid to Barcelona. Athletic Bilbao, for example, is a team that recruits only home-grown players. As I said, we do need to give it some time to create rivalries between teams. But random re-shuffling of players every other year is not going to help the cause in anyway.

Then, you have the case of one player playing for different clubs and choosing the “bigger” club in the Champions League for obvious reasons. E.g: Jacques Kallis plays for the Warriors and also for the RCB (Bangalore). In the CL he chose to play for Bangalore. (It is a different matter that he was injured and dint play in the CL) Now, that is something for organizers to look at. Surely, a player must give preference to the local team/ team of his nationality. I would not like to see a situation where Kallis is taking 3-fors and scoring fifties against his own Warriors, or Ross Taylor taking apart the Central Districts. They should only be allowed to chose the “bigger” team if their local team did not make it to the CL.

The idea of “home and away” games also seems tasty. While the Sri Lankan (Wayamba), New Zealand (Central Districts) and West Indian (Guyana) teams were outplayed by the the CSKs and the RCBs, it would be interesting to see how, e.g South Australia would would play Wayamba on a slow-low turner at Galle. Can Suresh Raina play his pick-ups and hoicks against Central Districts on a green top at Napier? I know, it will be difficult to have teams travel all over in such a short period of time. But, this is just an idea that the organizers could keep in mind and try to implement.

The Arspective

2010-09-15T10:33:00.002+05:30

Back after a long break with the Arspective.

Arsenal 4-1 Bolton

And Kevin Davies has just joined my "Most Hated Footballers List", which includes Van Bommel, the Walrus (Alladyce), Shawcross and more. We were lucky that we came out of the with no player injured by the Bolton captain. It was almost as if he was playing this game with intent of sending someone back on the stretchers. I
seriously do wish that the punk was red-carded instead of Gary Cahill. Diaby was injured by a typical 'Bolton' challenge ( I am sure the Walrus has a hand in this), and had to be subbed immediately after he came in. He has joined the RVP, Bendtner and TV in the 'injured list'

Anyway, it was a good performance by us offensively, but question marks on the defence remain. Although, a point to be noted is that we started with an almost second string backline. No Sagna, No TV, No Clichy. Koscienly scored a goal, but his defensive abilities will be under the radar after this match. Twice, his headers back to Almunia was short. Once, we were punished when the Chinese Bolton player retrieved the ball and gave it to some 'El Matador'. Fortunately, it dint really matter to us. It still remains to be seen who (Djorou, Koscielny and Squilacci) Wenger would prefer when all are fit to partner TV. Cesc's cecsy performance is something that we have got used to, so I wont waste my time ranting and raving about his awesome passing and vision. But what was heartening to see, was the way he was trying to protect us against the Brutal Assault by Bolton. Most notable ones are when Diaby was kicked in the shin by some Paul Robinson and when Koscielny was hammered on the head by a horribly late challenge from Davies. Rosicky's was another stylish performance. His (eye of the needle) pass to Arshavin from the outside of his boot in the forth minute was a thing of beauty, probably the highlight of the match. Song's was another powerful performance. As worse his hair looks now, his performance on the pitch has remained awesome (if not better). He was all over the pitch, defending, attacking and was rewarded with a goal. Talking of horrible hair and good performance, MMM comes to mind (Marouanne, Moron the Moroccan). Seriously, his hair makes him looks like one! But, we dont really care as long as he puts in good performances like today's. His link play was neat, and so was his headed goal. He looks to be a player a little limited in ability but someone who is more than willing to put in his share of hard work. Arshavin, I do feel for him. He missed a couple of sitters, was pushed in the box at least 3 or 4 times (of which one could have been a penalty), was Off-side a dozen times when he could have been clean through. The Czar could have done with a goal. Hope he scores one soon. Almunia was decent, except for one bad pass to a Bolton player that could have spelt disaster on another day. (We still need a goalie). Gibbs, Eboue, Squillacci, Wilshere put in good performances. Vela got himself on the scoresheet with a neat finish. He is a player who does confuse me a bit. There was talk of him moving on from Arsenal at the start of the season. Then he comes up with a finish like that. Hope he stays and goes the 'Fabregas Way' rather than the 'Hleb way'.

Looking ahead to Braga (our next game in the Champions League), we have Diaby out, TV out and obviously Walcott, RVP, Bendtner and RVP. At home to Braga should still be ok unless we get too far ahead of ourselves.
Likely team for tonight:
Almunia
Clichy Koscielny Squilacci Sagna
Song
Wilshere Fabregas
Rosicky Arshavin
Chamakh

US Open -preview

2010-08-30T23:30:00.001+05:30

US Open Men’s Preview

Andy Murray, Scotland

Strengths:
• Killer double-handed back-hand. Best in the game right now
• Beat Federer and Nadal en route to winning the recently concluded ATP tournament at Montreal.
• Youngest among the quartet (Rafa, Del Po, Djokovic and himself), so there is a sense of less pressure on him. He is just about at the right age to start winning slams, he is young but has enough experience.
• In the form of his life. The way he beat Federer (in straight sets) in the Montreal Masters was astounding.
• Playing on hard-courts, that’s his favorite surface. He likes hard-courts more than grass surprisingly.
• Does not need to rely on his serve. His all-round game is not based around his service. Even if he is serving bad, he can make for it

Weaknesses
• Never won a Grand Slam before. Came twice in the final against Federer in US Open 2008 and Aus Open 2010 and lost in straight sets
• British media, British History, expectations. The last decent British player, Tim Henman was so hyped by the media that he could not handle it. They named a ‘Henman Hill’, kept on reminding him when the last British player won a major and how he has a chance to make history. The stupid British media will not shut up and Murray will have to live with it.
• Bad first-serve percentage. Even in the win over Federer in the Montreal masters, he was serving something like 55% on his first serves.

Rafa Nadal, Spain

Strengths:
• Ability to grind down opponents,
• Tremendous mental strength,
• Chasing down every ball without giving up,
• Heavy top-spin from his specially designed Babalot racquet are some obvious strengths of Nadal.

Weaknesses
• Does not like hard-courts. His technique is not as smooth as Federer and thus he exerts lot of pressure on his knees and ankles. Hard-courts can be very unforgiving on those joints making him injury-prone on this surface. This very thought (of getting injured) would mean he may not come out with his A-game.
• Reducing “lefty factor”. When he burst onto the scene, immortals like Federer did not know how to handle the heavy top-spin from the left handed-forehand onto their back-hand, especially on clay courts.
• Never won the US Open before. Has won all the other slams, including the Aus Open.

Roger Federer, Switzerland
Strengths:
• Been there, done it before, five times at the US Open and sixteen times otherwise
• Huge hit. He is always the crowd favorite wherever he goes. Federer’s opponents will have to live with that
• Change of style. As evident from the Montreal Masters and the Cincinnati open, Federer has started using chip n charge more often than he used to. With awesome hands at the net, he could be a handful.

Weaknesses
• Weak back-hand. As awesome and elegant it looks, there is no doubt that his back-hand is his weakness.
• Weak back-hand means he also has a weak return of serve when compared to the other top players.
• At 29, you get a feeling that he has achieved so much that there might a sense of , dare I say, complacency and lack of hunger as compared to say a Murray or a Nadal.

Roddick, USA
Strengths:
• Awesome serve. Best serve in the Men’s circuit. A-Rod needs to forget about first serve percentages and go flat-out. If he goes flat-out and gets 60% first serves in, that is better than him going conservatively and getting 70 -75 % first serves.
• Home ground, home support.
• Been there done it before. Not often can you say that about A-Rod, but the US Open 2003 is the only slam he has won in his career so far.
• Reducing expectations. There were such high expectations immediately after he won the US Open 2003, that one gets the feeling it got to him. Now, no one expects him to win the US. Can he do a Goran’01?
Weaknesses
• Over-reliance on serve. If he does not serve well, he is in hot-water.
• Conservative shot-making. Built like and ox, some of his shots are put-it-back-into-play shots. Needs to go for broke more often.
• Inexplicable losses of concentration, leading to loss of confidence. His loss to Mardy Fish at Cincinnati was unbelievable. He was up 5-2 in the second set and all-over Fish. Lost concentration and the set. Lost confidence and the match. (losing the final set 6-1)

Win by a no-ball

2010-08-22T03:28:00.002+05:30

Cricket in the 80s and 90s seems to be so much more interesting than what it is today......

Here is an interesting story:

"I remembered Norman Gifford's no ball which made india win madras test in 1973 !!:)

India had to struggle to get the 86 runs to win. Both Engineer and Chauhan, who opened, as Gavaskar was nursing a finger injury, were back for 11 runs. Wadekar edged Old for a knee high catch to Greig in the slips but as umpire Mamsa did not at once uphold the appeal, there was some unseemly demonstration by some of the fieldsmen when Lewis showed a firm hand. The umpire, apparently unsighted by Old cutting across in his follow-through, upheld the appeal after consulting his colleague. Thirty-two for two at stumps, India hit off the runs about half-an-hour before lunch on the next day through a no-ball delivered by Gifford. Pocock, bowling into the same end as Prasanna on the previous evening, caused a fright but hard-hitting by Durani, who slammed two timely 6's, and firm batting by Pataudi saw India home."

sources....G.Nadarajan

Here is the scorecard..............makes for an interesting reading

http://www.cricketarchive.co.uk/Archive/Scorecards/33/33050.html

The good.........the bad and..... the ugly

2010-08-18T08:35:00.004+05:30

The good.........the bad and..... the ugly

1)
good.....

1996 Titan cup, Hyderabad - SA post 260 odd runs. India are 160 odd for 4 and in the hunt, when Ganguly is called back by cronje after he collided with the

Big old 'Fanie'. The South Africans do run him out, but Hansie(who is disliked by many, not so much by me) calls him back.

I think this is the one. The commentary is as funny as the incident itself

2)
bad

In the same series, the next match, India are in trouble chasing Australia's 210. Jadeja and Sachin help India recover from 47/4 and with the score around

120, the same thing happens to Jadeja which happened to Dada in the previous match. Steve Waugh though took the bails out and Mark Taylor had no intention of

calling back Jadeja. Considering some of the much more worse stuff that the OZs do, this one was more like a trailer to a 3-hr hindi movie. This is the same

match in which Kumble and Srinath put on 60 odd runs for the 9th wicket to help India to victory.

3)
good

Vettori, one of the most under rated captain and player according to me, called back Collingwood after he wandered out of his crease and Mccullum hit the

stumps down.

4)
bad

And that was after Collingwood refused to call back Grant Elliot after this incident. Vettori, you are awesome. Collingwood?.......hmmmm.......I wont berate
him for this but.......

5) ......the ugly

srilanka india sehwag. The Randiv incident was ugly. He landed is front foot at the place where he normally would land his back-foot. He may be a 'nice lad',

''no malice guy'. But it would take a lot of convicing to prove this one was not deliberate.

But the funny thing is that, the balls faced by him increased by 1 for
having faced the no-ball, but he does not get the runs. That, to me,
is a flaw, in the rules and something for ICC to look at.

6) .....ugly

This was one of the most ridiculous ones......Slater caught Dravid on the half-volley, with the ball clearly bouncing off the pitch. Not only does he

celebrate, he then asks Dravid to walk, and when the 3rd umpire gives him not-out, he goes on an 'oz sledging mission' with dravid.......And to top it off,

he is now a commentator and comes on air and talks bout how people should not sledge.......Anyway, Slater gets away with it, with probably 10percent 'match

fee'. And when Gambhir sticks his elbow out to Watson, he gets a one match ban..........

7)......bad

This one is from the famous India Australia Sydney test in Jan 2008. Watch out for 4:01 and 4:56 in this

What is ridiculous about this is that umpire asks Ponting and Ponting says its out.......and the umpire gives him out.....WHAT THE @#$%!!

8) I remember a similar incident when Graeme Hick caught Rathore in India's 96 tour of England. Darrel Hair asks Hick, he says its out and the umpire gives

him out. I cant recall an incident where the umpire asks and Indian or a Pakistani if he took the catch.

The good.........the bad and..... the ugly

2010-08-18T08:35:00.001+05:30

1)
good.....

1996 Titan cup, Hyderabad - SA post 260 odd runs. India are 160 odd for 4 and in the hunt, when Ganguly is called back by cronje after he collided with the

Big old 'Fanie'. The South Africans do run him out, but Hansie(who is disliked by many, not so much by me) calls him back.

I think this is the one. The commentary is as funny as the incident itself

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCqkD-8FU6s

2)
bad

In the same series, the next match, India are in trouble chasing Australia's 210. Jadeja and Sachin help India recover from 47/4 and with the score around

120, the same thing happens to Jadeja which happened to Dada in the previous match. Steve Waugh though took the bails out and Mark Taylor had no intention of

calling back Jadeja. Considering some of the much more worse stuff that the OZs do, this one was more like a trailer to a 3-hr hindi movie. This is the same

match in which Kumble and Srinath put on 60 odd runs for the 9th wicket to help India to victory.

3)
good

Vettori, one of the most under rated captain and player according to me, called back Collingwood after he wandered out of his crease and Mccullum hit the

stumps down.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsznuSW-1Ug

4)
bad

And that was after Collingwood refused to call back Grant Elliot after this incident. Vettori, you are awesome. Collingwood?.......hmmmm.......I wont berate

him for this but.......

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87m2d6cV4F0&feature=related

5) ......the ugly

srilanka india sehwag. The Randiv incident was ugly. He landed is front foot at the place where he normally would land his back-foot. He may be a 'nice lad',

''no malice guy'. But it would take a lot of convicing to prove this one was not deliberate.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SayybzYkzcs

But the funny thing is that, the balls faced by him increased by 1 for
having faced the no-ball, but he does not get the runs. That, to me,
is a flaw, in the rules and something for ICC to look at.

6) .....ugly

This was one of the most ridiculous ones......Slater caught Dravid on the half-volley, with the ball clearly bouncing off the pitch. Not only does he

celebrate, he then asks Dravid to walk, and when the 3rd umpire gives him not-out, he goes on an 'oz sledging mission' with dravid.......And to top it off,

he is now a commentator and comes on air and talks bout how people should not sledge.......Anyway, Slater gets away with it, with probably 10percent 'match

fee'. And when Gambhir sticks his elbow out to Watson, he gets a one match ban..........

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TrEbYhwBb50

7)......bad

This one is from the famous India Australia Sydney test in Jan 2008. Watch out for 4:01 and 4:56 in this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l0PeQiT1HnU..........

What is ridiculous about this is that umpire asks Ponting and Ponting says its out.......and the umpire gives him out.....WHAT THE @#$%!!

8) I remember a similar incident when Graeme Hick caught Rathore in India's 96 tour of England. Darrel Hair asks Hick, he says its out and the umpire gives

him out. I cant recall an incident where the umpire asks and Indian or a Pakistani if he took the catch.

No no no.......please ......no

2010-08-13T10:53:00.003+05:30

Fabianski says he wants to be number 1. He may become the number 1 in the world but please, I cant take him at Arsenal anymore. Almunia, Manone, Scheczezezezny.....I can have have these but not that Pole. He may be a nice lad, he might be ambitious, but if he starts against Liverpool on Sunday, oh buoy.....It will leave me in an al-too-familiar position where I hate a player, want him to do badly and yet I want the team to win......which is what I used to do when Mongia was our wicket-keeper, which is what I think when Ravindra Jadeja plays right now....How awesome would it be........howler from Fabianski Liv 1-0 Ars......oh he has missed another sitter Liv 2-0 Ars......and we come back in the Pires-Henry-Bergkamp style!......or maybe a hattrick for Koscielny.........

All those players 'linked' with Arsenal have one-by-one started coming out and said they are going to stay with their respective clubs. First it was Everton defender Jagielka, then the Fulham Golie Schwarzer. It is funny how, no one linked us with Koscielny, Vermaelen last year, and they were signed. I hope Wenger is on another one of those French Pilligrimage for a 'goalie hunt' and introduces someone before Aug 31 transfer deadline.........

Meanwhile, there has been a suggestion from Martin Crowe to have a test championship on a yearly basis. I would lovvvvvve to see that. He goes on to say that there are only 2 forms of cricket in the future and bye bye to ODIs. He has even said no to split-innings ODIs, which is going to be tested in the domestic cricket in Australia. Test championship does give an added edge to the tests and incentive for more people to watch cricket. Cricket fans/organizers have to accept that test cricket cannot be taken to newer shores/countries. But for the passionate cricket-followers this would be an awesome spectacle. The 8 test playing nations will quarters, semis and then finals. Total of 7 matches. The first 4 played simultaneuosly, then the 2 semis again and then the final. We are looking at most about a month of cricket, which is really not bad.

By the way......some Toronto (ATP) results.........cant see Roddick :(

N Djokovic 6 6 - - -
V Hanescu 3 4 - - -

J Chardy 6 6 - - -
N Davydenko 3 2 - - -

R Federer 7 6 - - -
M Llodra 6 3 - - -

T Berdych 6 6 6 - -
A Dolgopolov 3 7 4 - -

D Nalbandian 4 6 6 - -
R Söderling 6 4 1 - -

A Murray 6 0 6 - -
G Monfils 2 6 3 - -

P Kohlschreiber 6 7 6 - -
Y Lu 7 5 0 - -

R Nadal 6 7 - - -
K Anderson 2 6 - -

Football Transfers

2010-08-05T03:38:00.002+05:30

This season the transfer market has been relatively quiet. There has almost been only name, which has been going arround in the transfer market. You know who! Our skipper FABREGAS.

Anyway, following are some transfers, which you might have missed

Arsenal.
In: Chamakh, Koscielny
Out: Dudu, Gallas, Sol, Silvestre, Senderos, Merida

On the attacking front we've strengthened. Chamakh, with his aerial ability, strength and neat finishing is definitely a much batter player right now when compared to the low-on-confidence Eduardo. Merida's absence will not be felt as he played only a handful of games last season.

In the defense, there is definitely a net loss. Gallas, Sol and Silvestre may not be the best defenders arround. But the fact that we lost 3 of them and we bought only one instead is a cause for concern for the Arsenal fans. Djorou is coming back from a major injury, so we cant really count on him as a reliable backup.

ManU
In: Chicharito (little green bean), Smalling
Out: Foster, Tosic

Sounds like quiet transfer season for the gum-chewer and the Red Devils so far. But Chicharito has had a really good start to his Man U career. He had a good world cup and has been scoring for them in the International club-friendlies. I have never got a chance to watch Smalling. But I know that he was chased by Wenger and Fergie one time. So he must be good.

Chelsea

In: Kakuta, Benayoun, Ramires
Out: Ballack, Joe Cole

This is a "Net Gain" for Chelsea. I personally like Joe Cole more than Benyoun. But the English mid-fielder has had his share of problems at Chelsea (injuries, coach problems etc). But consiering that they also have Kakuta now, that makes them really strong on the wing. This Kakuta is the same guy for which there was that supposed "2 year ban" on Chelsea. I was delighted at that time. But I should have realized that it is Chelsea, and they would do anything to lift that ban. The ageing Ballack will be replaced by Ramires. Ramires is as strong as the German, and he also has the added ability to counter attack after breaking the opponents play.

Liverpool

In: Aurelio, Joe Cole, Jovanovic, Hodgeson
Out: Benayoun, Riera, Rafa

There is a net positive in the defence and probably a net zero in the attack for Liverpool. They also probably have a net positive in the staff, with the new coach. If I were a Liverpool supporter, I would be really concerned on the attacking front. There is too much reliance on few players. Injuries to any one of Gerrard, Torres or Cole (The last 2 being very susceptible to injuries) and pool could be in big trouble. If fit, then these 3 could be a major force.

Citeh

In: Kolarov, David Silva, Yaya, Jerome Boateng,
Out: Martin Petrov

Almost in: Mario Balloteli
Almost out: Adebayor

Both the "almost"s are buffons. So there is a net zero over there. I hear that Ballotelli is almost as egoistic and greedy as the Togolese striker. So, those are not good signs for City fans as Manciini looks to sell Adebayor (Inter Milan is in the running for him. No wonder its that stupid Rafa Benitiz over there).

David Silva and Boateng looked good in the world cup. Yaya has come to Citeh on such a big prize tag, more out of his name and the club for which he played than his ability. Never heard of Kolarov before.
Despite the amount of money invested by them, there have not really been any major net gains for Manci(ty)(ni).

Sol goes, Djorou injured, Koscielny looks good

2010-08-04T01:59:00.003+05:30

Sol Campbell singed for the Magpies. Not the worst thing for us, though he would have been a good backup. In the new 25-man squad rule, we need to make sure that most, if not all players are fit to play through out the season. Djorou injured himself playing in one of the Emirates cup matches. That leaves us woefully short of defesive options. Koscielny looks a 'class act' according to Verminator but hell we need a couple of decent back-ups and we dont even have one. We dont want Song to drop back if either one of our centre backs donot play.

By the way, we won the Emirates Cup, drawing 1-1 with Milan and beating Celtic 3-2. Koscielny and Vermaelen looked really good, but the goal was conceded to a set piece and that too to the 'little duck' Pato. While the Lorent man and the Belgian look solid for most part, their height(or the lack of it) must be a concern for Wenger. Both are less than 6 feet and surely a beastly defender (maybe someone like Kyrgiakos who is cheap and not too intelligent) is the order of the day. Chamakh got off the mark with a nicely tucked finish and Vela also looked good, along with Arshavin. So, yet again I say....a back-up defender and a goalie is all we need.......

Dhoni lost the seventh toss in a row as India were put to field yet again on a terrible Sri Lankan summer day. Mind you, no day is good in SriLanka, with those trumpets blowing in the background. Worse than Vuvuzelas! Ishant Sharma put in a much better performance for us as he got rid of one of the Lankan openers in the first half hour. Dilshan hit and missed his way to 50 before he was run out, a sharp piece of fielding by Vijay at silly point. Between this, Raina dived in front of Laxman just as the Hyderbad man was about to gulp a sitter and grassed it. The batter was Sanga and the bowler was Mithun. On these placid Lankan tracks, losing the toss, hot first day, it is CRIMINAL to drop, and that too Sanga. Srilanka ended up on 293/4. Despite an improved bowling performace, Sri Lanka sit pretty at the end of the first day.

Galle test first day, Sunil Chetri, Arsenal and Football

2010-07-27T01:11:00.003+05:30

The less talked about the SSC test the better. I dint really watch the opening day (due to the odd timings and poor Indian performance). But, yet again, the Lankan batsmen turned on the heat on the insipid Indian bowling. Ishant Sharma needs to get back to first-class cricket, get his old rhythm, pace and most importnantly the self-belief back. Harbhajan has to be dropped from tests. We must play Chawla or Mishra in tests and they give the ball more air and a beat of a tweak. 313/2 and SL are sitting pretty yet again. Our only hope is if we can come back early tomorrow and make some early inroads while the ball is new. Two left-handers, Sanga and some Paranvitana, plundered on some weak Indian bowling attack yet again. In the absence of Zaheer, India are struggling even more agains the lefties. In the warmup match, it was Kandamby and Upul Tharanga. Last match it was Sanga and Paranavitana again. That is 6 centuries by left-handed batsmen in 3 innings. A leg-spinner bowling in the rough (created by right-arm-over bowlers) outside the lefty's off-stump will give some chance. Admittedly, it was the first day and there would not be too much rough. But surely, it would give the lefties some thing to think about.

Sunil Chetri started the Kansas City Wizards match against Manchester United. The Hyderabad man, who is nearing 26 now, played as one of the 2 strikers for Kansas City. Was it more for a publicity thing in the Indian media or did he geniunely make into the team? I wish the answer is the latter. The American beat the Pink Devils 2-1, despite being reduced to 10 men. Jimmy Conrad (heard this name before somewhere!) got sent off for the Wizards.

Koscielny and Vermaelen look set to be at the heart of the Arsenal defence. The departure of Gallas means that the Lorent defender will partner the Belgian. If Sol Campbell signs an extension, then TV and Koscielny plus Djourou and Sol as backups would be a good central defence. There was a slight rumor of Clichy going to Madrid earlier. But that seems to be only what it was, a rumor. So Clichy backed up by Gibbs, Sagna backed up by Eboue looks good.

Song-Diaby, Fabregas-Nasri-Arshavin, with Van Persie up-front looks delicious. (Iniesta has said that Fabregas could stay for one more year with us ) Backup of Walcott, Chamakh, Rosicky (hope he regains full fitness), Denilson, Bendtner, Wilshere means that the only concern for us now is the goal keeper. I dont know what Wenger will do, but if Almunia or Flapianski are going to be the Arsenal #1, then even the most optimistic supporter of Arsenal like me would not give them a chance to win the title.

City are in for Ballotelli. Not sure they need him. They already have Adeb, Tevez, Santa Cruz, Bellamy and more. But if Real Madrid can go for Khedira, then surely City going for Ballo is not a surprise. Madrid already have Gago, Las and Mahamadou Diarra and Alonso as defensive mid field options and now it seems Maurinho is trying to get the German world-cup star in. Maurinho, I hate him! Raul and Guti are bidding farewell to as Real-MAdrid announced they are going to organize an exhibition match for these two legends. Guti is out on his way to Turkish outfit Besiktas and Raul on his way to England or Germany. Blackburn, will it be???

Bye Bye Dudu, Headingly! Galle Test, Egypt Open

2010-07-23T02:10:00.003+05:30

Shakhtar Doentsk of Ukraine have completed $6 million of Eduardo from Arsenal. After his last season's dissapointing performance it was not suprising and probably good for Arsenal. While we could use the money to buy someone else (GOAL KEEPER PLEAAAASE!!) and good for us in the long term, I was very sad to see DUDU leave. He was only beginning to settle in to our squad and his double at Everton in early 2008 was almost getting him into the 'grove' before the horrific tackle from Martin Taylor. He came back from the injury about 15 months later but has never been the player that Wenger portrayed since the injury. Best of Luck dudu at Shakhtar!

Headingly continues to amaze. It is definitely my favorite venue now, if it was not before. Pakistan shot Australia out for 88 on the first morning. Aamer-Asi-Gul looks a deadly combination all of a sudden (probably the best in the world right now). Coming back to Headingly, I remember some amazing test matches played here.

1) In 2000, England bowled West Indies for 61 here. Andy Caddick picked up something like 4 wickets in an over to bring to an end test match within 2 days!! Only second time that this has happened in the history.
http://www.cricinfo.com/ci/engine/current/match/63891.html

2) In 2001, England won the only test of the Ashes series chasing over 350 in the 4th innings. Butcher hit 173* after Gilchrist had declared the Australian innings to give England a sniff.
http://www.cricinfo.com/ci/engine/current/match/63939.html

3) In 2002, on a cold morning, under overcast conditions and a juicy pitch, Dada won the toss and elected to bat. Dravid and Bangar thwarted the new ball and took India to 236/2 at the end of the first day. Dada, Sachin followed up the century from Dravid the next day and took India to 600. India then bowled out England twice to script an amazing win over England in England after 17 years
http://www.cricinfo.com/ci/engine/current/match/63999.html

4) Now this test, which is poised precariously. Hope Aamer and co can come out tomorrow and pick up some early wickets.

Plus, Headingly is the home of Yorkshire, Leeds for which Sachin used play his county cricket. Leeds was also my favorite football club :( before it sank to the second division!!

Galle test. Murali 800, congrats. But I am not really a big fan of Murali. So lets just say best of luck to him.
Yet again, VVS Laxman was stranded and ran out of partners. India's bowling looks really weak in the absence of Zaheer. Harbhajan needs to be dropped. We need a spinner who can flight the ball. Amit Mishra, Piyussh Chawla?? They would be better than Harbhajan in test matches.

I was listening on NDTV the other day, Sharath Kamal of India won the Egypt open. Talking Table Tennis, by the way. This was following a victory in the US Open a week or so back.
http://sports.rediff.com/report/2010/jul/11/sharath-kamal-wins-egypt-open-tt.htm

Lords Test, Henry a 'Red Bull' , Mendis' burst, Fabregas' shirt drama

2010-07-15T03:49:00.004+05:30

Pakistan made the perfect start on a Lords wicket which was flat and dry. Their decision to bowl first was due to the heavy overcast conditions. The 18-yr old Mohommad Aamer and Mohommad Asif bowled beautifully and had Katich and Watson in all sorts of trouble. Watson was eventually bowled by the Pakistani left-armer. He got the first one to move away from Watson and had the batsman fishing. Then Watson showed his arms to leave the third ball. Much to his horror, the ball came back in but was a touch high to be adjudged leg-before. The forth one was spot on and had Watson dead plumb in front of the stumps. The umpire raised his finger, but much to his embarassment the ball trickled on to the stupms. First blood Pakistan. Ponting and Katich tried to steady the ship as Australia reached 50 for 1. Ponting then hit a leg-side ball towards mid-wicket or so he thought. Young Umar plucked the ball out of thin air much to the disgust of the Aussie captain. He then elbowed Mohd. Aamir when the rookie youngster was celebrating. And guess what, the match referee called Aamir and gave him an 'unofficial warning'. That, to me, was ridiculous. Aamir was well within his right to celebrate. And if you have a look at the video, it was Pointing who stuck his elbow out to the left-armer. Racism at its best.

Clarke and Katich stitched together a really good partnership against some really tight Pakistan bowling (except for "Boom Boom" who was hit for 25 off 3 overs). Katich has been the Gambhir of Australia except that his style is much more unorthodox compared to the southpaw from Delhi. He has scored something like 9 or 10 consecutive 50s and has been Australia's most consistent batsman for the last year or so. Last ball before tea and, Asif was finally rewarded as he had Clarke in front. Two overs after the break, Asif got more rewards as Katich edged a ball that offered to come in but shaped away from the leftie. Marcus North was plumb in front two balls later but amazingly there was no appeal from the Pakistani fielders/bowlers. It dint matter. He was bowled by a beauty the next ball by a classical banana in swinger to the left hander and the score card read 180/5. Gul and Kaneria mopped up the tail as Australia were bowled out for 253.

Ajantha Medis, meanwhile, has given his selectors some serious head ache, as he picked up 6 Indian wickets inluding those of Gambhir, Sachin and Laxman. He brought back memories of 2008 when the experieced Indian batsmen were clueless against the mystery bowler. The Indian batsmen, eventually seemed to have figured him out and smashed him to pulp in the only test he played against India in India last year. The prompted the selectors to drop him from the first test. But, this performance could mean an SOS on its way to the 25-yr old carrom bowler.

Henry, meanwhile, has completed a 'multi-year' contract with New York red bulls and will face his once-rival Tottenham in his first match for the American team.

Pique and Puyol, in their wild celebrations, put a Catalan shirt on Fabregas without the knowledge/consent of the Arsenal captain. To all Arsenal fans, I will say that this is just another dirty tactic of the Barcelona think-tank and please donot hate Cesc for this. If you have alook at the video, you will see it was not his fault and he was pretty embarrassed by it. If anything, this should make our love and bond with Cesc stronger. COYG!

From Start to Finish..

2010-07-13T02:54:00.002+05:30

The Indian athlete...an occupation of tending to thorns, harvesting them, making a throne out of them and then sitting on that ...and still smile...

Why! I always wanted to be an athlete...I wanted to feel that adrenaline rush when thousands in a stadium would cheer my name as i go on to hit the bulls eye..as I fill the hexagon shaped netted structure with a ball kicked by my feet...as I break a world record ...as I bolt across the winning line..!!! So much i wanted to do ..

Probably a story of many youths across the streets of India..They all want to bring glory for the country that is so very impoverished for sporting recognition. What happens to these dreams? Do they get lost in the ever increasing depths of school bag ,or become indiscernible in the huge passel of achievements that this society have stamped their seal as "Must Haves”, or are lost in the stampede of life wherein saving ones life takes precedence over living it.All of these could be the reasons. But apart from the incidence of this virga,there`s one more ball of thorns that is pinching the very flesh of the sporting soul of this country.

Why PT Usha has to cry to get decent facilities? Why the hockey team has to call upon an uprising to have their dues? why a certain Vijender is given padma shri and his fellow is gently brushed aside ? Why M Maricom has to remind all of us of her achievements on the world stage to get a sponsorship? Why we consider only the cricket world cup as a fitting event to give our "all the best india,dikha do" messages?

The partisan behaviour that our athletes in India are meted out with is at best a midget in comparison with the struggles they have to undergo as they aspire to bring glory to the nation.

It all starts from the strange stares your father and other elders would give you when you tell them that you are about to take up sports(which they till now encouraged as an hobby only offcourse!) as a career.Ofcourse cricket is the prima donna amongst the choices that parents would approve, but convincing your family that you giving up on a parchments you will receive from a university and the greenbacks from the MNC`s in lieu of the sweat, struggle and frustration that a sporting life ensures apart from the one off award sans comparable remuneration to buy yourself a new sporting kit is like scaling the Everest without a oxygen mask.

Still some brave souls convince their agitating (not a case if your elders were players themselves!)family folks and venture about on the dusty road towards sporting glory that has full of potholes and have lots of puncture potential pins waiting for your tyre to roll on to them. The kneejerk reaction that an athlete gets when he gets to taste the rudeness of the officials, the uncalled for dry and sarcastic comments from the fellow players makes him to come out the reverie that he so very well preserved and dreamed about in over the years.

The rat race that an athlete goes along with is a slap on the face of those talented ones who have to give way to their feeble images or to loose out to those who are politically inundated with support. Still he finds the courage to keep the dream alive, to run along the track, to keep his gaze on the bulls eye, to keep his sword sharp. The heart breaking inefficiencies of the system are all but a part of the daily routine that he goes through.

Body aching from feverish practice the other day cant keep him out of his sporing arena. He knows his time will come. He loves the game. He loves to be there when the sweet clunk of his bat hitting the ball, when his opponent is found wanting on the other side of court, when he mesmerises his counterpart with his moves, when his fluidity on the field makes for the most amazing visuals ever. He likes to be appreciated. He waits for his countrymen to see him, recognize him, support him.

Is he talking to empty walls? Is he beating on the doors of a deserted village? Is he encroaching upon your Ac groomed dreams, is he disturbing your lovely EMI supported and luxury laden life which goes about criticizing him most of the times? Is he an alien to you or is a part of you? That’s the problem of india.We don’t make our athletes a part. We have them worshipped as heroes. We have them climb the podiums, we godify them. We strip them of all these monikers when they don’t perform. We never let them enter our realms of reality. They remain to us an enigma that is bound to entertain and then fade away. We don’t forgive them the same way as we so conveniently forgive our gaffes. We love to crucify our Christs!!

The dearth of world class equipments, unavailability of funds, jinxed coaches who never seem to go beyond the paid vacation, lack of infrastructure and facilities (lack is an understatement here!) are some of the death knells for an athlete.

Wonder how these superhumans get hold of their instincts to tear the system apart. Being subservient doesn’t help either. Lack of players coming out in open about their grievances makes it easy for the weasels in the administration to burrow through with their sly teeth into the aspirations of sportsmen.

After manoeuvring his way through all the roadblocks ,when a sportsman finally gets to live his dream and goes on to lay that first foot on the sacred grounds of his sporting arena, he has still to face that last hurdle. To please the countrymen!

A dot ball, a missed penalty, a weak forehand...and you can hear the booes ...you can almost not hear the praise amongst the spate of invectives. A lost match...and you can hear the stones being pelted at your home. An incorrect medication...and you can hear vilification being directed at you of you being a cheater. A wrong move..and you can almost feel the heat of your effigy being burned. Indian audience although very enthused about few sports takes a red eye towards most of the other sports.The absent crowds from the stadium does nothing to invigorate the spirit of excellence amongst the athletes. In a country where those who dont play are the handlers of the games, its hardly surprising that more often than not the players have to face the ire of his countrymen. With no one to back him up, he performs under pressure. We need captains like Dhoni in every sport who would back players, we need coaches like maradona in every sport who are ready to put on stake their modesty for his team’s performance.

It was great to watch many youngsters receive the coveted sport awards this year. They smiled as they got their much deserved recognition and respect. But its high time we see the thorn forests in the backdrop they have hiked through to reach this summit of light and give them their due in terms of patience and support.

Gold will follow the claps....Silver will sliver as you see the effort beneath it ....Bronze will brace itself for a new tricolour ...

Murali Reitres, Dutch Delight and Paes wins and Paki revenge

2010-07-07T04:02:00.002+05:30

There has been an aweful lot happening lately.

Firstly, Murali has decided to hang up his boots after the first test agains India at Galle. The spin-wizzard is on 792 wickets now and needs 8 more to reach the unimaginable 800. Will he decide to play one more test if he finishes on 799? I would say no. The good news for the Sri Lankan fans is that the smiling-asassin is retiring only from tests and not the ODIs. One can safely assume that the world cup 2011 will be his last hurrah. In a career spanning the best part of 2 decades, the journey has been a tough one for Murali. The offie had a tough tour down-under in 95-96 and called for throwing by the OZ umpires. He then won the WC in '96 and kept picking wickets in bulk till his tour down under in 98-99. Again, he was called for throwing and he must be grateful to Arjuna Ranatunga for teh wayy he handled the situation. A weaker captain would have wilted under the pressure and stop Murali for bowling. Arjuna instead threatened to "walk off" in order to protect his off-spinner. There have been planty of allegations against him starting from BEdi, who called all his wickets and "run outs", Warne, Dean Jones, Holding and Martin Crowe amongst others. I, for one, was also one of those not in support of Murali and his action. Just because he was born with a deformity in his arm should not have convinced the ICC to let him bowl the way he did. And then, when they conducted those tests on him, the tests were conducted in a "cricket laboratory" instead of an actual match situation. I will not blame Murali for this, but the ICC for the way they handled the situation. Another point which the Warne fans can use is that Murali averages over 30 against Australia and Idnia, probably the two teams who had the best batsmen during his era. He has 76 wickets against Bangladesh at 12 a piece and 87 against Zimbabwe at 17 a piece. His record would still be good even if you took out these wickets against the minnows. But, to me, his unclean action and his inability to pick wickets against the top teams would prevent him from getting into the top bowlers of the world.

Holland won 3-2 over Uruguay. Indeed, the Uruguayans clearly missed the strike force of Suarez, (who has been really maligned for his hand ball against Ghana. I think any other footballer would have done the same in that situation). Forlan waged a lone battle up-front. The former ManU striker has continued his awesome form into the world cup. He is one of those "volunteer" footballers. He will come back, get the ball, pass it, take corners and free-kicks, distrubute the ball and most importantly score goals. For all the hype behind people like Barry some other so-called "stars" from Europe, particularly England, Forlan has taught them a lesson as to how to play the game. Why did Machester United let him go? Indeed, had Suarez been there, this would have been a much tougher game for the Dutch, who got a lucky break on the second gol. Not only was it a deflection, it was also a goal in which Van Persie was fortunate to have been judged off side. He clearly raised his foot, and was thus, "in play" when the ball crept into the Uruguayan goal.

Leander Paes and Zimbabwe's Cara Black won the mixed doubles for India. Did anyone know? Again, Leander's achievement has gone unnoticed among all the Football and Rafa Nadal hula-hoo......

Meanwhile, Pakistan got sweet-revenge against Australia, the team which battered the South-Asians 3-0 in tests, 5-0 in Odis and 2-0 in T20s earlier this year. And when Hussey completed the mirraculous turn-around at St. Lucia in the world cup semi-finals, it seemed as though even "biting balls" would not help Pakistan win against the OZs. Inspired by the young guns- Umar Gul, Mohd. Aamer and Umar Akmal, Pakistan outsmarted the Ozs in the two T20s.

Quarters line-up in wimbledon and the WC

2010-06-29T03:39:00.003+05:30

Really sad today, as Roddick went out of wimbledon. He was beaten by a certain Y Lu. Once again, it was a 5-setter and once again he lost only one service game through out the match. The same was the case when Roddick lost to Federer in last year's final. With time starting to run out, and only one slam under his belt, Roddick and all his fans (including me) are starting to get a little desperate now. Lets hope he gets the US Open'10. Lu will now face Djokovic in the quarters. The other quarters are Tsonga against Murray, Soderling vs Nadal (interesting game this one), and Federer against the big-hitting Berdych.

Chile Vs Brazil reminded me of Arsenal Vs Chelsea. Chile played the pretty game, but Brazil were the clinical ones. Chile had some nice one-touch youthful passing, but Brazil had the experience at the back and indeed in front of the goal. It was a case of one pass too many as they tried looked for that elusive goal. And once they were 2-0 down they committed too many people too often and were punished by the otherwise unimpressive Robinho whose needed only one-touch to pass the ball into the Chilean net. Kaka also has not found his best form yet and that must worry the 'Samba Boys' going into the match against the Dutch. Brazil vs Holland....thats a really mouth-watering encounter on the cards. Inter team mates Lucio, Maicon and Caesar against Sneijder. Van Persie against former team-mate Gilberto. Robinho against De Jong.

I expect Spain to beat Portugal tomorrow and the Paraguayans are favorites against the Japanese despite the presence of Honda, who has been one of the players of the tournament.

Germany Vs Argentina in the next round is going to be very interesting, with 2 teams in contrasting styles. It will be determination and physical strength of the Germans against fluid passing of the Argentinians. Interestingly for Argentina, they played Mexico in the pre-quarters in the last world cup also and then they lost to Germany. This time, having beaten the Mexicans again, they will be hoping for change of fortunes in the quarters. Ghana vs Uruguay is the other quarter-final and I will be strongly behind Ghana in this one.

French Demise, Serbian fightback, bad refereeing, club vs coountry....etc

2010-06-18T22:17:00.002+05:30

France's humiliation was completed when the 37-yr Blanco ran from some 20 yards (his run up was almost as long as Prasad's) and slotted the penalty past Lloris. Indeed, the French have, on paper, have some of the world's most talented players, players playing in Europe's elite clubs. But Club Vs Country is one of big debates in football. Do all players place/give equal importance to their countries as much as their clubs? When you saw the ease with which Barrera (the right-winger of Mexico) cut inside Evra and cut back out into the French "D" before winning rhe penalty, I was thinking to myself, "Would Patrice Evra allow any winger to do this in the English Premier League when he is paying for Manchester United?"....."HELL NO".....
Arsene Wenger, a couple of months back, said that it is the club which pays the player. And these players are being payed by their respective clubs even while they are playing in the world cup. But he said that in the context of who should decide if a player is fully fit to play in the international matches - club or country. In a competition, as elite as the World cup, it was sad to see a high-class defender give up the ghost. Actually, a lot people ask me "Why do football players (like Vander Sar, Scholes) retire from international football and continue playing for their clubs......the answer is simple-- because they are BS ManU players!....hehe......
Actually, it is simlar to asking why did Brett Lee and Flintoff reitre from test cricket and continue playing T20, ODIs and IPL.....It is human nature.....IT IS MONEY!!

Serbians, who were one of the most impressive teams in the world cup qualification matches, took on the Germans after having lost to Ghana. They were pretty much up against it and against a buoyant German side who had demolished the Socceroos 4-0! The referee, however, tried to hog the limelight and did not allow the match to flow.... He made too many stopages, brandished yellow cards for fun, and before you knew Germany were reduced to 10 men. Then, during half time, the referee thinks about what he did and comes out in the second half, tries to compensate, and allows players to get away with tackles which they wouldn't otherwise. "2 wrongs dont make 1 right".....they say. Klose, who always shows up in the world cups with goals from head or boot, would consider himself very unlucky. He will also miss Germany's important next match against Ghana. The Serbs went on to win, thanks to a Jovanivic (who has signed a contract with Liverpool) goal and Stojkovic (Wigan goalie) penalty save. The penalty was conceded after a moment of madness from Red DEVIL Namaja Vidic. There is no questioning the commitment of this "monster", but he does commit some outrageous fouls like this one- extending his arms out in the penalty box. Serbian victory setup a very intriguing finish to this group, which could be an alternative group of death, with only 30 spots seperating the 4 countries in terms of FIFA rankings. I dont think it will be as easy for Ghana against Australia as people think. The Socceroos, even though without Cahill, will come out and fight for their lives. An Aussie victory (unlikely, but possible) would leave all 4 countries on 3 points in the group and setup a mouthwatering final day.

Meanwhile, the Wimbledon draws have been announced. Federer's first major threat would be Tommy Robredo in the 3rd round. Andy Roddick faces Rajeev Ram in the first round.....Rajeev Ram is from the US :(.......But there is some hope for the Indian tennis fans. Harsh Mankad (with his Serbian partner Ilija) has qualified for the doubles. We also have Somdev, Bopanna, Paes and Bhupati (in the doubles).

Meanwhile does anyone know that Asia cup is on. Too many ODIs, too much cricket??
http://www.cricinfo.com/magazine/content/story/463521.html
The first match, though, was pretty exciting. Shoaib Akhtar coming back and picking up 3 wickets, Afridi's century, Pakistan's collapse..... I want to watch a 5-match test series involving India.......the last time that happened was in 2002 against the Windies.......!

Joe Cole to Arsenal? Hewitt beats Federer, Azzuri's opener

2010-06-15T03:40:00.005+05:30

I'll start off with the most exciting news. Goal.com claims that Joe Cole has "Signed A Contract To Join Arsenal After World Cup 2010". ("http://www.goal.com/en-us/news/85/england/2010/06/10/1968028/exclusive-joe-cole-has-signed-a-contract-to-join-arsenal)

Here are the clauses:
* free transfer
* Deal agreed in principal before player flew out to the World Cup
* England midfielder's move will be completed if he passes full medical
* Three-year, £80,000-a-week contract laden with incentives

I will not be suprised if this deal does not go through. It is not really a "Wenger" kind of signing. But then, I will be delighted if he does come. With the new Barca president pushing hard for Fabregas (http://www.teamtalk.com/arsenal/6206329/New-Barca-chief-makes-Fabregas-pledge), at people like Martin Keown saying that "Fabregas exit is inevitable", I am starting to fear the worst. If the "inevitable" does happen, then Joe Cole could play wide and Nasri could play in the position of Cesc.

Australian Lleyton Hewitt (just noticed that his name starts with two ls and ends with 2 ts), "fought" back to beat the world no.2, Foger Federer 3-6, 7-6,6-4, at the Halle grasscourt (warm up tournament for Wimbledon). This was Federer's 2nd loss since 2003. His record is now 76-2. The other loss was to Nadal in wimbledon 2008. So, here is again, is Roger Federer. At the same place where he was last year this time. On a losing streak, dethroned to no.2, critics asking "is this the beginning of the end?". I really hate to see this. Especially, comparing Roger with Sachin. when people talk BS about someone who has been one of the greats, achieved so much and does not need to prove anyone to anything anymore. If I were not a Roddick fan, I would be rooting for Federer in this Wimbledon.

It was a "mixed" day for the Azzuri,as they drew with Paraguay 1-1. It was a physical and a really fast game. Tackles flying and the ball going from one side to another in seconds. The Italians had a similar start in the '06 world cup, when they finished with 10-man against a 9-man US team 1-1!! This one, thought, was not as dramatic as that. Not, at least in terms of red cards. This was a very inexperienced looking Azzuri line-up, with the likes of Pirlo and Gattuso on the bench. Buffon, Cannavaro, Zambrotta and De Rossi were the only 4 starters who had also started in teh 06 world cup final. The Azzuri were dealt another blow, when Bufffon had to go off injured at half time. It required a mistake by the Paraguayan goalie, for Italy to come back into the match. Talking about Paraguayan goalies, does anyone remember that crazy guy, Chilavert? So, Italians now face New Zealand and then Slovakia. It is an easy pool, but I hope they dont mess up. Seeing what I saw today, they should be able to beat those two comfortably.

FO finals, Yuvraj Dropped, Sachin Rested, Arsenal Sign Dutch youngster, Benitez at Inter

2010-06-09T03:50:00.005+05:30

After signing Marouanne the Morroccan, Wenger signed this Dutch under-16 youngster Kyle Ebecilio. He is apparently a powerful midfield player, in the Michael Essien mold. I know most Arsenal fans are not too happy about this signing, but I for one, am very much behind Wenger on this. Signing experienced players does not mean we should stop signing youngsters. Wenger has already come out and said that he wants to beef up the defence. (http://www.arsenal.com/news/news-archive/-i-ll-spend-the-right-money-on-my-defence-). So relax, you gunners. In Arsene we trust. Meanwhile, Senderos has signed for Fulham. I am not sure about the transfer fee. I wish that we get Hangelaand and pay them some extra money to round of the Senderos deal.

Elsewere, Nani has been ruled out of the world cup and Rafa Benitez has agreed a deal with Inter.

French open mens final was an anti-climax. Nadal got his revenge from last year. This was one match I was so looking forward to and I felt it got over before it started. On the womens side, Schiavonne became the first Italian to win the FO. Good omens for the Azurri?? Paes-Dloghy lost in the final to some unknown pair. All these years, Paes seems to be another one of those unsung heroes. He has consistently reached the final of so many grand slams and won a lot of them too. He was the winner last year (pairing with Dloghy again) and won in '99 and '01 with Bhupati. He also came to the final in '05 in mixed doubles. And all this, I am talking only French open.

In Harare, Brendon Taylot steered Zimbabwe to yet another victory. What a tournament for them. They have a great chance to win this series and start ressurecting their status in int'l cricket again. They have been a major downward slide ever since the likes of A Flower Brothers, Streak, Neil Johnson, Murray Goodwin, Andy Blignaut left the side due to Political unrest in Zimbabwe. Go ZIM!

Kiran More has said that dropping Uvraj was a 'mistake'. I have mixed feelings about it. I think this will be a temporary thing and Yuvraj will be back in the next series. But, dropping him now was, again the correct decision. He has not been fit, he has not been in form, he does not really look to be mentally up there. So, let him go back, do the basics and come back fitter and better.

People have alleged Sachin of placing country ahead of personal interests saying he should rest for IPL and play in the Asia cup. I think Sachin has made the correct decision. Asia cup is just one of many series' that India plays. IPL, on the other hand, is one of its kind. It is a new concept, and something which Sachin (or any other player) has not had a taste of. Besides, this is the time India need to start building for the WC'11. So, it empties one slot for Gary Kirsten to try different players/combinations. It is important that Sachin stays fit for the WC, especially looking at the frailties in the Indian batting line-up.

By the by.......I went to this mall in NY last week and wnated to share these pictures.......

Wally's woes and Nadal's Foes

2010-06-05T02:15:00.003+05:30

Theo Walcott's omission in the 23-man squad has been the talking point ever since the squad has been announced. I, as much as an Arsenal fan I am, was not surpirsed at his non-selection. On current form, Lennon and SWP definitely pick themselves before the Arsenal rookie. Time is on his side though. Walcott is only about 21 now, and potentially has 2, of not 3, world cups to look forward to. Its funny, that he was in the squad to Germany in 2006 and now after 4 years he has been dropped.

Rafael Nadal has setup a clash with Soderling in a mouth watering men's final. It is kind of fitting that the guy who beat Federer plays Nadal in the final. It was a HARD fought match for Soderling, as he battled past the dogged Czech in 5 sets. It was much easier for Nadal as compared to the Swede, though he was made to stretch in the 3rd set by the Austrian, Melzer. Soderling and Nadal hate each other (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwvgnYDTTQ0). Last year, it was Soderling, who defeated Nadal in the French Open, in one of the upsets of the season. Both players are playing one of the best clay court, hard-hitting baseline tennis. If Nadal wins this, he goes number 1. If not, he stays second. It all adds up to the atmosphere. Nadal has a 60-40 advantage on paper. But alas, sport is not played on paper!

Meanwhile, Ferdinand and Drogba have been ruled out of their squads after suffering injuries. Ferdinand sufffered a recurrence of his back injury and Drogba 'broke' his arm. Ferdi's absence means the Tottenscum's Ledley King is likely to fill in for him. Considering King's inspirational performances towards the end of the season for the spuds, and Ferdinand's woeful defending off late (the goal he conceded to Bellamy of Man. City comes to mind immediately), the could be a blessing in disguise for England. Btw, who will be their captain now?
Lampard? Gerrard? Rooney?
I'll say the selectors will go for Lampard. Though it is funny to think that Terry is Lamp's skipper at Chelsea.

My boss, the Ivory Coast guy, says that Drogba's absence is also a blessing in disguise for the elephants. Apparently, Ivory coast play one-touch passing, ala the gunners and hardly put crosses into the box. A hardworker like Aruna Diadane might just be what the Ivorians want up-front.

China have beaten France in a world cup friendly. Though I dont read too much into the warmups. The french, very lucky to qualify for the WC'10, in the first place, are looking a jaded side. In a pool which includes the hosts Safricans, Uruguay and Mexico, I will not be surprised if they are eliminated in the first round.

Bentitez parts with Liverpool, Zim's win and French Open

2010-06-04T02:09:00.003+05:30

Starting with the gunners, Barca's "formal bid" has been rejected by Arsenal FC. After Messi, Puyol, Iniesta etc etc, Xavi is the latest one to come out and say "Fabregas would suit Barcelona, Fab has Barca genes.....etc etc". Are we not all so sick of it already? Why dont these players concentrate on the WC now? I know that it is the club which pays them. But a little bit of loyalty towards the country wont hurt them.

Elsewhere, Rafa Benitez and Liverpool have 'mutually agreed' to part ways. The Liverpool gafa had signed a 5-yr contract last season. But, ousted out of the champions league in the preliminary rounds and finishing outside top 4 was not acceptable to the Liverpool board and he was asked to leave. He is expected to take over the reigns at Inter.

In the WC warmup, Carlos Vela scored for Mehico as they beat the Azzuri 2-1. Happy that Vela scored. Not too sad that Italy lost. Let the real thing begin, and hopefully the Azzuri will be up and running.

Zim beat India for the second time in the series. They did it with a bonus point too. Actually not many people know about this ODI triangular series, also involving, surprise surprise Srilanka. India now have to beat Srilanka in the last game with a bonus point to get to the final. Aah.....who cares? The timing of this series is defeinitely one to be questioned. Immediately after the IPL and T20 WC, probably there is only one team which is benefited from this-- Zimbabwe. So, I wont be to unhappy to see them win this series.

Samantha Stosur of Autralia and Schiavonne of Italy will play the Women's FO final. Schiavonne, apparently, is the first Italian to reach the FO final. Stosur, the one who plays with her shades, is the favorite, with wins over Justine Henin and Serana on the way to the FO final.

In the mens, Nadal plays Melzer of Austria and Soderling plays Berdych. In the quarters, Nadal bt Almagro (who I expected to do well) in straight sets. But, this must be one of the hardest straight sets win for Nadal. For the most part, Almagro looked the better player in the first 2 sets.
Djokovic looked to be in the cuise mode against Melzer, before his breathing problems came back to haunt him. He was 2 sets and a break up before going on to lose the match. Soderling, of course beat none other than 'Roi Rodge' in 4 sets. It was a rain-affected match. But, Soderling was just too powerful for the world no 1 on this day. He has become the upset-man now. Last year, Soderling bt Nadal and now Federer.

French Open: Day 4 and football news

2010-05-28T07:39:00.004+05:30

Was a rain-affected day 4 at Philip Chartier, Roland Garos, Paris.

Andy Murray bt Juan Ignacio Chela. The Argentinian (whose name, I am a fan of along with Juan Sebastian Veron, Juan Pablo Montoya, Juan Pablo Angel), on the back of a victory on the clay court of Houston, threatened briefly, taking the 2nd set. But the Scot came through reasonably comfortably in the end. The Scot now faces the Cypriot, Marcos Baghdatis in another tricky match for Murray. He beat Richard Gasquet in the first round, then Chela and now has Baghdatis.......phew, thats a tough draw.......

A-Rod, lost the 2nd set, but came through in 4 sets. 'Sweet heart' Ivanovic was kind of humiliated really, she lost 6-3, 6-0. Is there something with pretty-looking tennis players? They never seem to play consitent. She was the 2007 French Open champion. But now, is sadly on a downward curve. Anyway, Justin Henin looks to be well-placed before rain-gods obliged again. She was leading 6-3, 3-2. Big serving Isner powered his way through with 36 aces.......

Watch out for Almagro. Touted as the other Nadal by the Spanish press, he could be the surprise package this time. He is similar to Nadal in that he can grind the opponent to pieces. The difference, a major one at that , is that he is right handed. Also, he has a one-handed backhand.

Else where, Maurinho seems to be destined to become the Real Madrid coach. He has already started making his cocky statements. The latest one is something along these lines:

"If I become the coach of Madrid, I will not be the coach of a star-studded team. All the stars are at Inter Milan" !!! As much I a hate this guy's tactics, I love his press ocnferences.......Van Persie sinked Mehico with a brace. Looks to be in the form of his life now. Was good to see him score 2 and yet so frustrating to think what might have been had he been fit for Arsenal

United have officially announced the arrival of talented Mehican Striker....Hernandez. Nicknamed 'Chicharito', he is a hot favorite among the Mexicans. At the match between the Dynamos, I asked this Mexican dude, who is better Carlo Vela and Chicharito and he shouted, much to my disappointment CHICHARRRRRITO.......

French Open Updates ,World cup preview, CL review

2010-05-25T04:29:00.004+05:30

Somdev Devvarman was ousted in the first round. Disappointing. But lets get behind our guy and hope he does better in the upcoming grand slams. This was his first grand slam. So lot of factors like playing in front of big crowds, nerves etc would come into play.

Federer was in 2nd gear and yet cruised into the 2nd round. Soderling (last year's finalist) eased into 2nd round with a straight-set win. The comedian from Serbia -Dojokovic, (type djovkovic mimicry on youtube, if you have not already), had a little scare but went thru in 4 sets. Jo-wili-Tsonga made heavy weather of little-known German, and battled thru in 5 sets. Best match of the 1st round though was between Gasquet and Murray. The Glasgow boy came back from 2 sets down to beat the local boy to go through in 5 sets. The Scot looked down, when he was 2 sets down and 1 break behind in the 3rd set. But, in an amazing turn around, he silenced the crowd and won in over 3 and a half hrs.
But, it looks like it is going to be the same old, fed-nadal final since there is no Delpotro and no Davydenko due to injuries. Even if they did play, it de-nadal was the likelier final, but now that they are not there, it makes it even more likely.

There is still hope for India, as Paes-Dloughy are seeded 3rd in doubles. Also, Bopanna is playing with a Pakistani guy Qureshi! Sadly, I dont see Sania Mirza in the FO'10. I hope all the Shoaib Malik/ Marriage thing does not take her focus away. If it does, it will be a shame. I cant imagine someone from the US or Europe stops playing because he/she got married!!

WC'10
Ballack is injured and wont play wc.
Grosso has been left out by Lippi. I remember this guy played really well in the wc'06, he defended awesome and also scored the goal that killed Germany in semi final. So, he must have done something pretty bad to be removed.
Ronaldo is 'worried' about Ivory Coast. Indeed, this group is the 'Group of Death'. Brazil, Portugal, Ivory Coast and North Korea. My boss, who is himself from the Ivory Coast, says Brazil and North Korea will go through. Lets see.

Champions League final was pretty boring

I kind of dozed off in between the match 5 or 6 times. Agreed, I was tired after playing cricket in the morning. But, certainly, a football match has to be really boring to make me go to sleep, and that too in a CL final.

But it certainly did escalate Maurinho's figure as the father who work magic. And for those who want trophies at 'any' cost, would be full of praise for the Portugese. He does have an aura about him. But never in my life would I want himto coach Arsenal. Indeed, their path to CL glory could not have been tougher, with the likes of Shelski, Bayern and Barcelona thrown in their path. So well donw Maurinho and well done Inter and well done Zannetti, the 36-yr old captain of Internazionale. And btw, it was sweet revenge for Maurinho. He was fired as the assistant coach of Van Gaal at Barcelona 10 years ago!!

........thats it for now

Hosting Cities & International Sporting Events : Olympics , Asian Games, Commonwealth Games

2010-05-24T22:06:00.006+05:30

1951 - Asian Games
1982 - Asian Games
1989 - Asian Track and Field Championship
1993 - Badminton World Cup
2000 - Thomas Cup and Uber Cup
2008 - European Tour Golf
2010 - World Cup Hockey
2010 - Commonwealth Games
2012 - SAARC Games
2024 - Olympics ( may be )

Are you able to find any similarity in the list above? All these big events were and will be hosted by India in only one City - New Delhi.

Besides the above list New Delhi has also hosted many other events like Cycling Championship, World Billiards & Snooker Championship, International Volleyball Championships and many Davis Cup matches. Golf tournaments have also become a regularity in the city now. Lets also not forget that Delhi is the second hub in India after Mumbai.

What does all this details signify?
Is there only one city in India capable of hosting international events in India?
Perhaps no.
Is the love for Delhi of politicians sitting in Delhi?
May be.
IS the easy availability of funds from the center for an event to be hosted in Delhi?
May be.
Or is the attitude that one city is ready and lets host the event here, investment will be less?
Quiet Possible.
or due to callousness of sitting from eternity on their seats as the Chief of various non working sports bodies in India?
Possible.

There is no single reason for hosting of events regularly in Delhi. Its a combination of reasons listed above, there may be others also. But point is big tournaments are meant for development of the city infrastrucutrally and culturally.

Lets first analyze how much delhi has changed since it got the CWG 2010 hosting rights. Construction of flyovers and broadning of existing roads has increased and its been getting completed before time. Metro rail has spread to NCR region covering Noida, Ghaziabad and will soon be entering Gurgaon. City has got swanky line of red and green low floor buses which are slowly replacing killer blue line buses. Power shortage is rare in major areas of Delhi now. New T3 terminal will be inagurated soon. Various cultural events are lined up during the games times.

More than 1 lakh visitors are expected during the games times, they will be like brand ambassadors of their respective nations and will take away what they see here. In case of toursim word of mouth is most powerful form of advertising. Keeping this in mind tours to major tourists like Agra, Jaipur , Shimla , Amritsar are planned by various travel companies. Economy of the hosting city gets boost due to hosting rights. This is just in brief what can happen to a hosting city. I am not mentioning here what benefits sports persons get due to hosting, there are rarely few benefits visible, we only remember the past heroes at the time of baton relays and in most of cases bollywood celebrities are given limelight.

Crux is India should have tried to spread out hosting of events in major cities of India. VEry few events are hosted in cities apart from Delhi. Youth Commonwealth Games in Pune, first and last Afro Asian games in Hyderabad and may be few more of international scale.

Cluster Model for Asian/Commonwealth/Olympics Games:

We should have followed the cluster model just like in industries in hosting events. Delhi in north , Mumbai/Pune or Ahmedabad in west, Hyderabad/Chennai/Banglore in south, Kolkata/Bhubaneshwar in east. This would have atleast spread the infrastructure development to varios regions in India.

Map Showing hosts cities of CWG Games

From

South Korea has hosted Asian games in its 3 cities Seol(1986), Busan(2002), Incheon(2014). Only Bankok is following the wrong strategy it has hosted Asian Games 4 times in 1962,1970,1978,1998. China is also spreading the cities Beijin hosted asian games in 1990 and Guangzhou will be hosting in 2010, if they wanted they would have easily hosted games in Beijing again and used olympics infrastructure.
Similarly in case of commonwealth games Australia has hosted games in Perth, Sydney, Brisbane. Scotland hosted in Edinburg and Glasgow(2014).
India needs infra development badly it should use such events as a way to develop cities. We dream of hosting olympics by 2020 but we cant event find place other than Delhi for hosting CWG/Asian games in places other than capital. India can start with bidding for 2018 Asian Games.

Specific Cities for Hosting Individual Sports Championships.

Boxing is popular in North East though due to rein of Mr Chautala as Boxing supremo hub is being shifted to Haryana. Internation Boxing events can be held in North East and Haryana to spread the sports here. We have to target regions from where we can get gold medals at olympics. Chances of a boxer from these region getting medals are slighly higher compared to other places.

In same way Hockey events can be hosted in Punjab, Wrestling in UP, Haryana , Punjab, Delhi. Badminton tournaments in Southern part of countires. By following this method we will be developing small clusters for specific games. These places will have better coaching facilities,infrastrucutre and culture for these sports which is most important.

I hope it would not be See you in Delhi next time

but

See you in Chennai

See you in Pune

See you in Kolkota .................. next time

The Racial Overtures ...The World Champions..

2010-05-22T02:49:00.001+05:30

It happened finally ...after a lull of what it seems a century ,english team has finally pulled the rabbit from the hat and won a world event in a game that seemingly they taught the world and forgot themselves.What a win for UK...

How often it has happened and how often it comes to light ?...Indian athletes were meted out a horrible treatment in UK.What a loss for UK...

Both the incidents above reflects the sport culture as of today.The first marks the transition of the English cricket team from their famous batting collapses,lack of adventerous(traditional) cricket.The men from the english shores were almost out of the tournament (thanks to rain gods),but the way they came back was exemplary.World cricket needed the genitor of the game to come aboard the ship of change and become a force to reckon with.And how well they have done it.Conquering the might of aussies in the finale might seem to many as a lucky shot,but the impression england gave was of a growing avalanche with more and more snow adding on as it rolled on to its victory,whereas the aussies resembled more like a vicious storm now cooling off,out of steam.And look at the transition in some of the english players.They looked their alien self.Stuart broad can now broadly grin and can have a good laugh about that penultimate over 3 years ago.The performance here would easily overshadow the double evil`s number he had to show for in the stats of his one over then.KP stamped his class over the tournament with some brilliantly crafted knocks one after other.Eoin morgan steered the ship through some tempests and has earned plaudits for the maturity he has shown even from the opposite ranks.

The win not only breaks the hegemony of the asian countries in world t20,but also raptures the aussie dominance in world cricket as well renders them void of the only trophy missing from their stacked glory shelves.Now the english team can bury the hatchet of not winning an international cricketing event after coming so close in the Second world cup of 1979,again in 1987,again in 1992 and then in the champions trophy where two tailenders from west indies made them accept silver.Rising from the ashes english team took the glory in this edition of world t20 ,and they would look forward to conquering the world(read australia)in the Ashes this year to tip the icing on the cake.

When a indian is insulted abroad,we feel bad.And when a indian sportsperson is insulted,is castigated just for his colour,we feel blood rising to our brain.But let us look at this incident in complete isolation from emotions.Indian athletes were supposed to be ferried by a bus to their destination,a right they were denied.Learning from the horse`s mouth,indian players were misbehaved by the caretaker staff as well.This incident is very unfortunate and mars the sporting spirit.Indian athletes, who are more often than not (if you arent playing cricket) are meted out a pathetic treatment by the local sports authorities in the level of amenities(financial and structural) are not guaranteed fair treatment at world/international events,then i think its time that india increases its clout in the international sports arena.As in cricket we have successfully made the rest of the world listen and address our redressals,same should be done here also.Also the recent diktat by the government to fix the serving tenure of the head honchos of the sports authorities is a welcome move.Too long have these old bureaucrates denied the players their rights and have wielded unjust levels of power.They have leeched the best of the talents by infusing corrupt and illogical practices.The athletes should be properly compensated for their troubles and to make sure such incident doesnt repeat itself we ask the indians residing there in other countries to do the hospitality.( they are aplenty everywhere and would be delighted to do so)

And here i would like to take my opportunity to congratulate possibly one of best sportsman india has and will produce,Vishy...

vishwanathan Anand on winning the world title in chess and making all of us proud.Keep moving the pieces...

Arsenal Next Season

2010-05-21T01:49:00.004+05:30

In Arsene we trust!

Lets start off with the Goalie issue. WE DESPERATELY NEED A HIGH CLASS GOALIE. There is no alternative to that. From what Wenger is saying it looks as though he might put the Pole (Fabianski) between the poles and make Almunia the 2nd choice. That very thought makes me nervous. I am not sure what Wenger sees in him. He may be a good shot stopper and he may have good reactions. But, what we need is a steady presence in our box. Someone who cannot collect (or punch) the corners effectively and efficiently. There are about 20 to 25 corners+freekicks to defend in a game and about 1 or 2 or sometimes up to 4 shots which require quick-reaction/ diving/ spectacular stops. (Arsenal-Barcelona was an exception). It is quite clear that to do the simple things efficiently is more important than to pull-off the spectacular. And this is what Wenger should look at. We know that Arsene will not bring in someone like Buffon or Toldo. I am hoping if he can persuade Lloris from the French team, that would be awesome. But, I think Wenger could go for someone really low-profile. Can he find another Lehman from somewhere? Over to you Arsene........

Gallas' wants and Arsenal/Wenger's policy means that the Frenchman could be on his way out. I have never been a big fan of Gallas ever since he came to Arsenal. Even though he formed a great partnership with TV earlier this season, I wont mind letting him go. BUT, that would leave a huge hole in the defence. We missed out on the Fulham youngster (Smalling). Can we get the Blackburn youngter? Jones? But then again, that would mean too many youngsters. So, in short, if Gallas stays, then TV + Gallas in the center with Djourou and Sol as backups. Otherwise, we need a well established center back. Would be awesome if we could get in a beast in the mould Lucio or Alex.
Over to you Arsene........

Left and right backs?
Clichy and Sagna backed up by Gibbs and Eboue. That is solid for me. There is talk that Clichy might go to Madrid or Barca. If he does, the Gibbs backed up by Armand Traore makes me concerned.
1) Gibbs, (even though, I like him as a player) is coming back from injury.
2) Traore is not a good defender.

Now the big one. The fab-skipper. This is what I think:
a) Fab wants go to Barca "some day". Some day is important.
b) Does he want to go now? Only Cesc knows the answer to that.
Why he would want to go
------Barca will probably win more trophies than Arsenal.
------Barca is his childhood club.
------Barca is in Spain
Why he would not want to go
------Papa Wenger. The person who has almost brought him up
------Feeling of almost there in Arsenal, just a little bit more to go. For a few seasons, we have been "almost there". If we sign a decent goalie and defender, (and having already bought the Morrocan), we should hopefully BE THERE next season instead of almost.
------Skipper at Arsenal, 3rd choice in Barca. Fab can dictate his terms over here. In Barca, Fab will only play if one of Xavi or Iniesta is unavailable.

Rest is upto AW.

There is a possibility that he might still go. But, I say he wont.

Since Cesc is not going, our mid field is pretty strong. We dont need any more re-inforcements in mid-field contrary to the pouplar belied. Song, Diaby, Nasri, Fab and Vin backed up by Walcott, Denislon, , Eboue and Rosicky is awesome, the best mid field in England.

RVP and Chamakh up-front backed up by Bendtner and Eduardo/Vela is still a little weak. But, if Jay-Emmanuel Thomas has matured enough, then we dont really need any more strikers. Jay-Emmanuel Thomas is a tall strong lad. May be just what we need.

arsenal this season

2010-05-19T03:57:00.002+05:30

In wenger we trust!

Oh buoy! yet another season! yet another year! do i need to say .....same old story.....there is a sense of frustration growing around the emirates.....so where the hell did we go wrong?

it could be any one of the following:

no pre-season buys??
.....in fact, our pre-season buys were negetive......we sold traitor ade and kolo habib toure.........and bought in vermaelen....we thought eduardo and rosicky's come-back will fill the adebayor's slot.....vermaelen, along with fabre and sir alex was one of our players of the season and probably would make it to the premier league IX of the season......so i would say pre-season buy was not something where we went wrong.....

injuries?
we lost nasri for first 3 months, rvp for about 5 months, fab for about 2 months, bendtner for about 3 months and of course aaron the ramsey....so, that would definitely be a factor I would say.......i dint follow shelski so closely......but they lost essien and cashley cole for 2 or 3 months......but no one else really......hope the injury gods are good to us next time.....

big-match losses??
......we lost home and away to shelski and manure......which is losing 12 points....and almost equivalent to 24 points......considering that they are our title rivals......so if we had even drawn those games or won our home games.....things could have been so different.....but considering that manure lost to loserpool both their matches last year and yet won the title means that we could have still made up for the lost ground.......

no january transfer buys
.......possibly......coz arsene knew we dint have rvp and bendtner......and he asked vin(arsha) to play up front as a lone-striker.....the dimunitive Russsian did a reasonable job.....and also scored a couple of wonder gols......the one against loserpool comes to my mind first......probably maruanne the chamakh boy at this time would have been ideal for Arsenal.....as much as Bendtner tried.....he is not more than a squad player, an impact player....who could come in the last 20 mins.......if you ask nick to lead the line against Barca at camp nou......oh buoy....you are asking way too much of him..... we did get sol in January who was a revelation really....but thats all we did

goal keeper???????

oh yes.......this is where we lost the title......

remember the manure again early in the season......we were leading manure 1-0 comfortably .......when manuel stupid almunia charged wayne rooney when there was no need to......rooney dived, made the most of it, got a penalty and united not only got out of jail, they went on to win the game 2-1.......against porto in CL, 2 horrendous flapianski errors cost us the game.......its a different story that that game dint really affect us much.......but its the confidence (or the lack of it in this case) that you instill in your defence as a keeper that was the problem......Verminator tried hard to be the leader.......but with flapianski and silvster arround......oh buoy!........u are asking too much......
against Birmingham......almunia could have punched the ball over but instead let kevin phillips equalize in the 91st minute.......
against wigan......again flapianski was found flapping........
i remember i used to not like leheman......because he used to shove the opposition off .... i remember when he used to rise to catch a ball he used to have his studs up.......so any striker near him would get a knock or two on their shins and knees if they dared to go near him......how we miss him now.....
david seaman says that wenger should trust in these 2 glovers......but as much wenger i trust.......i cant take these to flappers......i can even take bendtner......and trust wenger on that........but not on flapianski or almunia please......

India's T20 WC 2010 Debacle - Who is to blame?

2010-05-16T13:46:00.005+05:30

Today is the final of T20 world cup between Australia and England. India got out of the cup 4-5 days ago and since then every news channel is discussing the reasons for the loss and making their own predictions regarding who will be out of the team and who will be retained. From late night brawl in West Indies in which Nehra is accused of misbehaving with the others people in the bar to Kirsten one-o-ones with 7 players, everything is being debated day and night in media.

Here are few reasons which I feel are responsible for India’s debacle.

IPL

I don’t think 14 matches are responsible for India’s loss in world cup, not even IPL parties. IPL matches used to end at around 11.30 so what if players came to a party for 1-2 hours to relax and enjoy. Players are expected to be professional and if they feel that they bodies can’t handle the glamour of girls and drinks of IPL Nights they should have controlled themselves. This is at least expected from senior players. IPL nights might have done harm to younger players. Arjun Rampal’s wife the organizer of IPL nights might have said that players were not forced attend the parties but I think their owners might have pushed them to attend these. Sachin could say no to these parties because he is Sachin no player can dare to fight against the BCCI, if you dare to fight you will be kicked out for sure.

Illogical traveling around the country for the matches is the main reason for fatigue and tiring bodies. If a team is playing match in Bangalore schedule should be made such that if plays its following matches in Chennai, Hyderabad so that traveling is less.

Dhoni has given an invalid reason of IPL nights being responsible for the failure.

Team Selection:

I am not lover of BCCI infact all useless sports bodies of India being run by old politicians who I am sure would not clearly know the rules of the sports for whose body they are head.Chief selector is ambassador of Chennai Super Kings, Srinivasan secretary of BCCI is owner of CSK are they working for BCCI of CSK.

Bindra is handling a big Punjab lobby. Arun Jaitely head of Delhi cricket association. n number of politicians are head of their respective sports bodies why because cricket has money and power simple.

Punjab lobby pushed for Chawla as a spinner in Indian team despite the fact that Pragyan Ojha and Mishra. Robin Uthappa is getting huge sympathy votes for not getting selected despite being in from. Sehwag was fit to play matches in IPL but as they were kicked out of IPL he got injured, its clear he wanted to make money playing IPL matches he should have the guts to say that he is injured during the IPL tournament. He clearly put DD over ICC World Cup.

Yuvraj who is now filled with fatty acids and loads of chicken tikka should have been dropped, he is so sad after being kicked out of captaincy of Kings X1 team that he has started eating chicken in breakfast , lunch and dinner.

Shortpitch Delivery

In the last WC we failed against the short pitch balls, this time it also happened. We are vulnerable since time immemorial against the short ball. Its just the last 4-5 years when greats like Sachin, Dravid , Laxman were there in Indian team who could handle short ball easily that opponents stopped using the weapon.

We need to practice for these type of deliveries, point is we don’t have time to practice. BCCI wants to mint as much money as possible by playing use less tournaments against Zimbabwe, Bangladesh, Srilanka again and again. We have played I think every second month against SriLanka in the past year. Thanks to India being no-1 in test that BCCI now is trying hard to convert 7 ODI series to 2 test 3 odi wherever its possible but to BCCI it’s a loss of huge revenue as ODI gets more ads. Weren’t the BCCI a charitable body who is evading taxes since many years and filling their coffins?

When the player can go to National Cricket Academy to practice?

Poor Fielding and Running between wickets:

Outfield is very slow in west indies and one needs to run fast b/w the wickets but Indians players are adapted to hitting 4s in flat pitches in India. There was no practice match or time to practice in WI so we couldn’t adapt. Who is at fault again here – BCCI.

Player Fatigue:

We play lots of matches round the year. In 90's we were playing 35-40 ODI's are year and now we are playing lot of T20's ODIs round the year. Tours after tours is the routine , we will be playing in Triangular series in Zimbabwe, Asia Cup in Dambulla, Test series again in Sri Lanka , Triangular Series with NZ , SL in August. Australia coming to India and what not.

Ok we can't lesson the tours so lets make a bigger pool of players lets rotate them but that is also not possible till now. Players want to play as much as possible as you never know when you get kicked out, Fear of BCCI. ODI teams are not getting selected on basis of IPL performance which is wrong. Where is our bench strength. How many India A team tours to Australia , England , NZ took place in last 2 years. If same 15-18 players are playing so much cricket they will obviously get tired and fatigued, lets enlarge the pool and try to start rotation policy.

Indian crowd also need to understand that these are players not super humans. Saying that they keep on doing ads, party a lot and not play at all is wrong. Its good they lost now they will focus on test cricket which is the best.

Its very sad that we are having very less test matches when we have players like Sachin, Dravid , Laxman. Australia plays 8-10 tests a year and we should have used given these great players lot more chance to play test cricket in these years.

Its time to celebrate Vishy victory again, its a very big achievement to beat Topalov in his home. Indian hockey team is also performing well reaching the finals of Azlan Shat Tournament , today is the final.

Brute Force Vs Deft Touch

2010-02-03T05:22:00.001+05:30

So, yet another win of brute force over deft touch, or rather 2 more wins. Justin Henin played the beautiful game, but Serena Williams walked away with the honors. Arsenal had the technique, the passing, the footballing skills, but it was Darren Fletcher (Anti-football? No, not this time) and AF's (Alex Fergusson, for there is only one Sir Alex, Sir Alex Song!!!!) red devils who had the last laugh!! Henin had the drop shots, the pace, the nimble-footedness, the volleys, hell she even had the BEST ONE-HANDED BACKHAND ever but lacked Serena's MUSCULAR STRENGTH. I am taking nothing away from Man Utd and Serena Wiliams here for they deserve to win. In fact, I dont really believe in the statement 'Deserved to Win'. It’s pretty simple and universal and omni-present and ubiquitous etc etc, the team which wins, deserves to win. For otherwise, it would not have won!! (Now, don’t ask me, did Aus deserve to win the Sydney test 2008!! That’s a toughie!! (Darryl Tuffey??))

But, this begs to ask a question, are we entering an era, where 'Brute Force' is taking over from Style and Class? Is there no room for 'Lazy Elegance' no more? When was the last time we saw a Tennis player serve-and-volley his way to a major? Did anyone after Sampras, US Open 2002, win a major? Is there any serve-and-volley player right now in top 10? When was the last time, a team one-touch-passed its way to the EPL summit? Arsenal 2004. Anyone after that?

Andy Murray tried to beat Federer at his own game (with style, elegance and technique) and came up second best. But when Juan Martin Del Potro, in US Open 2009, 'brute force'd his way past Federer he was successful. When Nadal tried to 'Muscle' his way through, he was also successful.

I think earlier, the players were not physically very strong and the equipment/ gear they used was nowhere near as good as they are today. Take anything, the bats, the helmets, the racquets, the shoes all have become better and stronger. In fact, in the earlier days, with the wooden racquet, there was nothing called top-spin, for the strings would break if a player tried to give a tennis ball some heavy top-spin and that is why they relied on serve-and-volley and touch shots and drop shots. Not anymore though. If a player tries to serve-and-volley now, he will get killed by the bullet-like, heavy top-spinned shots.

But, I still believe, Technique and Style has an upper-hand over raw-power. For otherwise, 'Roi' (King in French) Roger would not have taken over from the Narcissist Nadal to become No.1. And that is why I say, in ‘Arsene we Trust’ and that is why I say ‘Keep the Faith’!!!

Please God......Chelsea 1- 2 Arsenal!!

Pakistan to Panicstan!

2010-01-07T02:10:00.002+05:30

I was really excited to finally watch a test match. Its always fun and interesting to see Australia lose. (even if its against pakistan!!). So, I got under my 'razai', found a good link(to a website) to watch what I hoped for a Paki voctory over the OZ's. But, it was Pakistan, after all. They have not won till they have won (and they have not lost till they have lost. Martin Crowe will testify that. Remember WC 92!!).

Mohd. Yousuf said "We lost the match because of me. My shot was pathetic" after the match. Well, I am not sure about the second part, I concur with the first part though. For me, Pakistan started loosing the match the moment they put 8 fielders on the boundary to Hussey. You have arguably the best bowling attackin the world, here is the opposition, which is effectively 50 for 8, you have one batsman who is struggling for confidence, was almost dropped form the team, was dropped 3 times by your tiny, squeaky wicket-keeper the previous day, before the start of the series, is averaging below 30 in this series and a tailender with you him and have all but the bowler and keeper on the fence??

This is where, I feel, Pakistan lost the match. Not only did it allow Hussey to control the game, it boosted Australia's confidence and degraded Pakistan's. Cricket (most sport in fact) is 50% about confidence and momentum and Pakistan had neither at the end of their innings. (If only you could combine New Zealand's efficiency with Pak's talent!!)

They made bowlers like Hauritz look unplayable. Fine, Hauritz is a decent bowler who can pick you the odd wicket, but Nathan Hauritz is no Murali and thats what pakistan made him look like.

Phrases like snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, sidhuisms like "bicycle stand. You push one and they will all tumble down.", my old class teacher's saying of "kulhadi pe pair maarna" started coming to my mind. Ponting's decision of batting first seemed to have been vindicated and his theory of scoring more runs in the first innings than the opposition's last innings was made to look good.
("I backed us at the start of the game to make more runs in the first innings than what I thought Pakistan could make in the last innings," he said. "As it turns out we got 120-odd and bowled them out for 139 in the last innings of the game.")

And now, they want Younis Khan to catch the next flight to Hobart. Well, it wont be surprising if he does. If a team can changed its skipper 6 times in the last 12 months, surely one more change wont make a difference!!

Zoom Barabar Zoom

2009-12-31T21:23:00.006+05:30

Here is a look back on the top few sporting moments in this decade

2001- Laxman's 281 and India's victory over Australia in Kolkata after following on. This series was played around the

Feb-Mar season. Despite board exams, and all those Engineering tests hovering, for the last 3 days of this test everything else was switched off.

2001- Goran wins Wimbledon.
First Croat,
First Wild card entry and the only wild card entry to date to win the men's grandslam,
200 + aces
Beating Rafter in the Finals
Espn/Star Sports Did not broadcast this match live

2003- Sachin hits 19 off Shoaib's first over. A Six over thirdman, flick off the wrists for 4, and the classic Sachin on-drive set the tone for India's visctory over Pakistan at Centution. Me and Chotu were just in time at the Off-campus hostel to watch this. If anyone wants the mp3 version of this innings of Sachin, email me. I listen to it when I feel low.....which is everyday I go to work!

2003- Jonny Wilkinson kicks England to world cup win
Yes, England did win the world cup. But it was not cricket or football. With the score tied at 17-17, Jonny steps up to take the "free-kick" and with it the Rugby world cup 2003.

2003-04: The Arsenal invincibles go 49 unbeaten. Henry, Pires, Bergkamp, Ljungberg, Vieira, Gil, Campbell, Toure, Cole, Lauren, Lehman backed up by Wiltord, Edu, Kanu.
I can sense a deja-vu is soon going to happen! Come on you gunners!!

2005 - Mission Impossible to Mission Istanbul
As much as I like AC Milan (my second fav.team), Gattuso, Kaka, Pirlo, Gerrard and Co still bring goosbumps when I look back at this night. Me, kure, vind, sycho, shiki, andy, pawan, havish, gudi, arku, desi, alok, chotu were in the off-campus hostel that night.

"Forza Milan" was the Banner held by the Milan supporters and Desi, Shiki and Havish were going home till we convinced them to stay back as Milan ius leading 3-0, having 75% of the posession and Liverpool cant get our of their half. And then Rafa brought in Hamman for Finnan. They say that was a "Masterstroke". But whenever a manager plays a "Masterstroke" I always wonder, did he err in the first place by not starting with him. Anyway, Jerzy dudek does the "Jelly fish" as pool complete an amazing fightback to win on penalties.

2005 - England tip Australia by 2 runs at Edgbaston. Flintoff offers solace/sympathy to Brett Lee. Kodak Moment!! clik!! Could not watch it live :(

2007 - Joginder Bowls, Misbah scoops, but alas, he forgot there is Mallu in every corner of the world! This was the headline on TOI as Dhoni and Co. erased the memories of the debacle in the Carribean within 20 days of 20-20 magic.

Picture sources: Cricinfo, BBC etc

World Cup Pots

2009-12-02T22:54:00.001+05:30

So, FIFA announced the 4 "pots" of next year's world cup. The 8 pools will be decided this Friday with one team coming from each “Pot”.

Pot 1 (seeds): South Africa (Group A), Argentina, Brazil, England, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Spain
SA, because they are the hosts are in Pot 1. Obviously, they are the weakest in Pot 1. Everyone else looks strong except Italy.

Brazil and Argentina, with their South American flair and also histroy/mathematics favoring them. For the last 40 odd years, the world cups have been won alternately by a South American and a European Nation. (Italy 06, Brazil 02, France 98, Brazil 94, Germany 90, Argentina 86, Italy 82, Brazil 78, Some european nation 74, Brazil 70, ENGLAND!! 66, Brazil 62). So, will it be Argentina or Brazil this time? I dont like Maradona. So no Argentina please.

England is everyone's favorite. Because of all this EPL broadcast. But, now there is a growing sense of feeling that English players among people are over rated. OR are they?

My favorite--Italy looks bad on paper. But they looked worse in 06 and yet won it. And also, they brought back the coach who won them the 06 world cup, Marcello Lippi.

Pot 2: Australia, Japan, North Korea, South Korea, Honduras, Mexico, USA, New Zealand
The Socceroos and the USA look the strongest here with Tim Cahill, Mark Schwarzer and Dempsey, Tim Howard, Donnavan etc.
Weakest would be NK and Honduras.

Pot 3: Algeria, Cameroon, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Chile, Paraguay, Uruguay
Wouldn't we love to see an African Nation going all they way?
IVory coast with Drogba, Toure Brothers, Aruna Dindane, Salomon Kalou, Eboue look really strong.
Algeria looks the weakest here.

Pot 4: Denmark, France, Greece, Portugal, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Switzerland.
France-strongest
Slovakia, Slovenia- Weakest.

There is every chance that we could have a pool with Argentina, USA, Ivory Coast and France in one pool. Or England, Australia, Ghana and Portugal in another.

Countries and players to miss out on WC 2010:
Bulgaria (Berbatov), Sweden (Zlatan), Togo(Adebayor), Russia(Arshavin and GUUS HIDDINK!!), Ireland(Given and Roobbie Keane).

Don’t miss the draw. Its on Friday 8:30 pm India time.

Sachin Tid Bits (1)

2009-11-30T23:36:00.004+05:30

Sachin was the first overseas player to be contracted by Yorkshire. Before he was signed in 1992, Yorshire had this policy of not allowing 'outsiders' in their team. There were claims that the Yorks were Racists. But, seeing the plight of Yorshire cricket, Geoffery Boycott, who was in the Yorkshire's cricket council, desperately wanted Sachin in the team. So, it was not easy for Sachin to play in the team, as there were lot of oppositions to his contract-signing at Yorkshire. But, the great man won the hearts of the Yorks. Even though, his performance was not as outstanding (a mere average of 46!!), he was commended by the Yorks for the way he carried himself on and off the field.

For some people, who might blame me for copying or plagiarism (LOL)!!!, I will be on the safe side. I got this info from a book which I was reading the other day,

Sachin: The Story Of The World's Greatest Batsman(Paperback - Nov 2003)
by Gulu Ezekiel (Author)Write a Review

खेल,इन्टरनेट और हम

2009-11-29T14:13:00.003+05:30

कुछ बाराह साल का था मैं, जब मैंने पहली बार भगवान् को देखा, वो नीले रंग का मुकुट पहेनता था अपने घुंघराले बालो के ऊपर, और एक भारी लकड़ी की गदा थी उसके पास, और अपने चमत्कार से वोह दुनिया के सबसे महान गेंदबाजों का नाश कर रहा था. उस साल था विश्व कप के उपलक्ष पर उसने दौड़ो की झड़ी लगा दी थी, और शेन वारने नमक गेंदबाज़ को तो उस महान ने नेस्तनाबूद ही कर दिया था.

पर फिर वोह दिन भी आया, जब कलकत्ता की रणभूमि पर ९१/२ के स्कोर पर वोह आउट हुआ, और उसके बाद कलकत्ता की जनता ने उस देवता के अभाव मैं मैदान को भस्म कर दिया, लोग कहते है वोह शिवजी का दुःख था की उस नन्हे भगवान् के आउट होने पर उन्होंने उस दिन कलकत्ता पर आग बरसाई. पर उस रात मैं सो नहीं पाया, और उन आँखों मैं कही कुछ पानी की बूँदें ज़रूर थी.

१९९६ का वोह साल और मायनों मैं भी ऐतिहासिक था, जब इन्टरनेट नामक तकनीक मेरी दुनिया मैं आई. एक घर्र्र घर्र करते संगणक के सामने बैठ कर आप दुनिया मैं कही भी चिट्ठी लिख सकते थे. हॉट मेल , याहू, और मेरे आज के नाम से जुडी एक पोर्टल काफी प्रसिद्ध हुए.

पर मुझे क्या पता था, की कुछ १० सालो बाद, इन्टरनेट के जरिये मैं उन महान खेल के क्षणों को संभाल के रख पाऊंगा, जिनका इतिहास मैं कोई सानी नहीं, और जो मेरे दिल के बेहद करीब रहेंगे. इसी का प्रयास करते हुए हम कुछ मित्रो ने मिल कर "पेन द गेम" की स्थापना की. इसके पहले ही वर्ष मैं इसने indibloggies पुरस्कार समारोह मैं भारत के सबसे बेहतरीन खेल ब्लॉग होने का गौरव प्राप्त किया.

इस वर्ष भी हम इस सम्मान के लिए नामांकित हुए है, कृपया इन संदेशो का पलान करे, और हमें विजयी बनाने मैं मदद करे..

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जय सचिन,
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Small God of All Things

2009-11-26T19:14:00.002+05:30

Readers might find this post biased, hindered by favoritism, but what I would like to believe is that I am pinning down facts accompanied by my perceptions. Yes, I am talking about Sachin Tendulkar, the much talked about, favourites of all (cricket lovers, spectators and all others). Moreso, where I want to draw everyone's attention are the statistics (numbers as called by people in Sales). For starts, a quick one, by the time I started walking properly, the Great Man started playing. Now, I am still nobody and the Master has achieved everything. A total of more than 30,000 runs in International Cricket, 12877 in Tests and 17178 in ODIs. The other day I was looking for definitions of 'infinite' and what I started believing in was that we should have some such concept in Cricket as well. I think Sachin's scores should be marked infinite. Why? First, I don't think its possible to touch this mark because they are way too huge! Secondly, like everyone was excited on him scoring 17000 runs in ODIs and then 30000 runs in International Cricket, what one of my friends rightly pointed out was, with every single run that he scores now, he is creating milestone after another - 30,001, 30,002, 30,003, and so on. Simply because its anyways too huge, so a run more or 10 runs more are taking an already huge number further down.

Moving on to a different track, a part 2 of this post. When I play cricket with friends I feel how good a feeling it would be for players like Yuvraj, Dhoni, Gambhir, Sehwag and others to share the dressing room with Sachin. To be on the crease with Sachin on the other end. And then I was wondering, his son would be so proud that his father is Sachin Tendulkar, all his relatives proud and happy of being related to Sachin, his friends for being friends with Sachin, in fact everyone related to him in one or the other way would be willing to proudly flaunt the fact of being related to Sachin Tendulkar! And this was precisely what I was discussing with another friend (yes, I tend to discuss Sachin 'n' number of times with 'x' number of people and the fact is everyone is willing to participate in the conversation, because as I said, he is a favourite of all!) and my friend said, back in college when any of us would top a course and be very confident of knowing all concepts and the fact that others would definitely come for help, there was a sense of pride, and more than that, an attitude that somewhat had a tint of arrogance, but look at this man, Sachin Tendulkar, the name is in itself so BIG but yet so down to earth, calm, composed! And who can debate this being as one of the key factors behind his success?

In this part 3 of my post what I want to say is what I had in the beginning of this post - You may find it biased, but then there is this another man named Tony Greig and what I feel is, if Sachin's Greatness is to be marked 9.9 on a scale of 10, Tony Greig makes it 10 on 10. His description of events while commentating when the Master is batting, his pitch modulation, flow of excitement in words, it can make even a dead man sit up and watch! Putting one of the many videos of the great combo - Sachin in Full Form and Tony Greig describing it in his own words :) (Take special note of the video at around 7:55, this in desh's words is called 'orgasmic commentary').
Enjoy. Have Fun. Good Bye :)

Fastest Gol

2009-11-26T04:22:00.004+05:30

Records are meant to be broken......but will this one ever be?

Nawaf Al Abed, the number 24 from Al Hilal, saw Al Sholah gol keeper (ironically also a number 24) off the line and unleashed a bekhamesque curling ball, which the gol keeper could only watch sail into his net.

This gol, which took only 2 seconds, is claimed to be the fastest gol in profesional futbol.

Well done Nawaf!!

For videos of the link, please visit the following website

http://sports.yahoo.com/soccer/news?slug=goal-videoalhilalstrikernawafala&prov=goal&type=lgns

Sports MBA style : United Warrior League

2009-11-25T14:14:00.004+05:30

First 10 days of November were full of sporting activities at IIFT. If was time of United Warrior League (UWL). Event was platform where we enjoyed playing and also learn management fundas.

UWL is a sports and marketing events based on lines of IPL. There are four teams
Southern Stallions
Aryans Juggernauts
Eastern Gladiators
Mumbai Hawks

First of all owners were selcted in an interview process by the organizing committee. There after another round of interviews were conducted for selecting 2 brand managers for each team. A team is not only supposed to win on the ground but also win hearts all around. IPL consist of only cricket we had cricket, volleyball, football, carom, darts, table tennis, basket ball, badminton and athletics.Owners and brand managers thereafter selected 25 players for their respective teams in a closed bidding process in which base price of a player was Rs30, total budget was Rs1000. Highest bid price went at Rs120 and for the girls it went to Rs70. It is not a male only tournament each team is supposed to have atleast 4 girls, 7 junior boys and 7 senior boys and 1 exchange student.

Teams tried numerous ways of promoting themselves with innovative ways like sending promotional SMSes, running ‘Enthusiastic Fan’ contests, launching blogs and websites, releasing promotional videos on youtube, hiding chocolates in classroom, Launching campus cleaning drive to outright crazy ideas like Running dating contest and loudest fan of the team.

Sports celebrities Vijay Dahiya, Indian ODI player and Badrinath Pathri, Physiologist to Sania Mirza inaugurated the sporting and branding event at IIFT Delhi campus. Launch event consisted of team introduction, team video, team jerseys and flag launch. Two teams got dhol and music band to introduce their team, one showed kerala martial arts.

Though its said that when the real battle start everything is kept aside, it was not the case here branding and promotional activities ran on full swing till the end. College was full of noise at 10.30pm when matches used to start. Though its rare to see a MBA student getting up at 6.00 am in the morning but for cricket everyone used to get up.

Eastern Gladiators lifted the cup this year, last year it was Aryan Juggernauts. Southern Stallions were awarded the best team in branding contest.

See you next year :)

Delhi is getting ready for Commonwealth Games 2010

2009-11-22T19:42:00.002+05:30

Less than 11 months are left for one of the biggest sporting extravaganza to take place in India. Preparations are on full swing, being in Delhi I am witnessing the changes taking place on regular basis.
India will be only the third developing country to host the event after Jamaica in 1966 and Malaysia in 1998. This is only the second time the event will be held in Asia.

India is lagging behind when compared to BRIC Nations in terms of olympic bidding. Rio will be hosting on 2016, Russia and China have already hosted the games. So India needs to show games which can give a strong message to the countries and make us a potential candidate for hosting olympics in 2020 or 2024

Here is how delhi is getting ready

Commonwealth Games Delhi 2010

View more presentations from Nitesh Luthra.

Nominated for Indibloggies Best Sports Blog

2009-11-22T01:12:00.000+05:30

2007 winners as sportolysis , 2008 as PenTheGame, we are nominated again for the best sports blog in the country.
Indibloggies 2008 Nominations

Barbados Vs Grenada - What a bizzare match!!

2009-09-25T19:13:00.004+05:30

Lets forget about Rooney, Arshavin and Messi for the moment and go down to Barbados. Rewind to 1994. Not to Brian Lara's 375, not to the house of Joel Garner or Gary Sobers. There is an interesting match between Grenada and Barbados. Lets go out there to watch a Shell Carribean Match "maaan". A match in which both teams will later on try to pull of a 'Diaby'. (Remember ManU v Arsenal this season??!!....Sorry Abou)

You would think that the basic tactic to win a football match would be to put the ball between the two posts, in the net. In the OPPOSITION net that is.

Barbados needs to win by two goals to progress to the next round. A draw would mean, extra-time and golden goal. Anything less than a two-goal win and Barbados are out. There was one weird rule though, a GOLDEN GOAL in the extrat-time would count as two goals.

Barbados are leading by 2-1 in the 85th minute. Not enough to go to the next round. Grenadan Defence is water-tight and there seems to be no way in for Barbados. A Barbados striker realizes that there is no way into the ultra-defensive Grenadan goal in the next 5 minutes. So, he runs towards his own goal and riffles the ball past his own stunned goalie!! 2-2!!

The comical farce begins now. Grenada, initially confused, realize whats going on. They try to pull off a "Diaby" themselves (Sorry Abou again). But, the Barbados players are mindful of that and they start defending the Grenadan Goal. The Barbados players managed to force the match into extra time and eventually won on a GOLDEN GOAL!!.

The Grenadians manager James Clarkson was furious. "I feel cheated, the person who came up with these rules must be a candidate for the madhouse.

"The game should never be played with so many players on the field confused. Our players did not even know which direction to attack; our goal or their goal. I have never seen this happen before. In football, you are supposed to score against your opponents in order to win, not for them."

Type Grenada vs Barbados on youtube to watch clips of the match.

Forza Azzura.......Come on Arsenal.......GO India GO.... lets kick some Fulham and Paki ass!!!

src- http://bleacherreport.com/articles/74831-barbados-vs-grenada-in-94-the-most-bizarre-match-ever

New Rules in ODI Cricket?

2009-09-17T22:39:00.002+05:30

7 ODIs and 2 T20's!!......While England are getting their asses whooped by the OZ's, I wonder if it should be the other way round......I mean it should have been 2 ODIs and 7 T20's.....

TEST CRICKET is the real deal......We have talked about that a few times....especially Lucy and me have had a few arguments on that.......So lets leave TEST cricket in its pristine form. I dont care what people say......"5 days!!??"....."Yes....5 days....."

......To me, there is nothing more exciting and intriguing than the first day, first session of a Test match.....

But how about new rules in ODIS......

My proposal is as follows:

--Divide the 50 overs into two 25-over innings.......
--The 2nd innings will continue from where it left off in the first innings. Which means that the batsmen who got out in the first innings CAN NOT bat again in the second innings.
--The team that wins the toss for the 1st innings automatically looses the toss for the 2nd innings.

What are the adavantages of it?
--Changes the "What is getting boring" ODI format. New tactics. Teams would want to loose the toss as they would get to choose for the 2nd innings!!
--Toss factor gets reduced. In day-night matches, both teams would have to bat under lights.
--If there is rain after 50 overs, the winner could be dclared based on the first innings.

Any comments?.......

Does the idea suck? or
It wont make too much difference. ODIs are dying anyway? or
Any other suggestions to improve the format?

Can they play for us? Not anymore

2009-04-17T02:23:00.004+05:30

Guys......my Arsenal predicitions have come good so far. So you better read this one too. and if you have not read the Arsenal predictions, then go down and read my Arspective before you read this.

NRI. Is it Non-resident Indians? or Non- returning Indians as she said in that movie? Or is it Not Required Indians?

I recently read an article which talked about the latest policy(You guys may be already aware of this policy) adopted by the India's Sports Ministry. From now on, only the Indian passport holders can represent India in international sporting events. My intial reaction to this article was "What the......You mean this rule was not there till now. I mean its not even a 'rule' per se. Its just common sense. Of course, non-Indians cannot represent India." But as it turned out, the reference was made to ABCD's. That is, people with foreign passport but Indian origin. But still, how can a non Indian-passport-holder represent India?

Well, till recently that indeed was the case. And that indeed was one of the reasons, why India did well in some sports at least at the Asian level, if not at the international level. Shikha Oberoi, born in Mumbai and brought up in the US, has had a career-high singles world ranking of 122. She won India the silver meda in the Doha Asian games. With a world- ranking of 210, the US-passported Prakash Amritraj is among the top-ranked Indians. Leave him out, and you come to the "citizens" of India, then you are looking at Rohan Bopanna with a world ranking 333. Among women, leave Sunita Rao(Us citizen) ranked at 197, and then you are looking at Isha Lakshmi at 362. Tennis, it seems, is the hardest-hit victim. It faces the hardly enviable task of either dropping these players or convince them to change their passports. Shikha Oberoi, for one, has already stated that she will let go the American citizenship and dig into her old locker to revalidate the Indian passport.

OK STOP. Stop staring at the picture above and continue reading the post.

It could take India a long time to recover from and start performing even at the Asian level. The impact this policy may have might be so deep/long that it could
outweigh the long-term gains of this policy. Critics also say that this policy could be unfair to the foreign-born Indian kids, depreiving them of the opportunity to represent their homeland because of a slight change in a technical document(the passport I mean....ok slight change in a technical book if you like it that way). In this era of ever-increasing globalization, has the Indian government erred by inflating the value of a passport? If Gary Kirsten could be our coach, Gregory King our trainer, whats wrong if we allow the ABCDs to represent India?

Whats wrong? Whats wrong is that the local players will always remain in the shadow of the ABCD's. With lesser training facilities the local talent will always fail to compete with their ABCD(ABCD = American Born Confused Desi.....for those who are condering what the f... it means. Its a general term used for someone with a foreign passport but with an India origin) counterparts. And hence, the abyssmal state of Indian sports, the poor facilities will remain unexposed for ever. Perhaps, the grassroots will be cleaned up. And rather than waiting for the next ABCD kid delivered, the Indian government may improve the facilties to develop the local talent. Let HOPE SO!!

One more question that came to my mind was. " Had Prakash Amritraj been good enough to represent the USA, would he even consider playing for India?" Chances are that he would not. So, should we allow a US reject to represent our country. Well, the answer I think, unfortunately is, YES if he is better than our best.

Vishy(Grand master Vishwanathan Anand) suggested a solution to solve the problem at hand.

His vision:
1) Long-term: No non-citizen should represent India.
2) Short term: Donot enforce the policy immediately. Announce the policy and tell everyone that it will be enforced in a year.

This will give the various federations time to think, time to talk to the players. It would also give the ABCDs time to think if they would want to give-up their foreing passport to represent India. I totally aggree with "Namma Tamilian".

Come-on Arsenal !!

Chelsea vs Liverpool (4-4) UEFA Match Highlights

2009-04-15T15:49:00.001+05:30

Watch the highlights below

Chelsea v Liverpool

Football Development in India

2009-04-15T09:50:00.002+05:30

"Maradonas made in India" This was the slogan which caught everyone's attention when Maradona was here in India in December last year. He inaugurated the private academy which has some big plans for football development in India. I was browsing through the slideshare and came across their presentation and thought to share it to you all. Football is catching everyone's attention in India. Hope to see India playing in 2020 world cup.

Mission 2020

India ratings : Pappu and Munna reunion

2009-04-08T19:49:00.003+05:30

Once upon a time there were two kids, pappu and munna, who never got marks in their classes, they got zero, once again again and again and again. And one day they decided that they would hit back on the face of this world by creating their own marks their own rating and their own scores. And they came up with this list, Pappu has already done it in the earlier post and here is Munna doing it. We did it Pappu, we did it Pappu.

Virender Sehwag - 3 - Can't blame him for getting out on spinners even on crucial occasions that's how it is. Either its his day(and thus India's day) or its the bowlers' day. A lot of starts but not even a single half century, and a ordinary match as a catpain in Napier test gets him a 3, more because of the great expectations he set.

Gautam Gambhir - 10 - Post ODI tournament, we had this discussion that Gauti is due his knock. Other than the sudden rush of blood in the first inning at Napier he has been the epical centre of Indian batting line up. His centuries in back to back test matches ensured that we have a solid start. Napier knock will stay as a Indian classic on foreign soil. The 'serious' guy continues to make an impact on Indian test matches' results. Meanwhile, he also reached a milestone of the top Indian scorer in his first 25 tests.

Rahul Dravid - 8 - Rahul Dravid the way we love him, the wall. We don't need no 'edge'ucation and he made his batting look like fluent floyd numbers. He has returned back to his gritty form and reminds that there is a lot of good test match cricket left in him. He will also remember this series for his catching records as we moved past Mark Waugh to become the test cricketer with most test catches. Wall is stronger now.

Sachin Tendulkar - 8.5 - Two 60s one 49 and one massive 160 in his 5 innings and making it all look so easy, he continues to rule the batting world. I would confess that I am always a little pro-tendulkar in all my statements (but tell me a reason why I should not be, or anyone should not be for that matter!). The innings were well placed, he failed only once in an inning where we were already on the top of the match. Two wickets in the last inning of third test match left us all happier than before.

VVS Laxman - 8 - While writing this and looking at the scorecards for three matches, I can so clearly see that India's series was eminent in all circumstances. VVS captured the other half of the southern hemisphere as well at Napier. Specially the second innings with 25 fours made the kiwi audience laugh and cry at the same time. Elegant as ever, people may call him lazy but who cares to run when you can hit them all along the ground with sheer perfection.

Yuvraj Singh - 5 - One good knock at Napier, but otherwise he looked ordinary. Yuvraj is a massive world figure when it comes to the shorter forms of game, but at tests he is still fighting for his place. With Pujara and Badrinath and others around it may get difficult for him in future. All of us love to see him once he gets going (but once he gets going!)

MS Dhoni - 8 - MS makes the other team feel aM aSS, apart from his captaincy he impressed by his keeping and the way he batted with tail whenever required. He has an invisible presence which was exposed in the second test where we let kiwis score 600 plus. And when he was back it looked that things well back in place. I sometime wonder if it is all a matter of stars, or its all planned. But as long as India wins, its three cheers!

Harbhajan - 9 - These were not the spinning Mumbai tracks or some other Indian dry pitch. He impressed by his controlled aggression throughout the series. The funniest Indian cricketer and still one of the most effective bowlers of his time. The turbonator acts as the sankat-mochak batsman for India.

Zaheer - 9 - Spearhead. Its difficult to bring adjectives when a team is doing good as a 'team'. And for those who write for Indian cricket, this is a dilemma we faced never before in such intensity. Zaheer's early strikes always led the floor for the rest of the bowlers and like bhajji he has become a very effective lower order batsman. This is revival of Zak.

Ishant - 6 - There were great expectations from him as well, he fared decently well but we have seen better of him and specially when situations were conducive for pace bowling. He is still one for the future.

Munaf Patel - 5 - India's third seamer worry is still eminent, in spite of decent performance from him in bits and pieces. Munaf has the tendancy to surprise by switching good and bad performances to and fro in no time at all. He has certainly worked on his fielding which can help him cement his place at least in the shorter versions of the game.

Gary Kirsten - 9 - I think he must be now busy in writing a book that he must write - 'The dos and donts of an Indian foreign coach'. Doing what he has to at his best. The players are happy, the captain is happy, the press is happy and the Indians are happier. Nobody knows a lot about what he is doing but its working and as I said earlier as long as it works its hurray!!!

Ind V NZ ratings

2009-04-08T19:43:00.001+05:30

Indian Team, individual rating for test series.......I did this before cricinfo

9.5-- Zaheer Khan.
Bowlers win you test matches, batsmen win you one-dayers they say. To win a test match, you need to pick 20 wickets. ZAK wasbeen brilliant. Always in and arround the off-stump. Using the bouncer sparringly. Reminded me of Wasim Akram, in his glory days. I dont know who was given the the MOS (Man of the Series). But to me, it surely is the Baroda express. We have always had a decent batting line-up. But, I think its the vast improvement of the bowlers thats helping India win test-series' abroad.
And to add to that, he also made some good contributions down the order.

9 - Gambhir
The dimunitive southpaw from saddi dilli showed tremendous application in the second test. Should have got the MOM in the 2nd test to me. His 137 off 436 balls drew compairsons with the Greatbatch knock of 146 off 485 balls at Perth against the Aussies. The resemblances are startling. For New Zealand the rescuer was a man who would turn into an innovative pinch-hitting opener. In Napier it was one who until last year was considered a one-day specialist.
Brilliant in the 3rd test too. Another reason for India's overseas victories. Successful and aggressive opening partnership.

9 - God
Ab god ke baare main kya bolein. Oh god, tussi great ho. On every April 1st, someone tries to post that "God to retire". I fear, one day, its going to come true :(

8.5 - Dravid
When Laxman is out of form, play him against the Aussies. When Dravid is out of form, play him overseas. To be fair, he did regain his touch with a century agains England in the last test of the previous test series. But, if ever there was any doubting and critics saying that he should now retire, he has shut them up now. Given out incorrectly in the 2nd test, when he and Gambhir looked to draw the game for India on their own. But he and Gambhir combined well and their success more than made up for Sehwag's failures.
Also, congrats to Jammy(no one calls him that these days), for becoming the highest catcher.

8.5 - Laxman
He has probably been India's most consistent in Test for the last 3 years. Comes lower down the order. So, gets overshadowed by the top 4. But, whenever we needed him he delivered. Even in the 2nd test 1st Innings, when most batsmen failed, he was at his silky/smooth best and got out only because he tried to push the scoring (since he was batting with the tail).

8 - Ishant Sharma
Bowled well. Ideal foil for Zaheer. Must be having nightmares for the dropped catch off Sachin in the 3rd test.

8 - Sardar
Sardar ne achi karayi. Lekin 50/3 pe aake achchi daalna badi baat nahi hai. Would be interesting when he comes in to bowl at 150/0, against a good opposition. He has this habit of not really flighting the ball when the opposition have runs on the board. But, to be fair to him, he bowled well whenever he was given the ball by Dhoni.

8 - Dhoni
Batted really sensibly and played a couple of crucial innings. His half-century at the Basin Reserve was a classic case of ugly-effective batting. What an important knock that was. Will have to face critics for not declaring earlier in the last test. But, I, for one, am totally in support of the decision. Why leave them even a sniff of a chance when we have the series lead of one-nil. Remember the 222 by Astle on this versus ground when NZ were set 550 to win by the Poms back in 2001.
The fact that India dominated the tests in which he played in speaks about his captaincy.

5 - Munaf -
Behti ganga main haath dho liya ladke ne. RP Singh and Sreesanth are better than him.

5 Sehwag -
Tried to dominate. Failed mostly. His 2nd test, 2nd innings, dismissal came under lot of criticism. But, thats how he plays. He would not have 2 triples otherwise.

4 - Yuvraj
Has lot to prove in test match. We should and probably will persist with him though.

Dinesh Kartik - theek hai yaar. Parthiv Patel se to better hi hai

Arsenal vs Villareal UEFA Champions LEague

2009-04-07T08:09:00.006+05:30

Posted by Giri

Whats up in April? The "Ars"pective. (Arsenal Perspective. Sorry Bad PJ)Wow!! Its an absolutely mouth watering month to look forward to. I will hopefully buy my first car in the US. And then I will hopefully get my work visa. I know it was funny when I completed my Masters in Computer Science. But its funnier to think that I am working full-time as an Engineer.

Coming to the Ars-pective (haha....I like my jokes/pjs)Arsenal Vs Villareal - Gooners Vs The Yellow Submarine. Ya thats what they call Villareal. Looks a pretty easy match up on paper. But, as some of you may remember, it required a last-minute penalty save from Lehmann, Jens not Darren, in the 2006 CL semi final. Would be nice to have Pires back at our home ground. I am sure he will receive a great reception. When Henry used to score those countless goals, this man's contribution was often forgotten. But the avid/ hardcore arsenal supporters, which I must admit I was not in those times, will know that he was one of the most important of the "Arsenal Invincibles". RVP has been ruled out. Arshavin is cup-tied. So, that leaves us with Adebayor and probably Bendtner up-front. The mid-field should be, Fabri, Denilson, Nasri, Walcott. I think, however, Bendtner might make way for Alex Song. Back four should be Clichy, toure, gallas and Sagna. And Almunia between the sticks.

The players to watch out for in Villareal would be Pires, of course. Though he would be playing after being red-carded in his last Primera Liga outing. Giuseppe Rossi, the Man U reject will be keen to prove a point. John Dahl Tomasson, (I wish Bendtner starts playing half-as-good as his compatriot) is a natural Goal scorer. Even though age is running against the Dane, Arsenal will do well to keep this man in check. Marcos Senna, he was regular member the Euro-winning Spanish team. Joan Capdevilla, I think he is the captain, but more importantly, this defender has the uncanny ability to come forward and score crucial goals. Edmilson, I remember this guy's brilliant over-head kick in the 2002 world cup for Brazil.
My prediction (Villareal 1 - 2 Arsenal)

18th Apr- FA cup against Chelsea.
We should have Arshavin and RVP back for this one. I hope Arshavin/Nasri rapes Ashley Cole.
My prediction(Chelsea 0- 1 Arsenal)

15th Apr- CL Home Vs Villareal
I think we will give them a spanking at home if my first prediction is correct. If it is wrong, we will spank them even harder at home. LOL
My prediction(Arsenal 3- 0 Villareal)

21st Apr- EPL against Liverpool

Then Arsenal travel to Anfield (The is Wigan in between that). Playing in front of 'the kop' under lights is one of the most daunting prospects in football they say.

My prediction(Liverpool 1- 2 Arsenal)

29th Apr- Champions League ***CL semifinal Vs Man U
Wow.......Porto Vs Arsenal would be interesting. But there is a slight chance that Man U might make it to the semis. Wow!!That would be an intersting one. I hope Macheda gets red-carded, Ronaldo is injured and Vidic starts fighting with Rooney.
My prediction(Man U 0- 2 Arsenal)

***if Man U beats Porto

Sachin to Retire from Test Cricket

2009-04-01T17:24:00.003+05:30

Sources are telling that Sachin is planning to retire from test cricket after the last test in New Zealand. He has said that he has achieved so much in Test cricket, he wants to focus on one day internationals and focus on winning the 2011 world cup .

"It has been my long cherished dream to lift the world cup" He said that in a press conference

Retirement from test cricket will give him time to stay fit and spend time with his family which right now he is unable to do in hectic season. He said that lot of youngsters are coming and he is sure they will keep winning.

International Players in IPL Franchisses

2009-04-01T16:22:00.005+05:30

Kolkata Knight Riders:

Chris Gayle, Brendon McCullum, Brad Hodge, Ricky Ponting, David Hussey, Angelo Mathews, Moises Henriques, Mark Cameron, Mashrafe Bin Mortaza and Ajantha Mendis

Opening pair is looking deadly this time as both Gayle and McCullum will play this year. I expect Ricky ponting may not be playing all the matches.

Mumbai Indians:

Lasith Malinga, Jean Paul Duminy, Graham Napier, Ryan McLaren, Dilhara Fernando, Sanath Jayasuriya, Dwayne Bravo, Mohammad Ashraful, Kyle Mills and Luke Ronchi.

Kyle Mills though he is thrown all around the park in NZ, I expect he will be able to give good start to the team. MI will have home advantage in form of Duminy. Mohammad Ashraful will get a big platform to prove his worth and talent. Jayasuriya is a legend and he has some experience of playing with south african twenty-20 franchise.

Rajasthan Royals:

Shane Warne, Graeme Smith, Shane Watson, Dimitri Mascarenhas, Morne Morkel, Robert Quiney, Tyron Henderson, Shaun Tait, Shane Harwood and Lee Carseldine.

All players I find to be dark horses. I have not seen much of Henderson,Harwood and Lee but they can be what Shaun Marsh was last year.

Kings XI Punjab:

Brett Lee, James Hopes, Shaun Marsh, Luke Pomersbach, Simon Katich, Kumar Sangakkara , Mahela Jayawardene, Burt Cockley, Ravi Bopara and Jerome Taylor.

All hopes for Brett Lee to be fit by the time tournament starts, Sreesant also will not be playing due to injury. Ravi Bopara will bring in some stability down the order.

Deccan Chargers:

Adam Gilchrist, Herschelle Gibbs, Scott Styris, Andrew Symonds, Ryan Harris, Fidel Edwards, Dwayne Smith, Chamara Silva, Chaminda Vaas and Nuwan Zoysa.

We had lot of expectations from the team last year, perhaps the burden on star players was unbearable or they didn't click properly. Team of power hitters and Sri Lankan bowlers. I have a gut feeling of seeing this team in Semis this season.

Delhi Daredevils:

AB De Villiers, Daniel Vettori, Owais Shah, Paul Collingwood, David Warner, Andrew McDonald, Dirk Nannes, Glenn McGrath, Farveez Maharoof and Tillakaratne Dilshan.

Watch out for Warner , De Villiers. I dont know Glen McGrath will be the same as he was last year. McDonald is a dark horse.

Chennai Super Kings:

Muttiah Muralitharan, Matthew Hayden , Michael Hussey, Albie Morkel, Makhaya Ntini, Jacob Oram, Stephen Fleming , Thilan Thushara, Andrew Flintoff and George Bailey.

Jacob Oram injury is a blow, Fleming will be doing the role similar to what Shane Warne did last year. Costliest player Flintoff will be under huge burden of expectations. Team is looking stable with nice combination of international stars. They might play Flintoff,Hussey,Morkel/Ntini,Murli frequently.

Royal Challengers:

Jacques Kallis, Mark Boucher, Dale Steyn, Dillon Du Preez, Cameron White, Nathan Bracken, Ross Taylor, Kevin Pietersen, Jesse Ryder and Roelof van der Merwe.

Mallaya will be after them this year expecting a semi final finish atleast.

Dark Clouds over Major Events in India

2009-03-31T09:22:00.004+05:30

Concern of security is affecting sports events on regularly basis. Thanks to Indian Government for their efforts to alleviate the fears which have increased since IPL committee decided to host the event in South Africa as we didn't have enough police/army/nsg/crpf to give the security cover. Country with 3/4th largest army and big police force can't provide security cover to common people, that is for politicans only.

GOI expected that BCCI will postpone the event but Modi was able to do a turnaround and get the event hosted in SA which will benifit hugely with the coming event.

But that decision as I also wrote earlier has put India-Pakistan-Bangladesh-Sri Lanka at same platform in terms of security concerns. Events are getting affected or main players are not turning up due to fear factor.

Players from the European Nations particularly from the Badminton powerhouse countries like England,Denmark pulled out from the India Open Badminton (Hyderabad 2009) due to security concerns. Hyderabad is due to host world badminton championship in August this year
ASIAN billiards is also hit by fears, players from countries Pakistan, Malaysia, South Korea and Iraq have pulled out from asian billiards and asian u-21 snooker championship.
Davis Cup tie against Australia is already under threat after Lleyton Hewitt raised concerns of having event in India during elections timings.

I feel its not the terrorists who have held the common public to ransom its the politicans and elections which have held us to ransom. You have to vote its a biggest democratic exercise of the world with 700 million voting.

Democracy is government for the people and by the people so the biggest elections are putting my National Pride at stake Why ?? . Image of my India is taking a beating.

I guess the time has come to think What we have done for the country not What the politicians have done and are doing.

Time for young guns to come over not those who spread communal voilence ......

The best indian DRAWing

2009-03-30T22:48:00.005+05:30

Ever saw an art movie with the subtlety of every move, every single dialog, the colours and the delicate sounds. You must have, but ever saw it live, being played in front of a kiwi audience.

'How can someone be so irresponsible, how can someone disrespect the bowlers like that?', these were the words of those commentators who were awed by Sehwag's reaction to Jeetan Patel on the third day of the second test of India-New Zealand test series being played at Napier. Indians (referred as we in this passage, in spite of this being an anonymous blog the nationality is inevitably inseparable from cricket) were left to chase a mountain on the fourth morning of this boomerang attack by the kiwis. Some 269 runs behind, we had to survive six cruel sessions of gameplay. And the rest is history! I had a hunch that Gambhir had waited too long on this tour, and the time had come. One of the most prolific T20 batsman of our times, played an innings that will be remembered perhaps as the most gritty overseas knock by an Indian. Rahul Dravid reminded of the great rivalry days during the South African tour in late 90s. And they held the fort.

And then dravid succumbed to appealing. A bad decision indeed, and my disbelief in the referral system disappeared. He certainly deserved better than that after all that hard work. Life is not fair, but as far as possible, let technology help bring fairness to whatever aspects of life it can.

Sachin came, and the new ball was taken. Here is the snapshop of next few overs:

82.1 Martin to Tendulkar, FOUR, full but drifting down leg and Tendulkar tickles it to the fine-leg boundary

82.3 Martin to Tendulkar, FOUR, lovely whippy flick. It was the inswinger but full and on the middle and leg, Tendulkar waited for the swing to play out, allowed the ball to come into his zone before wristing it away

82.5 Martin to Tendulkar, FOUR, And now he pings the off-side boundary. He went down on a bent back knee to cream a full delivery through covers. He held the pose as he watched the ball race away to the boundary

83.2 O'Brien to Tendulkar, FOUR, Very classy on-the-up back-foot punch. He moved back, stood on his toes and played a delicious punchy drive through covers. It appears even the bowler appreciated that shot.

87.2 O'Brien to Tendulkar, FOUR, his first bad delivery after few good ones and Tendulkar puts it away immediately. Full and on the legs, flicked to the boundary. He is very positive today, looking for run-scoring opportunities.

87.6 O'Brien to Tendulkar, SIX, It's a bouncer and the red ball flies over long leg. Tendulkar swiveled to unfurl the pull and it flew over the ropes

I will need to stop here, the list is getting too long, and remind you its the same slow test match we were talking about. Day ended, kiwis tired of two days hard work on field but still in lead and with a very good chance of leveling the series. Sunset.

Fifth day, Sachin starts with a boundary but perishes to Martin playing an uncertain uppish drive. In comes the man who scripted India's great follow-on victory against Australia at the Eden Gardens, VVS Laxman. The guy who loves the southern hemisphere a hint more than the northern, and then there were stats. India survived what would be remembered as one of the finest performance by Indian batsmen overseas. Cricinfo has provided some stats relating this match, and its imperative that we see atleast a few of them here:

India batted 180 overs in their second innings, which is the eighth-highest number of deliveries they've batted in the second try. The first six of those instances had all been before 1980
It's also the second-highest number of overs they've played when following on
For New Zealand, it was the first instance of not winning a Test after enforcing the follow-on at home.
Gautam Gambhir's 436-ball 137 was easily the slowest of his 15 fifty-plus scores in Tests. His innings spanned 643 minutes, which is the seventh-longest by an Indian.
Gambhir's knock is the slowest by an Indian, in terms of balls faced, for an innings of less than 150. His strike rate of 31.42 is still better than Sanjay Manjrekar's strike rate of 24.64, when he scored 104 off 422 balls against Zimbabwe in Harare in 1992.
VVS Laxman's unbeaten 124 contained 25 fours, which is the highest by any batsman in an innings of 125 or less.

This is certainly the best Indian drawing that I have seen.

IPL in South Africa: Match Schedule

2009-03-30T14:49:00.003+05:30

Here is post number 280 we are nearing the triple century mark.

Below is the schedule for IPL-2 in SouthAfrica

April 18: RAJASTHAN ROYALS v ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE (4 pm) Cape Town
April 18 MUMBAI INDIANS v CHENNAI SUPER KINGS (8 pm) Cape Town

April 19: KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS v DECCAN CHARGERS (4 pm) at Cape Town
April 19: DELHI DAREDEVILS v KINGS XI PUNJAB (8 pm) at Cape Town.

April 20: ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE V CHENNAI SUPER KINGS (4 pm) at Port Elizabeth.

April 21: RAJASTHAN ROYALS v MUMBAI INDIANS (4 pm) at Durban
April 21: KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS v KINGS XI PUNJAB (8 pm) at Durban

April 22: DELHI DAREDEVILS v CHENNAI SUPER KINGS (4 pm) at Durban
April 22: ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE v DECCAN CHARGERS (8 pm) at Cape Town

April 23: KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS v RAJASTHAN ROYALS (4 pm) at Port Elizabeth

April 24: KINGS XI PUNJAB v ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE (4 pm) at Johannesburg

April 25: KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS v CHENNAI SUPER KINGS (4 pm) at Cape Town
April 25: DECCAN CHARGERS v MUMBAI INDIANS (8 pm) at Durban.

April 26: RAJASTHAN ROYALS v KINGS XI PUNJAB (4 pm) at Cape Town
April 26: ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE v DELHI DAREDEVILS (8 pm) Port Elizabeth

April 27: KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS v MUMBAI INDIANS (4 pm) at Cape Town
April 27: CHENNAI SUPER KINGS v DECCAN CHARGERS (8 pm) at Durban.

April 28: DELHI DAREDEVILS v RAJASTHAN ROYALS (4 pm) at Pretoria

April 29: MUMBAI INDIANS v KINGS XI PUNJAB (4 pm) at Durban
April 29: KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS v ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE (8 pm) at Durban

April 30: DELHI DAREDEVILS v DECCAN CHARGERS (4 pm) at Pretoria
April 30: RAJASTHAN ROYALS v CHENNAI SUPER KINGS (8 pm) at Pretoria.

May 1: ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE v KINGS XI PUNJAB (4 pm) at East London
May 1: MUMBAI INDIANS v KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS (8 pm) at Durban

May 2: RAJASTHAN ROYALS v DECCAN CHARGERS (4 pm) at Johannesburg
May 2: CHENNAI SUPER KINGS v DELHI DAREDEVILS (8 pm) at Port Elizabeth

May 3: MUMBAI INDIANS v ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE (4 pm) at Durban
May 3: KINGS XI PUNJAB v KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS (8 pm) at East London

May 4: DECCAN CHARGERS v CHENNAI SUPER KINGS (4 pm) at Port Elizabeth

May 5: DELHI DAREDEVILS v KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS (4 pm) at Durban
May 5: KINGS XI PUNJAB v RAJASTHAN ROYALS (8 pm) at Durban

May 6: MUMBAI INDIANS v DECCAN CHARGERS (4 pm) at Pretoria

May 7: KINGS XI PUNJAB v CHENNAI SUPER KINGS (4 pm) at Pretoria
May 7: ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE v RAJASTHAN ROYALS (8 pm) at Pretoria

May 8: DELHI DAREDEVILS v MUMBAI INDIANS (4 pm) at East London

May 9: DECCAN CHARGERS v KINGS XI PUNJAB (4 pm) at Bloemfontein
May 9: CHENNAI SUPER KINGS v RAJASTHAN ROYALS (8 pm) at Port Elizabeth

May 10: KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS v DELHI DAREDEVILS (4 pm) at East London
May 10: ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE v MUMBAI INDIANS (8 pm) at Johannesburg

May 11: DECCAN CHARGERS v RAJASTHAN ROYALS (4 pm) at Bloemfontein

May 12: ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE v KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS (4 pm) at Pretoria
May 12: KINGS XI PUNJAB v MUMBAI INDIANS (8 pm) at Pretoria.

May 13: DECCAN CHARGERS v DELHI DAREDEVILS (4 pm) at Durban

May 14: MUMBAI INDIANS v RAJASTHAN ROYALS (4 pm) at Durban
May 14: CHENNAI SUPER KINGS v ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE (8 pm) at Durban.

May 15: KINGS XI PUNJAB v DELHI DAREDEVILS (4 pm) at Kimberley

May 16: CHENNAI SUPER KINGS v MUMBAI INDIANS (4 pm) at Johannesburg
May 16: DECCAN CHARGERS v KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS (8 pm) at Port Elizabeth

May 17: RAJASTHAN ROYALS v DELHI DAREDEVILS (4 pm) at Kimberley
May 17: KINGS XI PUNJAB v DECCAN CHARGERS (8 pm) at Johannesburg

May 18: CHENNAI SUPER KINGS v KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS (4 pm) at Pretoria

May 19: DELHI DAREDEVILS v ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE (4 pm) at Johannesburg

May 20: CHENNAI SUPER KINGS v KINGS XI PUNJAB (4 pm) at Durban
May 20: RAJASTHAN ROYALS v KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS (8 pm) at Durban

May 21: DECCAN CHARGERS v ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE (4 pm) at Pretoria
May 21: MUMBAI INDIANS v DELHI DAREDEVILS (8 pm) at Pretoria

May 22: Semi Final 1 at Pretoria

May 23: Semi Final 2 at Johannesburg

May 24: Final at Johannesburg.

Indian Premier League in England/SA gains and losses

2009-03-23T16:14:00.003+05:30

So finally we saw yesterday what we all were expecting since long. IPL governing body decided that there is no way the tournament can be organized in India. It was decided that tournament will be shifted to England or SA with England having upper edge.

Why BCCI had to take this decisions:

1. Petty politics between NCP chief Sharad Pawar and Congress and congress trying to diminish the clout of Mr Pawar after he offered himself as PM candidate

2. Government of India thought that the returns of organizing the event will be less at the time of elections.

3. Why take the risk of any unexpected terrorist attack which may raise questions on the running government. Lets get it scrapped or push for delay

4. Fear among the politicans that they may be sidelined duing the IPL season, i.e cricketers will be the heroes not the great nation servers politicans.

What is lost with IPL going out:

1. Big opportunity to the political parties to advertise duing the IPL season.

2. Revenue for reeling Hotel industry, and other tourism related industry. If the even had gone peacefully lot many foreigners would have stared coming back to India who have stopped after Mumbai attacks.

3. Image of India as a powerful country has taken a hit. Elections elections are the biggest festival but that doesn't mean that no other event can take place during this time. This is not what superpowers are made up of. We cant even have 3000-4000 police force for the match day where as we can have big 60,000 police force to protect any big small medium politicans in New Delhi.

4. Feeling of city-city rivalry which was the base of IPL will not be the same. IPL-1 was hit due the big city fan following TV viewing being the other reason.

5. This decision has put India together with Pakistan and Bangladesh which are not save for cricket.

What's good for having IPL outside India:

1. Eventhough the sport may go the England or SA, still we can expect a upliftment in the level of game in that region and also increase in fan following. EPL organizers are trying to have 1-2 matches added in the season which can be played outside England so as to cater to fans in Asia, in the same way with whole of IPL going out of India we may see an increase in fan following. It may make IPL fully global in a way and may lead to cricket being played by more then 8-9 serious countries

2. Logistics industry will get a boost in the organizing country.

3. Easy money for organizing country as BCCI will pay hefty amount to SA/England

4. We are seeing globalization in cricket now, there are no boundary walls now as a local tournament of one country will take place in other country.

Some people will say they will not watch the matches, it will not be the same as last year. But i feel this was the only way out considering the options left to the organizers.

Enjoy the game at same timings atleast and i will be glued to the TV that is for sure.

Whats left in EPL?

2009-03-21T16:00:00.000+05:30

After the initial shootouts by Liverpool, sudden ups and down by Chelsea there is not much left now in the top race. In spite of the humaling defeat against liverpool, ManU looks all set for the top place. 4 points clear of both chelsea and liverpool with one match in hand, and it has also completed its 4 matches against these two teams. It needs to underplay to loose this battle.

However, there are a lot many interesting fights going around in the league. First and foremost the unimportant second spot between the champions league rivals, pool and chelsea at 61 points and 9 match in hand are both set to fight it out and try to toggle ManU at the top. My money on pool this time as chelsea looks a little more uncertain this season and for the gerrard-torres factor.

Secondly and more importantly, the fourth place fight is interesting. Arsenal, unfortunately for them, fights with Villa and Everton for the fourth place. Gunners and Villa are at 52 each and a third spot looks like mercury and Pluto to them. But a European slot is for grabs and while Arsenal try to avoid embarrassment, Villa and Everton would want to continue the impressive season and make a claim for the dream European place.My money has to be on gunners (otherwise the head of this blog will get me chucked out of this team).

The most intriguing battle for me is at the bottom, oh what a bliss to see them fighting for survival! A certain WBA exit at 23, but along with it it's all hidden. Boro with 27 points, Stoke, Portsmouth and Newcastle all at 29, Blackburn at 30, Sunderland at 32, Hull and Bolton at 33. To sum up 6 teams in the cluster of 8 points. It can be anyone, absolutely anyone of these. It's not as much a fight at the top as it is at the bottom.

There is a lot left in the last 9 matchdays, but my predictions are as follows:

1. Manchester United
2. Liverpool
3. Chelsea
4. Arsenal
5. Villa
6. Everton
7. Wigan
8. Spurs
9. West Ham
10. Man City
11. Bolton
12. Fulham
13. Sunderland
14. Newcastle
15. Portsmouth
16. Hull
17. Blackburn
18. Middlesbrough
19. Stoke
20. WBA

Rock Stars of Cricket

2009-03-21T13:47:00.000+05:30

Rock stars of cricket are on fire. Critics might argue that we were expected to win. Agreed, man to man India is any day much better team than New Zealand. But the way of winning is something which I loved the most. Right from the time the first ball was bowled to the 4th day, we never really looked like losing. There was an air of certainty in the way we played, much like the aussies of late 90’s , when no matter what the opposition team does , end result was always certain.

Sachin Tendulkar says this is the best batting line up he was played in, quite a debatable claim considering the fact Tendulkar was part of every Indian batting line up for past 20 years. In my humble opinion, I think he is probably right , but the dada’s boys of early 2000 comes quite close to them. The factor in which this bunch of boys scores over dada ones was probably the fear factor. These guys are just fearless, I have been following cricket for now more than 15 years and I have never seen an Indian team which plays with so much confidence, fearlessness and the enjoying the game as they do. May be it’s a there captain effect (cool and charismatic), means he is an enigmatic personality , he is not a technically correct batsmen, not even technically correct Wicket keeper , neither he is pretty too watch (in fact that bottom hand approach is quite ugly to watch) , but still he is damm effective. Look at his career development , he started off as an exciting batsmen who can smash sixes at will , people says he is a flat pitch bully, will never work against good pace attack or on bouncy pitches. But he proved everyone wrong, he scores decently in every situation, is very reliable batsmen (perhaps after SRT, especially in ODI) but most importantly has got one hell of a cricketing brain, the most important thing for a good captain.

Other factor which is makes this team more ominous is the role of SRT, u can sense a calm, relaxed person in the way he bats now a days, a person who is dead sure of his role in the team, he might have cut down on his flamboyance a bit, but the new methods are as effective as the old ones. Also the presence of so many rock stars have resulted in lowering of expectation from him, thus making him plan his cricket in the way he wants to.

Anyway, it’s really a great feeling to have a winning cricket team, I don’t really know whether we are currently the best team or not, but we are very close to it; probably SA with their wonderful pace attack and a very good captain might be ahead of us. But these are really exciting team for world cricket with some good hard competition making it really good to watch.

Sehwag Fastest Century in NZ : 4th ODI

2009-03-18T09:53:00.006+05:30

Here are the highlights of the 4th ODI of the India-NZ series 2009. Sehwag made a 60 ball century and lead to a historic series win of India. This is the first series win for India in NZ.

India Batting::

Kapil Dev :: Straight From the Heart

2009-03-15T22:09:00.007+05:30

On telling someone in an interview that I loved reading autobiographies, the interviewer asked me have I read anything about Kapil Dev. I replied a no !! making a sad face. I ordered his autobiography "Straight From the Heart" the same day.

Kapil Dev is Dhoni of Old era or that would be injustice to great legend, I would say Dhoni is Kapil of new era. Both have few similarities being brought up in non cricketers producing states of India and both lifted the world cup in earlier stages of their captaincy.

Book start with memories of Kapil's childhood days. Kuckoo as he was known in his family was into sports and atheletics since his childhood and was as away from his studies as is Jammu is away from Kanyakumari. Playing whole day not cricket but football, coming back home and pretending to sleep in front of his father so that he is not scolded for studying. But as we know father is father how much we say child is father of his father. He got trapped when his father used to say this football is torn and it should be thrown away. In a flash Kuckoo was awake and his father used to say "Hmm t rajkumar jaag rahe hain. Ab jaag hi rahe hain, to inse kahye ki thode der baithkar padhaai kar leing... Nautanki kahi ka...."

Just like any other Indian family where children are pushed to only study and study same was the case in Kuckoo's family. Kapil loved challenges and he writes one incident of trying to get on the back of police horses who were not used to clumsy boys. He was successful after few attempts and he takes the police horses away and is caught by his father.

Kapil was as ignorant about cricket as most of the Indians are about Ice Hockey. He used to ask his brother about players when his big brother used to read a cricket magazine.

Kapil used to get irritated when his bother disturbed his sleep listening to cricket commentary in the night. He is introduced to playing cricket by his brother Bushan when one of their team member is absent and Kapil is used in place of 11th player. He showed his fielding skills and impressed everyone. His natural talent is again seen by eveyone when in other match his 4 hits in 5 balls are out of boundary and during bowling he also took 3 wickets. On being encouraged by his brother Kuckoo decides that cricket is his future.

Kapil starts his coaching under coach Azad and is asked to increase his stamina by drinking more and more milk. His dad gets two buffaloes in few days and so he became a milk guzzler as was teased by his sister as Nikhanj Milk Diary. He coaches with other cricketers Yograj Singh, Ashok Malhotra. Kuckoo was assertive and fought for his writes, he writes about an incident where he fought with BCCI officials over food quantity in under-19 camp.

Finally his efforts pay off and he makes his debut under Bishen Singh bedi in Pakistan. He has never watched test match before and here is making his debut against arch rivals Pakistan. He feels the bad side of international cricket when he is teased while batting, but his moment infact moment for India came when bowling Pakistani batsman halts the play and ask for a helmet. So here is a fast bowler who has arrived to prove to the world that India can also produce fast bowlers.

He writes about how less money players got and they couldn't afford to get their clothes washed and they used to wash it themselves. He also writes about the divide in the team among seniors and juniors and how the divide wanished when young crickters came and stopped following orders from seniors and asked for equal rights in decision making. He writes about his and gavaskar spat , various tours and World Cup in details. He also writes about BCCI's nature of changing captain every now and then and how little say the players had in BCCI working.

I enjoyed reading about his 175 run knock against Zimbabwe and world cup final. Its exhilariting to read how a team who is at 66-1 odds from beginning of the cup and also the final lifts the world cup. Its an era when BCCI doesn't give lakhs to a team winning world cup but it has to organize a Lata Mangeshkar show to earn money to give to the world cup winning team.

Book is different from other autobiographies in a way that it has not covered only Kapil cricket but also separate chapters are given to his marriage , matchfixing scandal. He talks in detail about his business, he first started a publishing company but has to close that down with the coming up of satellite telivision in India. Later on he started a ground lighting company which has lighted many stadiums across the country.

Till 200 pages there is no talk of marriage, but in chapter "Love Makes you go round" he talks at length about his marriage and love life. I liked the chapter in which he talks about BCCI, honorary presidentship , biased zonal selection. All this is all relevant today and has been going on for ages, one can easily see the biased selection on seeing Balaji in the team as we know Balaji shares state with one of the selectors.

Finally he talks about the Match Fixing saga, cricket fan will surely hate outlook editor Vinod Mehta who without doing proper enquiry kept on publishing what Manoj Prabhakar said about Kapil's involvement. Other one is noted women writer Shobha De who has written in some article like "She never invites cricketers to her party’’. ’’How can She deduce that all cricketers are involved?’’ is what Kapil wants to know. And what to say about another great Mr Bindra Punjab Cricket Board chief who has seen kapil playing and growing in front of him naming Kapil on cnn. You feel sorry for Kapil when you read things like this. You feel like this is not the way to treat people who have brought laurels to nation.

You will enjoy reading about 83 world cup, 175 against zimbabwe, azar and kapil relationship, wisden Indian cricketer of century award, sunil gavaskar and kapil dev saga , romi his wife and her wierd behavior during the 83 final.

Must read for any one who says he is Indian cricket fan

Adventure Sports:: SwatTV Roadies 1.0 :: Future of Pakistan

2009-03-13T12:11:00.007+05:30

Hi I am your host Mullah Omar

Welcome to the SwatTV Roadies 1.0. 2012 marks the first year of Roadies being organized in Pakistan.

First a brief history of SWAT TV ::

Last year various international satellite channels pulled out of Pakistan citing security reasons.So SWAT region decided to launch their own channel on the lines of MTv. Its a music channel where we show folk, rock and everykind of music. Motto of the channel is to spread jihadi music. As we all know music is everywhere, we can generate music from anything so we have positioned ourselves as the only channel showing music from bullets, tanks, grenades. Practice in training camps is shown live as we feel there can be no better music then the sound of bullets hitting the targets.

TRP of the channel touched new heights when we showed live second mutiny in as many as 3 years by Bangladeshi Rifles group. For two whole days our viewers listened to the sound of bullets, tanks rolling on Dhaka Roads. SwatTV was the first to show the whole incident infact our cameras were in place 2 hours before the event started as we have our network of reporters spread everywhere.

We have got exclusive rights of showing missile launch by North Korea in July 2012. One team is on way to Sri Lanka to meet the LTTE to get rights to show live attempt by LTTE to regain its lost area in Sri Lanka.

Before continuing further its time for a short commercial break::
(Companies selling military warfare and related equipments are given discount of 25%)

[

Ringa Ringa Rocks Ringa Ringa Rocks
SWAT Rocks .small big diagonal horizontal rocks SWAT Rocks
Buy SWAT rocks to be used during stone pelting spectacle
Buy 5 get 2 free
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]

Welcome back to Al Qaeda SwatTV Roadies 1.0.

Further about the channel, Swat TV has generated huge interest and we are planning to launch the channel in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Iran in a year or two.

Now about the Roadies.Since we got the idea of the show from a bald man in India (the most dangerous place in the world), we are getting thousands of enquires from the youth.

We have got large number of sponsors. Main sponsor is Al Qaeda, other being
Mulla Umar Consultancy Services .. "Consult us before killing",
Lahore Powder ... "For that heightened feeling",
Toiba Oil - "Keeps your guns shinning"
and Swat Rocks - "For easy throws".

We have got 10 participants from different regions and first edition is an international one with participants from Afghanistan and Bangladesh also.
And for the participants everything will be unexpected, i.e expect the unexpected, there will be real stunts, killings, gun battles, and many more adventure sports tests.

Winner will get straight entry into the next planned mission of Al Qaeda at an unspecified location.

I will not reveal all the details as it is SwatTV Roadies 1.0 Expect the Unexpected

Till then its goodbye from all of us here at SwatTV Roadies 1.0

ps: Some people are not able to intrepret it and saying that its a sports blog and I should write only sports related posts. I feel the post is very much related to sports and such scenario can take place in future in Pakistan, we are seeing what is happening there and sports be it cricket or anything may not be possible in that country. So it is like a dark humor which has some bitter reality in it.