Wah! Cricket

Duncan Fletcher to coach INDIA

2011-04-27T04:13:00.000-07:00

The most awaited result is out. Well of course, you guessed it. Its Drunken .. oops Duncan Fletcher who will be coaching the World Cup 2011 Champs. For the first time in the history of Indian cricket, BCCI have actually hurt their reputation of being the lazy government officials we think they are. They have announced the coach of the national way before the whole world was ready for it. There were a lot of speculations about who would be filling in Kirsten's shoes. Would it be Andy 'The Reverse Sweeping' Flower, Stephen 'CSK-Player Turned Coach' Fleming, Brian 'Snubbed by IPL' Lara, Wasim 'Aiming Indian Citizenship' Akram, Sania 'now married' Mirza even David 'The Hoff' Hasselhoff was in the reckoning aparently. BCCI has been strictly avoiding desi coaches for GOD knows what reason. And as it appears Duncan Fletcher has bagged a 2 year contract to coach the Indian *cough* world champions*cough* team.

"If it aint broke,don't fix it."
© Getty Images

Fletcher has had his own share of ups and downs. Captaining Zimbabwe for not too long and having never played test cricket he was chosen as the light-bearer of the England national team. He guided the morally low, very brittle English side to the Ashes Glory in 2005 but, also lost the away series 5-0 in 2007 followed by a very forgettable World Cup campaign. More than coaching, his job is to handle the pressure of media and the board. Personally speaking, he has hit a jackpot at the age of 63. His pay package and perks are sure to put the ECB to shame. I think his story will unravel during the India tour of England. Will he be the next Greg Chappel or Gary Kirsten. Time will have the answer. Let's wait and watch.

The Big Bash just got Bigger

2011-04-15T01:04:00.000-07:00

Big Bash League - Bigger than before
http://bigbash.com.au/

A T20 revolution is (apparently) about to take place down-under, thought it was wise to spread the word before the world was caught napping. Well of course if you already knew too much it will be wise to stop right here. So, wake up now and see what the Ozzie blokes were up to when you were busy bleeding blue (last heard). New format, new teams, new colours almost as though "new" is an understatement.

Clearly, Cricket Australia is pumped about the Big Bash League. The newer, bigger bash will now feature 8 teams- Adelaide Strikers, Brisbane Heat, Hobart Hurricanes, Perth Scorchers and 2 teams each from Sydney and Melbourne which are Sydney Sixers, Sydney Thunder, Melbourne Renegades and Melbourne Stars. Each team is represented by a unique jersey colour, unlike a certain T20 league that does not identify different colours in a rainbow. Talking of which, the 8 teams have made sure the colours will remain in your heads even after you switch off your television sets, take a nap, remain blind fold for the next 48-72 hours.

BBL Teams

Name	Colour	Venue
Adelaide Strikers	Blue	Adelaide Oval
Brisbane Heat	Teal	Gabba
Hobart Hurricanes	Purple	Bellerive Oval
Perth Scorchers	Orange	WACA Ground
Melbourne Renegades	Red	Etihad Stadium
Melbourne Stars	Green	MCG
Sydney Sixers	Pink	SCG
Sydney Thunder	Electric Green	ANZ Stadium

Will be interesting to see how many foreign players are allowed per side and how the local players are distributed which is incase it is not based on which domestic side they represent. Either way Sydney, Melbourne have 2 teams so the loyalities have to split here. Bringing in the corporates does ring the cash registers so, the teams will now be going under the hammer. Whether the auction (players & teams) is the way to go is unknown. So far each teams have picked names, assigned a stadium and chosen their colours. Stay tuned for updates on the BBL as we break them to you right here!

We leave you with this video to keep your mouth watering till the revolution strikes no sooner than DEC-2011. Enjoy!

IPL 4 - Who's In Who's Out

2011-04-14T05:17:00.000-07:00

   Only few days into the cricket extravaganza, already a few cracks are seen. The crowd response has been mild at average. The opening ceremony was a big bore, Modi cam is now redundant, star power is lacking, players are bailing out due to injuries and as if bad news was not enough the worse has just been announced. Apparently, the Lankan cricket board is not comfortable with their cricketers playing in the Indian Premier League. Especially, after the recent loss in the World Cup finals coming from them their not so friendly neighbours. Clearly the board wants the players to shift loyalities to the national team. And so for the prosperity of Sri Lankan cricket the board has decided to call their players back for a practise camp ahead of their gruelling tour of England. Now, do you see the big picture? (Well, it was never going to be Jacqueline Fernandez and Ritesh Deshmukh, sorry guys!)

   Big blow to Mumbai Indians who had pinned their hopes on Lasith Malinga picking another 30-35 wickets, so that the rest of the pack could just watch the batsmen save their toes and lose their wickets. Deccan Chargers and Kochi Tuskers Kerala also face serious set backs since the two sides are captained by Sri Lankan players. CSK the Lanka loving IPL side will lose services of Randiv, Kulasekera, Tharanga due to the announcement. Pune Warriors India might not get any duty from the injured Angelo Mathews. MI, KTK will also lose Dilhara Fernando, Thissara Perera although Kochi Tuskers Kerala will be lucky to retain Muralitharan with them. Royal Challengers Bangalore will have to rethink their team mix when Dilshan along with Pradeep follow the board's orders. So far none of the players have shown objection and it is most likely to remain that way. Clearly, most sides will have to re-think their composition and gane plans but, they do have a respite till May 5.

   Good news is that the Aussies have completed national duties in the very long & tough (feel the sarcasm) tour of Bangladesh, which saw the Australians victorious under their new captain, Michael Clarke. So, the teams get some big names in their squads trying to boost their fortunes. Steven Smith however, wont join the Kochi Tuskers Kerala. He will undergo an ankle surgery.

Team	Players Out	Players In
MI	Lasith Malinga, Dilhara Fernando	Nil
DC	Kumar Sangakkara	Cameron White
KTK	Mahela Jayawardene, Thissara Perera	John Hastings, Steve Smith
PWI	Angelo Mathews	Callum Ferguson
RCB	Tillakaratne Dilshan, Nuwan Pradeep	Nil
KKR	Nil	Brad Haddin, Brett Lee, James Pattinson, Shakib Al Hasan
RR	Nil	Shane Watson
CSK	Nuwan Kulasekera, Upul Tharanga, Suraj Randiv	Michael Hussey, Doug Bollinger
KxiP	Nil	Nil
DD	Nil	Nil

Team owners of KKR will be mighty pleased with 4 quality players adding to the squad, having spent not too many days into the IPL. RR will be glad their maverick Shane Watson is in good form and ready for duty. MI will need to re think their bowling combination and hope for Andrew Symonds to get into the zone as soon as possible. Where as DC have not only lost their captain but also their wicket keeper, they need to do some serious fixing in their squad. The rest of the bunch have made up in some way or the other. Kings XI Punjab and Delhi Daredevils have nothing to take from this news. Its almost as though they are immune to what is happening around them.

In other news, WICB have dropped Chris Gayle, Shiv Chanderpaul, Ramnaresh Sarwan from the upcoming ODI series Vs Pakistan. Marlon Samuels makes yet another come back into the team. Good news is that Mumbai Indians will not lose the services of Kieron Pollard. Chennai Super Kings however, will have to wait for Dwayne Bravo to join their squad once the ODI's are over. He will miss the 2 match test series between West Indies and Pakistan.

IPL Season 4 - Group B Preview

2011-04-08T04:22:00.000-07:00

   Kolkata Knight Riders:
   The Dark Knight! A complete white wash in the team and new look and feel (mostly Dilli-wallas) some key foreign purchases KKR will be hoping for some change in fortunes as well. After controversially dumping Dada for some multi-captaincy theory and then falling on their bum making him the man in charge to not bidding for him in the player auctions. WOW! quite a ride to be honest. This year they have a lot that is talented and have quite a reputation. Wonder if this season is make or break for the owners. Since, KKR is the only team from the previous 8 that is yet to make it to a semi-finals in the IPL. They made the biggest purchase during the auctions that of Gautam mommy loves Gambhir now named their captain, for 2.4m$. And the prize catch of Yusuf Killer Pathan for another 2.1m$ Phew!! Kallis being their third million dollar baby. Some very smart picks in the domestic players now makes the team a contender for the semis at least!
Captain: Gautam Gambhir
Players Retained: Nil
Key Players: Yusuf Pathan, Eoin Morgan,
Dark Horse: Iqbal Abdulla,Ryan Ten Doeschate, Sourav Ganguly (well of course)
Group A: Deccan Chargers

   Royal Challengers Bangalore:
   Where KKR have many DD's domestic players, Dr. Mallya's men seemed to have robbed the Daredevils in broad daylight. They have Daniel Vettori their new captain, Dirk Nannes, Dilshan, AB De Villiers all from the Delhi Darevils Geeez! Well then again RCB lost all their merry men in Robin, Rahul, Pandey, Steyn none of whom they retained when they had a choice. Apart from the Dilli-walas there is Ex-RCB man Zaheer who makes a come back to his IPL team after swapping to the Mumbai Indians squad for Robin Uthapa. Immensely talented (and slightly over rated) Cheteshwar Pujara, trying to show his tools in T20 cricket and U-23 player of IPL season 3 Saurabh Tiwary and Once upon a time in Indian team Md. Kaif are in the squad as well. Which helps their batting but who are their bowling options?
Captain: Daniel Vettori
Players Retained: Virat Kohli
Key Players: Zaheer Khan, AB De Villiers, Dirk Nannes
Dark Horse: Saurabh Tiwary, Cheteshwar Pujara, Arun Karthik
Group A: Group A: Kings XI Punjab

   Rajasthan Royals:
  The winners of the inaugural IPL, Royals have not had a sweet time in the middle. After being almost kicked out like the KxiP they too have been fortunate to get the mercy plea from! the courts. Although, they did retain skip Warney and talisman Watto it doesn’t explain why they didn’t retain their mojo man Yusuf Pathan. As a result the bidders went bezerk and only KKR could afford him at over 2m$. The Royals look thinner than before only occasional Ross Taylor, the seasoned Rahul Dravid, useful Johan Botha, off target Tait a few names to reckon. Addition of in-form Jacob Oram must be good news for the Royals who replaced Collingwood due to injury. They have done some wild recruiting in the domestic circuit though. Getting some top catches like Rahane, and their usual suspects like Sid Trivedi. A couple from the last years Ranji season heros like Meneria, Chahar. Despite having 3 seasons of experience Royals have done well to remain underdogs.
Captain: Shane Warne
Players Retained: Shane Warne, Shane Watson
Key Players: Shane Watson, Ross Taylor, Rahul Dravid
Dark Horse: Deepak Chahar, Jacob Oram, Ashok Meneria
Group A: Group A: Mumbai Indians

   Chennai Super Kings:
   MS Dhoni’s yellow army had a perfect 2010 season where they won the IPL and the CLT20. The onus is upon them to make their owners proud again. The owners too haven’t played much with the team balance. They tried hard to buy back as many players from their previous winning combination. In the process they seemed to have over priced some of their own players and bought them at a premium if not more. They did lose some of their talent like L Balaji, Muralitharan, Parthiv Patel and did not go for Jacob Oram or Mathew Hayden. Their new additions were pretty impressive but injuries seemed to have plagued them just before the tournament. Bravo, Hilfenhaus, Bailey, Bollinger the main accused. They have found solace in Southee and Tharanga who seemed to have put their best suit on during the WC. T20 is an altogether different ball game, a change in mind set. So, far no team has been able to defend their title successfully. Let’s see if the champs still have it in them.
Captain: MS Dhoni
Players Retained: MS Dhoni, Suresh Raina, Albie Morkel, Murali Vijay
Key Players: R Ashwin, Mike Hussey, Suresh Raina
Dark Horse: Tim Southee, Suraj Randiv, Abhinav Mukund
Group A: Pune Warriors India

   Kochi Tuskers Kerala:
   The newbie in Group B will have a tough task in their debut season against the seasoned pros like CSK and RCB. They had some over the roof bidding technique throughout the auctioning. The pattern was tougher to crack than the Da Vinci Code. They did end up with a strong domestic bowlers list and some key hitters from the foreign buys. Murali's fitness will be alarming but they will be hoping he's fit for some part of the tournament. The only team which can accomodate VVS with a Brendon McCullum then add Muralitharan with a Steve Smith a little bit of Romesh Powar and top it off with Ravindra Jadeja... and well of course the home grown Sreesanth. WOW!! Whether the odd mixture gels well, will be keenly studied.
Captain: Mahela Jayawardene
Players Retained: Not Applicable
Key Players: Muralitharan, Brendon McCullum, RP Singh
Dark Horse: John Hastings, Kedar Jadhav, Vinay Kumar
Group A: Delhi Daredevils

   It seems the Group B is well stacked with 2 former champions. Unlike Pune Warriors, Kochi Tuskers have their hands full and don’t look all that deadly to handle. Since it isn’t about topping Group A and Group B separately the ten teams will realize they cannot afford slip ups. The top 4 will only make the cut and there are no consolation prizes. That’s that then, wishing you all a fun-tastic and fooper IPL. The entertainment just got a little dirty!
p.s. - Who are your key players to watch out for in the IPL4. Share with us in the comments section. Cheers!

IPL Season 4 - Group A Preview

2011-04-07T02:25:00.000-07:00

   Deccan Chargers:
   DC, the only team in Group A to have won the IPL. No players retained but, they did buy Ojha back in the player auction. They spent big money on key names like Steyn and surprisingly Cam White! They were fairly lucky to loot many players on Sale! like Rusty Theron, Amit Mishra, Shikhar Dhawan, JP Duminy. New look to the team starting with a new captain, King Kumar. Looks slightly brittle on the domestic batting which means the foreign buys will be the key when it comes to batting. KP's absence due to his hernia means Cam White and JP Duminy will have to Charge up quickly. Overall, having Mishra and Ojha will be a great advantage over most teams.
Captain: Kumar Sangakkara
Players Retained: Nil
Key Players: Dale Steyn, Pragyan Ojha, JP Duminy
Dark Horse: Dan Christian, Kedar Devdhar, Ishant Sharma
Group B: Kolkata Knight Riders (to be played home and away)

   Delhi Daredevils:
   Daredvils retained only Virender Sehwag from their previous squad. A trick missed perhaps as they could not manage to buy back most of their key performers like AB De Villiers, Dilshan, Vettori, Nannes. Spent a whooping 1.9 m$ on Irfan Pathan who's not even sure to be fit. They do not have any big names in their squad barring David Warner and Morne Morkel not even the domestic players. Clearly DD are the dark horse for this season as they have key individuals who are not too popular with the Indian crowd. Names such as Aaron Finch, Mathew Wade and upcoming Indian talent like Umesh Yadav, Dinda, Naman Ojha. And also some ex-fame players like S.Sriram, Venu Rao, Irfan Pathan, Salvi, Ajit Agarkar Geez!! Will be important to see who's their frontline spinner (Yogesh Nagar??). Since they dint pick anyone in the auctions.
Captain: Virender Sehwag
Players Retained: Virender Sehwag
Key Players: Morne Morkel, David Warner, Ajit Agarkar (Duh!)
Dark Horse: Aaron Finch, Irfan Pathan, Naman Ojha
Group B: Kochi Tuskers Kerala

   Kings XI Punjab:
   Zintans have had a rough time both during the IPL and the off-season. From being almost kicked out to running around court rooms they're releaved to be featuring in the IPL. Sadly, it is due to the harakiri they said they couldn't retain their players. But, their auction journey was a sleep walk. They had no clue what was happening. Injuries to Praveen Kumar, Stuart Broad and Dimmi Mascarenhas wont help them either although they have signed Ryan McLaren and David Miller as cover. Australians will be the core in this team with Gilly, Hussey, Marsh, Harris. Familiar Indians in the form of Dinesh Karthik, Piyush chawla will be vital to their fortunes.
Captain: Adam Gilchrist
Players Retained: Nil
Key Players: David Hussey, Praveen Kumar, Dinesh Karthik
Dark Horse: Abhishek Nayar, Ryan Harris, Nathan Rimmington
Group B: Royal Challengers Bangalore

   Mumbai Indians:
   The runner-up in the previous season, the mighty Mumbai Indians have retained the solid core and replaced a few parts here and there. Their auction presence was poor, they didn't put up a fight for most of the auctioning. And then they were clearly unhappy with last minute changes in the auction procedure. Nevertheless, they look a formidable unit with some smart buys during the auction in the form of Symonds, Davy Jacobs, Blizzard, Rohit Sharma and easily getting some of the best domestic crop like T Suman, Rayudu. With SRT in the side and leading them it wasn't too difficult to get some ripe talent from across India. With Pollard, Malinga, Bhajji retained their core strength looks retained!
Captain: Sachin Tendulkar
Players Retained: Sachin Tendulkar, Lasith Malinga, Kieron Pollard, Harbhajan Singh
Key Players: Andrew Symonds, Rohit Sharma, see list above.
Dark Horse: Davy Jacobs, Aiden Blizzard, T Suman
Group B: Rajasthan Royals

   Pune Warriors India:
   The newbie in Group A looked very impressive during the players auctioning. They went big but, very cautiously almost similar to the Chargers and found some balance in their squad. They stuck to the plan and got some key names in their franchisee. Along with that some vital domestic players were added outside the auctions that makes them a notable opposition although it is only their IPL debut this season. Injury to Angelo Mathews will keep them hunting for the right balance to their team. As such some big domestic names like Yuraj, Robin, Pandey, Nehra, Murali Kartik, Mithun Manhas and foreign imports like Smith, Nathan McCullum, Tim Paine, Ryder, Parnell, Ferguson and the lesser known Kamran Khan, Jhunjhunwala, Mitch Marsh, Mohnish, Rahul will bring about a solid mix to the franchisee's hopes of making an impact in the IPL.
Captain: Yuvraj Singh
Players Retained: Not Applicable
Key Players: Robin Uthapa, Ashish Nehra, Graeme Smith
Dark Horse: Nathan McCullum, Tim Paine, Callum Ferguson, Dheeraj Jadhav, Kamran Khan
Group B: Chennai Super Kings

   These were the teams from Group A that will be contesting for the IPL Champions' fame and glory. Not much to choose between them but, MI, DC look formidable and DD the dark horse from this group. But the new addition of Pune Warriors India will be the focus. They look well balanced to upset many experienced oppositions. Wont be surprised if KxiP struggle this season as well. For Group B preview keep tuning in.
p.s. - Who are your key players to watch out for in the IPL4. Share with us in the comments section. Cheers!

IPL Season 4 Opener

2011-04-06T04:11:00.000-07:00

Its that time of the year again.. you know, "DLF maximums", "Karbonn Kamaal Catch", "Citi moment of Success" yada yada all that crap sans Modi cam err.. Lalit K Modi. Well, what's new then? Primarily the tournament is bigger with 10 teams now in the fray and the format is as complex as the Benedict–Webb–Rubin equation, if not more. You know.. split into two groups then play home and away games with teams in their group and a random draw to pick the team to play twice from the opposite group and play the rest of the teams once.. Then the Playoffs for the finals. Phew!! If you're still reading this, either that made complete sense to you or you are waiting for the Benedict–Webb–Rubin reference to appear in this post somewhere. In the case of the latter please stop reading now! Thank you, for those now searching for some IPL hungama can continue reading.

Two new franchises Sahara Group owned Pune Warriors India and ~~Rendezvous Sports World~~ Kochi Cricket Pvt Ltd. owned Kochi Tuskers Kerala. Yes, the tradition of picking crappy team names is still very much evident. Somethings that keep the IPL very Indian indeed. Along with new teams the existing 8 teams were busy at the auctions buying players since the existing 3 year deal for all teams went *poof*. All franchisee owners were allowed to retain a maximum of 4 players (2 foreigners max). The first player retained will cost a team $1.8 million against the salary cap of $9 million, regardless of the amount the player is actually paid. The second player will cost $1.3 million, the third $900,000 and the fourth $500,000. Using all four retention options will mean that a franchise will have only $4.5m to spend on 26 other players. IPL season 3 champions CSK and runner-up MI were the only two teams to retain 4 players each. Where as, season 2 champs DC, KKR, KxiP did not retain even a single player. DD, RCB retained 1 player each and RR the inaugural season winners retained 2 players.

Players Retained:

CSK - MS Dhoni (Ind), Suresh Raina (Ind), Murali Vijay (Ind), Albie Morkel (RSA)
MI - SR Tendulkar (ind), Harbhajan Singh (Ind), Lasith Malinga (SL), Kieron Pollard (WI)
RR - Shane Warne (Aus), Shane Watson (Aus)
DD - Virender Sehwag (Ind)
RCB - Virat Kohli (Ind)

In the players auctioning things seemingly went very ugly. Some key highlights of the auctions can be seen HERE. The 10 teams have been split into two groups A and B.

Group A	Group B
Deccan Chargers	Kolkata Knight Riders
Delhi Daredevils	Kochi Tuskers Kerala
Kings XI Punjab	Royal Challengers Bangalore
Mumbai Indians	Rajasthan Royals
Pune Warriors India	Chennai Super Kings

Coming up next will be the "Team Previews" before the "maha yudh" starts. So dont forget to catch all the action-reactions right here!

ICC World Cup 2011 Dream Team

2011-04-05T00:58:00.000-07:00

Well of course, the World Cup 2011 is over and well of course you know who won it. Well of course Team India. April 2, 2011 will be etched in every Indian's heart. Kapil's Devils wont be shown on TV lifting the cup anymore or not as frequent. The Blue men have shoved up the critics's ___ in style. We couldn't have asked for a better climax. Dhoni's helicopter hit meant that he will feature in the PEPSI ads for lifetime. Anyways, back to business. This world cup had everything a cricket lover would want. Its time for us to pick the dream team, i.e a team which every captain would love to have.
WARNING: Selection criteria purely based on World Cup performance .

Openers

Dilshan (SL):- Scoring the most runs in this world cup (500), he is in by default. Not to forget his attacking batting, more than handy bowling and brilliant fielding .

Tendulkar (Ind):- "In God We Trust" However well the team may perform, they always believe in GOD, so do we. Also with 482 runs under his belt and 2 top notch centuries, Sachin pairs up with Dilshan in the opening slot.

Middle Order

Trott (Eng):- He has been the mainstay of English batting. Consistent, calm, courageous. 5 fifty's in 7 innings, his lack of 3-digit score was the only flaw in his WC campaign. Its only because of him (and some Irish luck) England reached till the quarters at least. His almost perfect technique, cautious approach makes him a perfect no.3.

De Villiers (SA):- He's one man who can up the ante anytime. His batting is a mix of caution and aggression. Brilliant fielder at any position of the field. He scored at a S.R. more than 100 and averaged 88.25 only second to King Kumar. It was tough to choose between Sangakkara and ABCD so, we had to toss and since there was no ~~cheating~~ re-toss De Villiers was our pick.

Yuvraj (Ind):- Coming into the world cup with negative confidence, his performance in this edition shut the mouths of many. Chipping in with the ball initially, his confidence meter improved with every match and it showed in his batting and mainly on the field. We got glimpses of Vintage UV on the field during the finals. He pinned down the other nominations of the Man of the Series hands down.

MS Dhoni © (Ind):- Do you need any explanation on why he features in the Dream Team? Moving on...

Afridi (Pak):- Yes, his batting was dud but he overcame it with his magnificent bowling where he ran through the middle order of the opposition in most of the matches. 2 5-wicket hauls and 2 4-wicket hauls his strike rate was 21.2 balls per wicket and averaged 12.85. Also, Pakistan's only safe pair of hands this world cup.

~~Tail-enders~~ Bowlers

Southee (NZ):- Wonder kid of New Zealand. He made wonders with the ball picking up 18 wickets @ 17.33 per wicket. He picked up wickets in all the matches and his economy rate was also exceptional.

Zaheer (Ind):- He was Dhoni's 'go-to' man this world cup and he never disappointed . He has improved a lot on his control of the ball. He was instrumental in breaking partnerships in the power plays or applying brakes to the scoring he's done it all.

Malinga (SL):- He's a captains dream. He picked up wickets whenever he bowled.Again was tough to choose between Umar Gul but, the sheer accuracy and consistency of hitting the block-hole in the world cup earned Slinga Malinga a spot here.

Tahir :- South Africa's ~~import~~ find of the decade. An almost perfect leg spinner with lot of varieties and mainly tons of confidence. With an average of 10.71 per wicket and Strike Rate of 16.9 he would be ~~leader of the spin pack~~ perfect support to Afridi in this team.

12th Man
Sangakkara (SL):- Averaged 93 with the bat. Was the third highest run accumulator getting 465 runs. Was amazing behind the wickets as he was in front. Captaincy wasn't 100% though. And he lost out to AB De Villiers.

Close Calls
Andrew Strauss, Umar Akmal, Gautam Gambhir, Virender Sehwag, Upul Tharanga, Robin Peterson, Umar Gul, Muralitharan, Kemar Roach, Brett Lee, Jacob Oram, Graeme Swann, Dale Steyn.

ICC World Cup 2011 Champions

2011-04-02T13:28:00.000-07:00

ICC World Cup 2011 - Grand Finale : India Vs Sri Lanka

2011-04-01T00:59:00.000-07:00

Two warriors, who will emerge victorious???

   After a long journey through the world cup, the teams have arrived at the final destination where 1 team will lift the up and celebrate and other team will have just the commiserations. It is again an India - Sri Lanka encounter. Man, aren't they bored of facing each other??? They have played exceedingly well and they thoroughly deserve their spot in the finals. Both the teams must be on a HIGH after thumping their opponents in the QF and SF. Wankhede is supposed to be a square turner and we should not be surprised if the captains fill their armory with spinners.

   SRI LANKA :
   They have cruised through the groups, quarters and semis. They made minced meat of Poms in the QF and ran through the Kiwis except for the glitch where they lost 4 wickets quickly. Their team overall has looked brilliant. Their openers have been setting up a great platform for the middle order. Both their batsmen have scored 350 + runs in this edition. Jaya'dene has not in form this tournament, but its highly likely that he would come to form against the Indians. Though Murali is not fit, its 100% sure that he would
play the finals. The SL physios would try their best to get Murali back to his springing best. If Mathews doesn't recover in time for the finals. The Lankan lower order becomes more brittle, whether they opt for Perera for his batting services of Kulasekara for his better bowling skills will be a tough choice to make. Lankans have called in Randiv and the epic Warnakulasuriya Patabendige Ushantha Joseph Chaminda Vaas as backup players. Maybe they are trying to bring back older players to remind Indians of the 1996 WC. Given a chance, they would even call DeSilva, J'suriya, Ranatunga et.al. Vaas, playing in for Mathews is a bluff if I can read it right. Dilhara Fernando available why look further?

   INDIA :
   For majority of the Indian Population, the world cup is all about India beating Pakistan. Now if you think it doesn't matter much what happens in the finals, you are wrong! MSD surprised everybody by playing Nehra over Ashwin against Pakistan, and luckily for him it paid off really well. It should have been a very tricky decision for MSD on who to drop to rope in Ashwin, thanks to Nehra for injuring himself and making it easier for MSD now. India Pakistan encounter was an alarm for the Indian batsmen, mainly the middle order barring Raina which crumbled to quality bowling. Once again MSD's form with the bat has been begging. The opening on the other hand has been tremendous, Seh-whack and Sachin have gone after the bowlers irrespective of the opposition. Their bowling which was under a lot of pressure during the group stages, but they have stood up to the occasion in crunch situations. They have been very disciplined, their first wide was in the 37th over and no no-balls were offered to the Stanis.

Men Who Matter:

SL - Dilshan, Sangakkara, Jayawardene, Malinga, Murali
IND - Sachin, Sehwag, Yuvraj, Zaheer, Harbhajan

Key Battles :

Murali Vs Sachin :

World's best bowler to the World's best batsman. Both teams would go Full Monty to try and give the perfect swan song they truly deserve. Sadly, one of them will have to go back empty handed. Although, it is not evident that Sachin will retire for sure. He's God right? God's dont retire or go for holidays or need time off.

Sehwag Vs Malinga :

We saw how Sehwag dented one of the Pakistan's best bowler, Umar Gul. Malinga , as usual has been at his best most of the times, not giving away anything to the batsmen. This battle would be interesting to see who gets a the last laugh.

Dilshan Vs Zaheer :

Dilshan is the Lankan version of Sehwag, a time bomb ready to explode. Zaheer, has been the linch pin for the Indian bowling for quite a while. Both teams will be looking to get an ideal start in the big match.

Numbers Game :
* Dilshan is the leading run getter in the world cup. Three runs more than SRT.
* SRT holds the record for most runs in world cup games - over 2000(2260).
* Sri Lanka leads India 4-2 in world cups. Last time SL bt Ind by 69 runs knocking them out of the 2007 world cup.
* Overall India leads Sri Lanka 67-50. At home India leads 28-11 over the Lankans.
* Both teams are playing in their 3rd WC finals. Winning 1 and Losing 1. Both Lost their finals to Australia in 2003 and 2007 respectively.
* Sachin averages 45.61 against the Lankans scoring close to 3000(2965) runs in 78 matches.
* Murali averages 31.25 against the Indians picking 74 wickets in 58 innings.
* Indian batsmen has notched 16 50+ scores in the tournament so far against Sri Lanka's 14 such scores.
* Sri Lankan batsmen has notched 6 100+ scores in the tournament so far against India's 5 such scores.
* Teams batting first hold the edge in Wankhede 11-6. Also, both teams lost to Australia in the WC finals chasing.

A match that could redefine most of their lives, transform them into heroes. 100 overs to fight for anything they have dreamed for, aspired to achieve growing up. Lankans play disciplined cricket, fight hard till the last ball and have produced consistent results. Indians on the other have played crunch games and have beaten some of the top teams or gone down in the final moments. There could be no bigger stage set for the finals. Dhoni or Sangakkara both captains, both wicket keepers both have immense belief in their squads. But, the similarities must end here. As only one can emerge champion. And so is the fate of this game. Even a warrior must accept defeat with pride. Come saturday Wankhede will be a Colosseum, bull-ring, battle field all wrapped in one. Loud chants will go numb and heart beats will get loud. Whether Sri Lanka will upset a billion hearts or it is not just a mere co-incidence that the 1983 calendar and 2011 are similar?

ICC World Cup 2011 - Semi Finals 2: India Vs Pakistan

2011-03-29T02:12:00.000-07:00

Funny that Dhoni needs a leggie who can pick wickets and Afridi needs a wk who can hold on to the ball. Eh?

   The tournament has had its highs, lows, Canada et al. But, cricket fantasy is set to come true in Mohali during the second semi-final of the ICC World Cup with the mother, father, Godzilla of all battles!! Arch rivals India-Pakistan to battle it out for pride, glory, world peace and tumbling stock markets. This is what the ~~whole world~~ umm.. ~~Shiv Sena~~ ummm... ~~Hon. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh~~ ummm... cricket crazy fans have been expecting. Its an early Christmas for the sponsors, their prayers have come true. This match is "HUGE", for most people across the borders of the two countries winning this match means more than winning the World Cup. No wonder if the productivity dips by a few levels during the match, the players will have to pay back in blood and tears.

TEAM NEWS:
   PAKISTAN
   They blew the Windies out the competition in the QF. Afridi has been their strike bowler. He has done nothing wrong with the ball , which has been compensated by doing nothing right with the bat. Gul has been top notch, both with the new ball as well as the old one. Pakistan's batting has been a bit wobbly with the reliability of Muammar Muhammad al-Gaddafi. Umar "Leprechaun" Akmal has been their 'go-to' man. Razzaq has gone un-noticed with the bat/ball this time, Afridi has used him only as a stock bowler. Afridi will be tempted to play Akthar in place of Razzaq to hurt the Indians. Its good to see Akthar tone down his bowling as well as his attitude and play with the team rather than playing against them which he is always used to. He would like to peak in against India like any other guy in the team . Their fielding has been mediocre, thanks to the one man army behind the wickets.

   INDIA
   India started off their campaign as favorites and then they were the punching bag for most critics. But, in the QF they knocked out the defending champions Australia, ending their 12 year old reign over the World Cup. With the heroic win against Aussies, hopes of 1billion + hearts stay afloat. India's bowling was their main weakness, no one except for Zaheer standing up to the occasion. Now with the entry of Ashwin, it seems to have got a combination going for them. Though, MSD would be tempted to play Nehra/Sree in Mohali, he would play the same winning combination against the Stanis. After all, his dil-logical decisions have been successful. Indian batting has looked good, except in the batting powerplay where they seem to get a "brain freeze". Those maddening 5 overs have cost them a lot. Again Raina's entry as the finisher has helped them stabilize. Indian fielding, though it was looking rough in the group stages improved exponentially against the Aussies. Or as MSD says, they could do no better.

Head-to-Head

Sachin                Hafeez
Sehwag            K Akmal
Gambhir             Shafiq
Kohli                  Younis
Yuvraj                Misbah
Dhoni                 U Akmal
Raina                 Afridi
Harbhajan        Gul
Zaheer               Riaz
Ashwin               Ajmal
Munaf                Akhtar
Nehra*(12th)    Razzaq* (12th)

Man to man the teams look well balanced. Although, the tons and tons of runs and experience of the Indian top-order and the depth and variety in Pakistani bowling will be the key battle to win the war.

Key Encounters:

Sachin-Viru Vs Akthar-Gul

Mouth watering clash on the cards, if the Pakistani think tank decide to bring Shoaib out of the wilderness. He may have announced his retirement plans but, Sachin n Sehwag will be eager to make him pay!

Gambhir Vs Afridi

Gambhir and Afridi have history. Afridi has picked 21 victims already. Gambhir has been among the runs. These two on the field would spark emotions as easy as butter melting on a hot pan.

Zaheer-Ashwin Vs Pakistan Openers

Zaheer has been the strike bowler whenever MSD needs a wicket. Ashwin has been the answer to India's bowling woes. Akmal, Hafeez know to play in only one gear, attack! It will be exciting to see this mini-battle among the several high voltage conflicts on the centre stage.

Yuvraj Vs Umar

Umar Akmal's green sunscreen should come handy when he faces UV's rays!

Not so much Trivia
-Yuvraj has won 4 m.o.m awards so far in the world cup.
-Pakistan have never beaten India in world cup competitions.
-India have never beaten Pakistan at Mohali.
-India has never crossed the Semis in world cups held in India (sub-continent).
-SRT is on 99 international centuries & yet to win a world cup (in case you missed. haha!).

Both India and Pakistan will be on a high beating some good teams and reaching the WC semis. It's "war time" for the 22 players, do-or-die would never have sound more apt. Its not just a "game" for the two countries, its a question of superiority, pride, everlasting glory and endorsement deals. Well of course!

ICC World Cup 2011 - Semi Finals 1: Sri Lanka Vs New Zealand

2011-03-28T04:25:00.000-07:00

Alas, the final 4. In the first of the two semi finals we have co-host Sri Lanka take on the surprise packet New Zealand. Funny story, I had a dream where Australia lose in the Quarter finals and New Zealand play the semi finals. No Shit!! Oh wait... So, coming back to the game, Sri Lanka steam rolled passed English muffins in their quarters encounter while, Kiwis pressed the Choke button rather dint need to as Proteas have mastered it over the years.


When every appeal matters!

Team News:
Kiwis - Mills has been finally sent home, Andy McKay flown in as his replacement might not get to do much. Tuffey might get the slot in the playing xi depending on conditions. Otherwise, Oram's form will help Vettori go in with some slow bowlers who should be handy in Sri Lanka.

Lanka - Murali looked highly uncomfortable in the ending stages of his spell in the quarter finals game vs England. Whether Lankans will risk him or rest him is the million dollar question. With Herath and Dilshan turning out to be more than handy options and Mendis around Lankans are most likely to play a seamer in his place.

Head-to-Head (probable 12)

Dilshan               B McCullum
Tharanga           Guptill
Sangakkara        Jesse
Jayawardene      Taylor
Samaraweera   Styris
Silva                   Williamson
Mathews            Oram
Perera              Franklin
Malinga              N McCullum
Mendis               Vettori
Herath               Southee
Murali*             Tuffey*

Man to man Kiwis have the depth in the batting but a big score depends on the big names. Lanka clearly banking on familiar home conditions and using spin as their key weapon.

Key Encounters :

Lankan Openers Vs N Mac

Lankan openers have bullied most teams(minnows), they were hardly tested by the Poms. But, last time they played the Kiwis it was 19/2 and Southee was on a roll. But, Nathan McCullum has been excellent with the ball. And this battle will lighten up the game early on. If Kiwis want to get under the skins of the home team, they need to strike early or else like other teams their fate is sealed.

King Kumar Vs Dan the Man Vettori

Easily the clash to look forward to. Last time these two teams met in the tournament, Sangakkara notched up a 3 figure score (first since 2008) and helped his team post a respectable 265. But that was Kiwis sans Vettori. With Vettori back in the equation the battle will be the key to the match, perhaps!

M-factor Vs Kiwis batting

Kiwis batsmen will have to tackle the "M-factor" at the Premadasa, Malinga, Mendis, Mathews, Murali (if he's fit). Kiwis batting has depth, probably the most among the teams but, they need a key innings from their top order. A key three digit score can really lift the spirits of the rest and the late hitting can be left to Oram, Franklin, McCullum, Vettori.

Last time these two sides met. It was game on till the innings break and then fizzled out without a fight. Once again, Lanka have the home advantage. Luckily, for Kiwis their league match was held at Wankhede and not the Premadasa. It doesn't matter what happened in the past. Just two wins away from taking the 'World Cup' nothing can be taken for granted.

ICC World Cup 2011 - Quarter Finals 4: Sri Lanka Vs England

2011-03-25T02:12:00.000-07:00

The final two teams to fight out for the semi finals spot of the ICC World Cup 2011. Sri Lanka, former world cup champions and also the runner up in the 2007 World Cup and England the bad parent which never gained respect from their child. In other words, they invented the sport for the rest of the world (although they have been in the finals) they have not once done the "full monty" so to say win the World Cup!

England Report :
They beat South Africa, West Indies. Tied against India. That speaks volumes. But, they also lost to Ireland, Bangladesh and almost faced defeat to the Netherlands. Its been a mixed bag for the Poms throughout the tournament. They've been the most unpredictable side in the competition, even more than Pakistan. They managed to sneak in to the Quarters but, now face a very strong Lankan team playing at home. Their form is difficult to rate because they have sent home players and got replacements week in, week out. Latest being Yardy, who probably has had a sudden increase in his Estrogen level. The very capable Adil Rashid who should have made it to the world cup in the first place now replaces him. Earlier, Eoin Morgan got his 'Golden ticket' thanks to KP. Dernbach and Tremlett also came in as replacements for injured players. Now, Strauss and Andy have to pick xi players that can put up a fight against a formidable Lankan team. As it is, Sri Lanka have a very disciplined and strong outfit beating them in home conditions will be asking too much. Once again, onus will be on Strauss to lead from the front whether Prior continues to open is questionable. He has failed, I would want him to come down the order as a slogger. Trott has been very consistent with the bat, England will be hoping he fires a big one against Lankans as well. Eoin Morgan will be the guy England will be pinning their hopes for a late flurry and a big finish. Bowling wise it is clear Swann is the leader for the Poms. Broad back home, Bresnan not fully fit, Shahzad's patchy form, Tredwell's inexperience and many more. The signs are not good but, English will be hoping it works out with the new faces coming in. After all, its only about winning 3 more games, ain't it?

Sri Lanka Report :
The Emrald Islanders have once again shown their muscle in the world cup. Playing at home they have hardly put a wrong foot forward, their only loss coming against Pakistan. Sangakkara has a very committed set of players and he's been consistent with the playing xi. Dilshan at the top, Jayawardene and himself form the core of the batting. Where as Malinga, Murali, Mendis take care of the bowling duties. With Mathews, Perera, Kulasekara, Tharanga, Herath as ad-ons, this team is just unfair to the rest of the teams in the competition. Lankans would like to treat the home crowd once again when they take on England and make sure they book their semis berth without any hiccups. English don't possess as big threats for Lanka but, they did manage to defeat the islanders at home. The absence of KP will haunt them, but having Morgan has boosted their poor lower order. Swann will be another hurdle the Lankans will have to tackle before they can claim that semis berth. Swann has been like a man on a mission, it will require the top 4 from the Lankan batting to take him out before he causes irrepairable damages. The Lankan lower half of the batting has not been fruitful. Mathews has had a quiet world cup so far, they will hope his fortunes are going to change soon. Murali announcing his farewell from the 50 over format at the end of his world cup journey, has made this even more special. The entire team will be hoping to give the perfect swan song, that he deserves for his contribution to Sri Lankan cricket over the years.

Watch Out For :

Malinga Vs Strauss
Murali Vs Morgan
Swann Vs Sangakkara

The English will be hoping to surprise the home team, with a few new tricks. Lankans are no pushovers, and the fight has to be taken to them in every aspect of the game. In Sri Lanka the party is just about to begin...

ICC World Cup 2011 - Quarter Finals 3: South Africa Vs New Zealand

2011-03-24T03:30:00.000-07:00

   The only quarter final game which does not feature a team from the sub-continent or even a previous world cup winner. But, if you are thinking this just makes for a lame encounter, you need to wake up now! Proteas have for long been tagged "Chokers", Kiwis have been the dark horses in most big tournaments. This cup is no different. Once through the league any team that can win 3 more games is crowned the champions. Like it or not. This brings the equation very close, its just on the day performance and not the potential of the teams that will affect the end result.

New Zealand Report :
   Vettori's side has seen pretty much the worse period ever for the Kiwis. They do not justify their talent with their current ODI rating but, losing to Bangladesh and then India did not help their cause. They have looked better in the world cup though, they beat the Group A leaders Pakistan thanks to a mad max innings courtesy Ross Taylor. But struggled against Australia and Sri Lanka and hence finished 4th in the group. Once again its the consistency that has been lacking from the black caps. Facing Group B leaders won't be simple, their top guns Taylor, Mc Cullum, Vettori will have to make sure that it isn't thrown away. Southee has looked good and will be responsible to bring early breaks against the majestic Proteas batting line-up. Hopefully, Vettori is fit and that will severely boost their chances. Brendon McCullum, Martin Guptil, Jesse Ryder will have to deliver with the bat. Taylor, Styris can later give the impetus. If they can post a meaty score like they did against Pakistan. They should look for wickets early in the SAF innings. Hopefully, bowling coach Alan Donald will give them key pointers. Proteas batting has blinked a few times once the top order is back in the hut. Kiwis should look to play disciplined cricket all along to beat the mighty Proteas.

South Africa Report :
    Smith's men have come to the party and bullied everyone. Except for the hiccup against England in chennai, they have beaten others convincingly to top group B. Playing at Dhaka once again, Proteas would be keen to play Tahir, Peterson and perhaps Botha considering their winning run.Tsotsobe was great in the game against Bangladesh. Smith has yet to fire with the bat and would be hoping that one game is not far away. Kallis has shown flashes of his reputation. Yet, Amla and AB DeVilliers will be their trump cards once again. If any of these four click they can easily post a huge total with the help of Duminy, DuPlesis, Botha. Van Wyk has been disappointing, I think his place in the team is now taken. Will be keen to see if Ingram gets a chance ahead of Faf in any case they need to play the slogger's role. Steyn has looked at his menacing best. And Morkel has been no less from the other end. Proteas have a well balanced attack and a fearsome one at that. Proteas who have done well against Kiwis in world cup games would be hoping the trend continues and gives them a berth in the semis. Yet to win a world cup, they will be hoping the tag of "Chokers" doesn't arrive for 3 more games.

Watch Out For:

Tahir Vs Taylor
Vettori Vs De Villiers
Steyn Vs McCullum

The teams know very well this is the knock-out time, one bad day and they will be boarding their flights for home. This is the time to bring out all the tricks from the bag, do anything but win. Proteas would just have to hope Duckworth and Lewis are not anywhere in the vicinity of the ground. New Zealand have to do just one thing, put the opponents under pressure, then they will stand up-to their name "Chokers". Rest assured it is all going to happen at Dhaka.

ICC World Cup 2011 - Quarter Finals 2: India Vs Australia

2011-03-23T08:03:00.000-07:00

   After a lame first quarter finals effort by the Windies we move on to Ahmedabad for the next encounter which involves co-host India taking on the defending champions and four time winner Australia. Its the battle of the #1 ranked ODI team against the #2 ODI team. Yes, its HUGE!!! No matter how badly you want to ignore it you cant. Once again it will be tough to shift focus from statistics, records, support, dreams, desires to the actual on-field act. Which one of these two will go one step ahead to the final 4? The build up has already grabbed the attention across the cricket crazy folks.

Australia Report:
   Australia chasing yet another world cup victory and under the captaincy of Ricky Ponting this would be the third. The number that eluded even the great Clive Llyod and the indomitable Windies. Funny that, it was India that put an end to Lloyd's team in '83. Ozzies have worries of their own, they haven't been able to find a spinner who can do half the job Warney was capable of. But, then they did manage to win the world cup with Brad Hogg as their spin force. This cup being played in the cub-continent has emphasised the importance of spinners more than the earlier cups that Australia won quite easily. Already, they have faced the impact when the finally lost a world cup game to Pakistan. Afridi clearly used Rehman at the start with Gul and the fire & ice combo was just too much for the Ozzies. Add to that Afridi and Hafeez were capable enough to bowl 20 more tight overs to strangle them further. And the Lankans never tested them. Come the Indians in the quarters, the number of slower bowlers will only mount. Bowling has clearly been India's weakness, Ozzies can take a sigh of relief from that. They will need to be on top of them right from the start and let the home pressure do the rest. Ahmedabad has not been sweet to the Indians in the recent past and the team from down-under will hope that happens one more time in the Quarters. Ponting has shown a lot of faith in Smith and Krejza but against the Indians he might still be tempted to go back to their default seam attack. Batting wise Ponting will want to send a strong message to all who believe he is in his farewell trip. Haddin Watson have done bulk of the scoring for them and the batting has never been pushed far enough, except against Pakistan where they came a cropper.

India Report:
   Sachin. Any report on India has to start with the mention of the not so little master. In fact, the saving face for Dhoni's boys has been that Sachin has looked in the pink of his form, cracking 2 centuries already against top sides. Unfortunately the results and the way the results have come for India has been a heart-break for their fans. Most believe that this time also the team will fall short of the goods. But, they will still cheer for every run scored, every wicket earned by the men in blue. The bowling will once again come under the scanner for the Indians playing against no push-overs, the #1 ODI team. Indians will be hoping the match does not stretch as far as 100 overs, and hopefully the end result is in their favor as well. Concerns in team selection does not seem to end at all. We are already in the knock-out phase of the tournament and India does not know who their starting xi will be. Even the bowling attack has changed in almost every game giving no certain picks before the crunch game. Once again selection issues will plague the team, whether Raina & Ashwin will retain their spots in the side. Batting in the death has really meant suicide for the team. Not so long ago they relished the final overs. So, it takes just one good match for fortunes to change. Dhoni will be hoping that day comes before their world cup journey ends. It will not be easy but, they will have to take what ever comes their way and fight for glory. Pressure will mount at every pit stop during the match, this Aussie side is very much beatable. And that faith has to be restored in the team. There will be no excuses this time!

Watch Out For:

Sachin-Sehwag Vs Lee-Tait
Ponting Vs Harbhajan
Hussey Vs Zaheer

Man to man both teams are well matched. Its very hard to pick a winner. Its sure to get exciting in the second quarter finals. If Sachin-Sehwag get going, the front-line attack will be reduced to some college team in no time. Whether the Indian bowlers continue to suffer the treatment they have been receiving of late? Will the fate of India's batting in the death change? Or whether aussies will finally end a world cup in the quarter finals itself? Needless to say I would kill if required to get passes for the game. So, if anyone needs a hand to do the messy work. Leave a note in the comments section.

ICC World Cup 2011 - Quarter Finals 1: Pakistan Vs West Indies

2011-03-22T03:42:00.000-07:00

   Finally, the suspense ends the quarter finals are set to start and game 1 see's two time former world champions West Indies face off with the former world champions Pakistan. Easily a mouth watering clash considering the history between the two sides.With both teams possessing players who have the caliber to win matches on their own potential, it will be one contest even neutral fans will look forward to.

West Indies Report :
   Windies have been branded the "Minnow Slayers" this world cup. They thrashed them and stamped their authority, which luckily helped get through to semis over hosts Bangladesh. The only test playing team they managed to beat in the league stage. The reason I am saying this is, Pakistan can be worse than 'minnows' some days and if that happens tomorrow, Windies will have a feast. Jokes apart, Windies have been close to winning their last two matches . They bowled well to restrict their opponents to a low total. Their batting is solely dependent on their top order. None of them seem to stand up from the middle order excepting a few strokes of genius from Darren Lara Bravo. A lot more is expected from the likes of Sarwan, Pollard and their 'once upon a time anchor' Chanders (if he plays). The return of Gayle and Roach should give them a boost. Pakistan's batting has been their weak link too. They have struggled against quality bowling. You never know what to expect from their team. Infact , the players themselves aren't aware. Windies should somehow send the news that its the birthday of their top 5 batsmen. This is the 'CHEATCODE' to activate the Jumping Monkey aka Kamran Akmal. Windies have the potential to beat Pakistan. They just need get everything intact and play normally instead of screwing up things themselves.

Pakistan Report :
   On paper easily Pakistan have the edge, the edge is so big that you could have Shoaib Akhtar mark his run up on it. Pakistani outfit would definitely believe this to be a walk in the park. Considering, there is no real opposition in this Windies outfit. Windies lost all their games to the teams that have qualified in the quarters from Group B. Afridi's boys have gone from strength to strength topping the list in Group A. Their bowling has looked solid. Except for one wild innings from Ross Taylor, every other time bowlers have delivered for Afridi and he has been the most boisterous, picking 17 wickets so far, leading the wickets tally in the tournament. Batting has really been a mixed bag, you never know what to get from the Stanis on a given day. Clearly, bowling is going to be their strength once again. Not much to fear from the opposition. Chris Gayle is more like a self-timed bomb, more often blowing up his own game(avg 32 vs Pak). Kieron Pollard another Gayle clone, only batting lower down the order. Middle order has time and again collapsed as seen in the games vs England and India respectively. Playing Benn, Bishoo/Miller will not be a pre-match concern for batsmen bred in these conditions. Umar Akmal has been playing the finishers role and will look to continue to deliver for his captain.

Watch out for:

Gayle Vs Afridi
Benn Vs Akmal(s)
Pollard Vs Gul

Playing in Dhaka, Windies will have fresh memories of thrashing the home team and then facing the wrath of the crowd. Pakistan will be the front-runners, playing in not so new conditions and with momentum behind them. But, if both the team look to play cricket for 100 overs we may witness yet another run-feast and the teams need to compromise with what they get. Everybody is looking forward to the first game of the quarter-finals and expect no less than a cracker of a contest.

Why South Africa should consider losing to Bangladesh

2011-03-17T05:00:00.000-07:00

World cup is almost coming alive, final few days before the business end of the tournament kick starts. Yet, we don't know which teams are likely to face each other in the knock-out phase of the world cup. South Africa are sitting pretty on top of Group B. But rest of the crew is looking to kill each other for the quarterfinals berth. England are playing West Indies at the moment in Chennai. More like a game to the death, if they lose they'll join their national football team, to leave the world cup in a hurry. A win doesn't guarantee them a spot either. So, they might win and still end up losers. After all one South African team is enough in the final eight line up. Or will they send the West Indies far far away into the... ummm west. Or a very good chance that host India will be remembered to playing perfect hosts off the field and even on it. After all "Athiti devo bhava" (Guest is God).
To experience this exciting race to the quarters, the Proteas need to do one thing right. Yes, lose to Bangladesh in the last league game for both the teams. Here, are the top excuses South Africa can use if they "manage" to lose to Bangladesh.

If anything the "Chockers" tag could never have come this handy before.
Lose one for the "fans" (and avoid the fear of being belted with stones.)
They cannot possible win 3 consecutive games without "Imran Tahir" in the side.
Blame your bowling, fielding, batting, umpires, DRS, pitch conditions, weather conditions, "Law of Averages", bench strength, mental strength or take a new leaf out of MSD's book of complaints.
Shakib has been practising hard. See video if you are that naïve :

p.s. - There have got to be bigger/better reasons to tempt the ~~Chockers~~ Proteas to lose the game with all due respect. Let us know your ideas in the comments section, best ones to be added to the post. Cheers!

My Name is Nehra and I am not Alone

2011-03-14T05:43:00.000-07:00

Ah, there's been a lot of hue and cry regarding the final over of the India-South Africa match, that Nehra bowled. People slamming the captain for opting for Nehra over Harbhajan for bowling the 50th over. Harbhajan may or may not have restricted the runs, you never know. Losing was always on the cards when Indians faltered throughout the day. Poor Nehra is being made a punching bag because the match went close(13 reqd off 6 balls). Mainly thanks to the ~~slow~~ cautious batting by Saffers. If you guys remember, Pakistan once required 6 of the last over, chasing 340+ and Nehra bowled really well India won. Again, in this match the first ball was an in-swinging yorker which unfortunately went for four. The second ball was a mighty slog by Peterson. I have compiled a list of duels where similar things happened wherein the best of bowlers got the stick treatment from unknown entities carrying a bat.

Harbhajan & Aamir – Asia Cup – Akthar got into Bhajji's nerves and he showed the anger on poor Aamir by hoicking him for a huge six.

Balaji & Akthar – India Tour of Pakistan – The hot guy of ~~India~~ Pakistan (L Balaji) went crazy and smacked Akthar over the long on boundary, broke his willow et al.

Sreesanth & Nel – India Tour South Africa – Who can forget the smooth dance moves he showed in front of Nel after that epic six.

Symcox & Srinath – Titan Cup – Trace walk to the 1990's. Symcox hit Srinath for a 6 so hard that it struck the electronic scoreboard.

Nayar & Flintoff – IPL – Freddie was the most expensive buys of that season (along with KP) and he was put to shame when Abishek Nayar sent the ball screaming to all parts of the ground.

Symcox giving it the full treatment.
© Action Photographics

"Cometh the hour, cometh the man." this was certainly not true in any of the cases if you had the ball in hand. In this T20 age of slam-bang cricket brutal hitting, slog shots, or even thick edges helping the ball to the ropes you have to cut some slack for the bowlers and eat the humble pie. For pointers even the slogan (theme song) for the 2011 world cup is "De ghuma ke" and not "Gilli uda de", its a brutal world and crowd want to see the bats do the talking. Or like MSD would aptly say, "Well of course!".

p.s. - If you guys have some upset moments that you cant seem to forget so easily, feel free to add them in the comments section. Cheers!

World Cup 2011-India Vs Bangladesh Update - Match -1

2011-02-20T00:12:00.001-08:00

   What a way to start the World Cup....Can't ask for a better treat , ain't it ? The first match of the Over Hyped tournament surely lived up to its expectations. The Mirpur crowd surely got their money worth for the second time after the Maha-Opening Ceremony. Indians were on a tremendous high after acing through both their warm-up matches. Bangladeshis, on the other hand had the home advantage though, all sub-continent pitches are alike.

   No surprises in the Mirpur pitch, as always it was on the slower side . India made a couple of surprising changes. Dhoni played Virat over Raina and plugged off Fuze and played 2.5 pacers (No, Munaf is not a complete pacer). As expected, Dhoni lost the toss. Bangladesh let India bat first (Maybe , they were trying to get lucky the II time after 2007 WC). Little did the poor Shakib know what was in store. So the Revenge match went underway. Viru and Sachin took strike. They started off like a dream until Viru suddenly woke up and ran Sachin out. Then came his Jodi, Gauti who looked set and solid, but eventually crashed out. On the other hand, Sehwag was playing a very Un-Sehwag innings, ducked for bouncers and played the ball at its merit. C'mon, people don't pay to watch him like that. In came another Delhi'ite, Kohli and their partnership blossomed beautifully. They were cautious,yet attacking and kept the rate ticking. There was never a moment that Bangladesh were on top. Viru and Kohli hit tons.

   With a Himalayan (say Alps over Himalayas) target of 371, Tamim and Imrul took strike for B'desh. Sreesanth swung the ball all over the pitch and paid heavy price for it. Imrul pounced on him like a hungry lion does for its prey .Sree din't budge, he continued the same. Bangla were off to a flyer till Munaf drew first blood. From then on, it was boiler plate stuff. Spinners pegged back the scoring rate assisted by Zaks and Munaf in the later stages. B'desh ended up scoring 283/9 in their quota, which meant India won by a good margin of 87 runs, which would boost their NRR .Finally,India had the last laugh and took revenge in style.

Match Summary

India : 370/4
Sehwag 175
Kohli 100*    Shakib 1/61

Bangladesh : 283/9
Tamim 70
Shakib 55 Munaf 4/48

No prizes for guessing the Man of the Match.
P.S-Another match just got over , NZ humiliated Kenya badly at Chennai.As expected the crowd meter was almost zilch.Expecting a similar result against Lanka and Canada.

India Vs Australia - POST MORTEM REPORT #1 Warm up match

2011-02-13T13:49:00.000-08:00

  Funny thing about warm ups is that it doesn't boil enough. The players don't seem to care enough when the going is tough, the spectators who pay for their tickets are made to look like douche bags all along. Coming to this particular match, it was pre-decided the full squad will be given a chance and the brittle ones in both camps will have a day off. For a warm up match the settings were all wrong. Or so it seemed at first. The pitch at Chinnaswamy stadium, Bangalore looked like the ones we were witnessing not so long back in South Africa. Only this was not South Africa playing India at home.

   It seemed like a waste of practice game, Australia went in with Krejza in their spin armory on a track that offered a lot of bounce and his bowling was aided plenty. But most damage was done by the seamers early on. Lee, Johnson, Bollinger never made it easy for the Indians except for a certain Mr. Virender Sehwag. He seemed to batting on a typical Bengaluru wicket at the other end. Pre-match he had announced his desire to bat out 50 overs in a match to get the maximum benefit of his stroke making abilities. Almost half way into the innings it seemed Sehwag was serious. But, in the 23rd over Viru got out to Krejza after hitting a 6! No surprises. His 54(56) was the contrast in the Indian batting card. John Hastings, David Hussey picked up 2 wickets each and that should summarize how hopeless the Indians had performed. There were no demons in the pitch, neither was the bowling attack fiery. The mental block of the batsmen kept them on the back foot even when they were at the non-strikers end. Patient innings by Yusuf and contributions from no.10, 11 Ashwin & Nehra helped post a score of 214.

  The score of 215 was never going to challenge Australia in a 50 overs game. The only hope was to pick 10 wickets and do that convincingly. MSD dint have Zaheer's services to help him do that. Nehra, Munaf, Sreesanth led the pace attack on the same track where Lee and co. picked up 7. Watto and Paine went about their duty from the word go. The Indian attack had no sting, no discipline what so ever. Nehra bowled 2 overs and was then replaced by Munaf, who then bowled 2 and was later taken off. Sree at the other end picked up Watson who was going all bazookas after the Indians. Sree then, played his wild card i.e. he got into the 'Are you smarter than a 5th grader?' mode. Needless to say MSD had to rely on his spin attack for the rest of the game. The Aussies dint mind, they just steam-rolled their way to 100/1.

   This is when the Bengaluru track kind of transformed from Perth to Patna as if the aliens wanted to see a fair game. Fuze Chawla was turning the ball in every way possible, like he was playing with his XBOX game pad. From 118/1 the mighty Aussies had a windfall. When Chawla had White and Hussey in consecutive deliveries it was game on!!! Ponting was set at one end and the finish line was visible. Then capt. Dhoni brought on Bhajji, shortly then the well set Ponting was well settled in the dressing room. Punter Vs Bhajji lasted 14 balls in which 4 runs were scored and a wicket. Bhajji had his man! So, Valentine's day came early for the two love birds err.. Ricky n Bhajji. Now, the tail were facing Bhajji who had his tail up. In the 38th over the final wicket fell and Aussies were short by 38 runs.

   Australia have lots to ponder upon with their spin tackling abilities, as there will be lot more coming their way. India on the other hand escaped from the knife's edge, but their inconsistent batting form and glass like seam attack will be giving a few sleepless nights to the coach and captain to choose their world cup eleven.

Oz lose their Fuze!
© Getty Images

ICC World Cup 2011 - SWOT Analysis : NEW ZEALAND

2011-02-04T05:44:00.000-08:00

Who will stand-up and deliver for the Black Caps?

Kiwis are going to the world cup, with the worst possible form imaginable. Like your date never turned up to pick you up for the "Prom", the night you've dreamt about all your life. But, just then the door bell rings and the rest is interesting if you are a girl and totally lost. So, coming back to the cricket.. which is why you and I are here right? Something's gone horribly wrong for New Zealand in the last 12 months, they've lost the ODI series against Bangladesh(0-4), India(0-5), Pakistan(1-3*) which includes a 11 match losing streak, which brings us to having new coaches, management and even Dan the man Vettori giving up test captaincy. Vettori has announced he will give up his ODI captaincy after the WC so, where do the Kiwis go from here?
On the team selection front most notable names feature as expected with a few youngsters making a back-door entry. Selectors have opted not to take Gareth Hopkins or any back-up wicket keeper so, Baz is the only man for the job. Grant Elliot too misses the team bus where as Jacob Injury-free Oram is chosen. Considering the world cup fiesta is taking place in the sub-continent, the selectors have given Vettori a helping hand and opted for Nathan McCullum and a certain Mr. Woodcock. No kidding! Kyle Mills, Tim Southee, James Franklin the team is nicely beefed up with bowlers who can bat and vice versa.

Daniel Vettori (c), Hamish Bennett, James Franklin, Martin Guptill, Jamie How, Brendon McCullum (wk), Nathan McCullum, Kyle Mills, Jacob Oram, Jesse Ryder, Tim Southee, Scott Styris, Ross Taylor, Kane Williamson, Luke Woodcock.

Strengths:

Dictator Dan. Vettori is the key to this team, forget the current form and start afresh.
Ross Taylor & Brendon McCullum. If the team needs a new lease of life. They need it ASAP from their senior players. Rosco, Baz are hard hitting batsmen and they need to deliver more often.
All round abilities of several players will be extremely useful.

Weakness:

Kiwis opening batsmen have struggled. They've tried so many opening pairs of late that we can go on and on. Ryder and Guptill seemed to have been given the responsibility to get them good starts in batting friendly conditions.
Middle order has been very inconsistent and failed more often than not. Taylor, McCullum, How, Styris will need to show some gutsy performance.

Opportunities:

This edition of the world cup favors out of form sides like West Indies & New Zealand or even the underdogs. Once, they pass the league stage it is a knock out tournament. Kiwis should be able to get through to the quarters, from there onits just backing yourselves to win.
They did very well in the 2009 champions trophy which is a knock-out tournament. For the record, they lost in the finals to Australia or should I say Shane Watson!
Comeback man Big Jake, has taken time out from his injuries and is most likely to participate in the world cup. His batting, bowling abilities will be key to the Kiwis. In his absence James Franklin has made quite a reputation for himself. If both play along with Dictator Dan, Nathan, Mills, Southee the Kiwis tail looks more consistent than the top-order.

Threats:

The team is at a low right now any injury to their top performers will spell "doomsday" quicker than Andrew Symonds giving a radio interview.
Current set of Black Caps are brittle against quality spin attacks as we have seen recently. They face Pakistan, Sri Lanka in the league stage that wont paint a beautiful picture for them. They could try and avoid India in the Quarters.

To keep the plot short, no one is expecting much out of the Kiwis. They are the underdogs, which is reason enough to cheer them. They haven't really put on a show in big tournaments and have won just one champions trophy back in the days of Roger Twose! A decade later their cupboard is empty and talent is starting to fizzle out.

ICC World Cup 2011 - SWOT Analysis : SRI LANKA

2011-02-02T01:38:00.000-08:00

Will the Lions roar again at home?

The last team from the sub-continent to win the world cup. The last team to be in a world cup finals (and losing). The last team to beat the no.1 ODI team, Australia in Australia. The team that won the last world cup played in the sub-continent. It is easy to say, the emerald islanders know how to go about their job. They keep it simple yet, are one of the most competitive teams that has consistently done well home and away. Any team that boasts of talent in the category of Dilshan, Sangakkara, Jayawardene, Murali, Malinga cannot be made overnight. Add to that youngsters such as Tharanga, Mathews, Herath, Mendis and experienced players in Samaraweera, Fernando, Kulasekara this team has it all.
The selectors have gone all out and as expected stars of the past such as Jayasurya, Vaas have been left out keeping the team composition in mind and providing the strongest squad to win the world cup at home as it is being played in their own back yard. Although, surely they would liked to win another world cup for their fans. Only notable absentee would be Suraj Randiv who is unlucky to miss out since, Murali is playing his last world cup and with that he will retire from the ODIs as well. With Perera in, Mirando misses out and the dangerous(for kids under 6) Isuru Udana. Maybe, a back up wicket keeper could have been included but, at who's cost?

Sri Lanka squad: Kumar Sangakkara (capt & wk), Mahela Jayawardene, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Upul Tharanga, Thilan Samaraweera, Chamara Silva, Chamara Kapugedera, Angelo Mathews, Thisara Perera, Nuwan Kulasekara, Lasith Malinga, Dilhara Fernando, Muttiah Muralitharan, Ajantha Mendis, Rangana Herath

Strengths:

This team looks like no holes barred, depth in batting, variety in bowling, experience, youth et al.
Dilshan at his no-non-sense best will be tough to handle once he gets going.
Slinga-Malinga will be a handful for even the most experienced and aggressive batsmen.

Weakness:

King Kumar's captaincy has been a sinusoidal curve at best. Lots of highs and some earth shattering lows.
Like most modern day captains, Sangakkara goes to the defensive quickly. He has a potent bowling attack and needs to back his boys completely.

Opportunities:

We might have called the Paki spin attack the best in cricket at present but, with Murali back in the scheme of things, check out the Lankan spin trio "Murali + Mendis + Herath" Geez! Dilshan will be happy to get a break from bowling.
Murali will want to gift the perfect farewell present to his fans with the big one.
Upul Tharanga will want to make a strong case for his place in the ODI team and maybe push his way into the test team as well.
Angelo Mathews, has impressed one and all along with Thisara Perera will want to provide the depth in batting and back Murali-Malinga in the bowling and keep King Kumar happy.

Threats:

Possibly the only threat is that they are great starters in major tournaments and have the expected off-day when the team should be at its peak. Since the '96 WC they have been consistent in reaching semis and finals but failed to win, which will haunt them.
The bowling has enough variety in Kulasekara, Mathews, Mendis, Fernando, Perera and they need to be aware that Murali, Malinga will be their strike bowlers but, their hands need to get dirty as well. They cannot depend heavily on star power.

Ranatunga's men were like a breath of fresh air, they changed the way limited overs cricket is played. Pinch-hitters, using the field restrictions to their advantage they had a plan to defeat different opponents in different styles. Given the Power-Plays and UDRS debut during the 2011 world cup it is obvious to say that if they remain injury free, and play to their potential we can see some top-notch cricket from the islanders and most certainly Sri Lanka can win the world cup once again in the sub-continent.

ICC World Cup 2011 - SWOT Analysis : AUSTRALIA

2011-02-01T00:01:00.000-08:00

Can he get his hat-trick?

The period between 1998-2007, this team just could not do anything wrong. You could term that to be the 'GOLDEN ERA', undisputed champions of the world not just once but three consecutive world cup wins! add to that the '87 win courtesy Allan Border and his team. Well, times have changed, so have the men. The golden bunch have retired and made way to the young brigade who, have been struggling to continue the legacy. They aren't the feared opponents anymore like they were previously. They got beaten by Sri Lanka at home, burnt to Ashes by the Poms at home(Also!!). They have somehow clinched the 7 match ODI series and have avoided more humiliation. This series win might give them a moral boost as they leave to the sub-continent in a few days.
"Cometh the hour, cometh the man" in this case men, umm.. Aussies if you don't call them men. They become a totally different side during the WC tournament. Take this for example: they have been undefeated for the last 29 WC games now and its just unbelievable!! Their squad is a mixed bag really, they have taken a back-up wicket keeper unlike most teams. But, Tim Paine sitting out for Brad Haddin is a shame really. Shaun Marsh, where is he? He's in the form of his life, still a genuine opening batsman cannot make it to a world cup, is a question the selectors haven't answered. Lee + Tait = handful, expect anyone to break down or fly home. And who the hell is John Hastings, anyways???

The 15 member squad looks like this: Shane Watson, Brad Haddin (wk), Ricky Ponting (capt), Michael Clarke, Michael Hussey, David Hussey, Cameron White, Tim Paine (wk), Steven Smith, John Hastings, Mitchell Johnson, Nathan Hauritz, Brett Lee, Shaun Tait, Doug Bollinger.

STRENGTHS:

Shane Watson has been the pillar of strength for the team for quite some time now. His aggressive, yet cautious batting at the top combined with his wicket taking abilities with the ball has made him of the best all rounders in the world at present. As a result, the Australian team has looked more like Shane Watson + 10 other men on the field.
Ponting's comeback from injury should steady the wobbly middle order. If Mike Huss gets fit and makes it to the XI, it will be a totally different team then.
#1 team in the world, they might have lost the top-spot in tests but, they are very much rule the roost in the ODI's. Add to that the World Cup stage, they know how to run about their business.

WEAKNESS:

Where is the spinner in the side ?? Hauritz? Smith? Hell NO! When other teams are stacking their squads with at least a couple of front-line spinners, Cricket Australia does a reversal. The seamers such as the revived Mitch hell Johnson, Doug ginger Bollinger, Shane can do it all Watson, Brett come back from the dead Lee, Shaun has still got it Tait have done the job so far for them. Come the world cup, the team will need them even more.
Its been quite some time since the middle order contributed something useful. Clarke seems to be lost in a different world forever now. White and David Hussey haven't stepped up when needed and impressed either.

OPPORTUNITIES:

Its a make or break chance for Hauritz. He's another top-casualty in the injury list at the moment. If he doesn't make his captain happy this time, he better start looking for retirement plans PRONTO!
Its a huge stage for SPD Smith to perform. He has been sneaking away by scoring 20s and picking up a couple of wickets in the middle overs. This is the time for him to make it big and become a permanent member of the squad for at least a year or two.
Off Cricket, its a known fact Tait has had some mysterious psychological problem. Its the perfect place(India) for him to meet an Exorcist and kill the ghosts of his inconsistent past.

THREATS:

Injured Mike Huss is a big blow to the brewing problems for the Aussie mid-order. The current problem is that, their batting only 1 or 2 guys firing in a match. Sooner the problem is resolved, better for them.
They aren't the same juggernaut now, a few screws loose here & there. The team is highly dependent on the seamers for a while now, and its high time they raised their game as they have to fight it out against the top teams. Back the Aussies to do exactly that, as there is no better stage for the Aussies than the "world cup".

Never take the yellow fellows lightly. Come the mother of all competitions, they pull up their socks and play the game at their best, as it should be played. In all world cup competitions they have won 51 out of their 69 games. Ricky's side might be a mixed-bag of sorts but, it has potential to be world champs. So, will Ricky get his 3rd world cup title as captain? Something, even Clive Lloyd and the mighty Windies failed to achieve. Ozzy, Ozzy, Ozzy...

ICC World Cup 2011 - SWOT Analysis : WEST INDIES

2011-01-31T03:29:00.000-08:00

The other "Indian" team in the world cup other than the Indians of course is the West Indies. Gosh!! that was as lame as I can get. They are two time world champions, hard to believe from the current state in which they are, it seems as a completely different dimensional world where the Windies were once indomitable. With game changers like Gayle, Chanderpaul, Sarwan, Pollard, Bravo(s) they still are a team no one is likely to take lightly. Darren Sammy once again leads this side, and hopefully the contract problems will not rise up again till the world cup is over. Selectors have gone for spinning options in Miller, Benn and provide some teeth to the attack with Roach, Rampaul, Rusell who will be joined by captain Sammy, Pollard, Bravo and perhaps Gayle. There is balance to this team but notable names like Edwards, Taylor are missing who can make impact immediately. Carlton Baugh's selection is debatable.

West Indies squad: Darren Sammy (capt), Chris Gayle, Dwayne Bravo, Darren Bravo, Kieron Pollard, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Devon Smith, Sulieman Benn, Nikita Miller, Carlton Baugh (wk), Andre Rusell, Ravi Rampaul, Kemar Roach, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Adrian Barath.

Strenghts:

"Gayle Force". No team would like to be the one on the receiving end.
"Kieron Pollard". The man can tonk the ball some distance and we shall let his bat do the talking.
"Batting". The batting finally looks to be coming around with all holes being plugged and Sarwan, Chanderpaul's experience will be mightly useful in sub-continent conditions a.k.a. batting pitches.

Weakness:

"Team" game. Whether they play as a united team or as individuals who impress is a bother for many.
"Consistency". The only consistency this team has showed us recently, is the lack of positive results.

Opportunities:

Darren Bravo, who has impressed cricket followers all over will be keen to cement his place at no.3, despite the return of Sarwan and the rock solid Chanderpaul.
Benn n Miller will have a task up their sleeves to help the side win games and get the ball rolling or rather spinning.

Threats:

The Windies have not played top-notch cricket for a while, and it shows with their current rating of 8 in the ICC ODI ratings. They don't need just one big knock from Gayle but, a consistent show to take them all the way and re-live their glorious past.

They are placed in the Group B, along with hosts India, Bangladesh and top teams South Africa, England. The Windies are very much capable to make the cut to the Quarters, it remains to be seen whether they overcome their internal issues and play as the team that they're capable of.

ICC World Cup 2011 - SWOT Analysis : PAKISTAN

2011-01-23T03:59:00.000-08:00

Even God can't predict the outcome of the match, when Pakistan is playing. They can thrash Goliath convincingly and get whacked by David at the same time . Entertainment is guaranteed when the team is on the field and nowadays, off the field issues have overshadowed their on-field performance. Fitness issues , disciplinary issues have haunted the team for long. PCB is the most active board among all the countries as they are always in action.This country has tonnes and tonnes of talent and its a sad to see players falling prey to unethical issues. Keeping them aside, the board has finally decided the final 15 but the captain hasn't been announced. Wonder what's the issue with them again! The bowling attack looks strong, would have liked to see Md. Sami. The batting has just been pieces put together, Md. Yusuf again left out and no genuine opener as well. There is Younis, Misbah, to provide the solidity followed by Umar Akmal who has impressed one and all with his sheer talent, and then there are Afridi, Razzaq to go bezerk. So the final 15 looks like this :

Shahid Afridi, Misbah-ul-Haq, Mohammad Hafeez, Kamran Akmal (wk), Younis Khan, Asad Shafiq, Umar Akmal, Abdul Razzaq, Abdur Rehman, Saeed Ajmal, Shoaib Akhtar, Umar Gul, Wahab Riaz, Sohail Tanvir, Ahmed Shehzad.

STRENGTHS:

The team is a good mixture of experience and youth.
Their bowling has always been their strength and this time its not a different story either . They have a good vareity of pace and probably the strongest spin attack at present.
Razzaq and Afridi.Period.
Very well aware of the sub-continent pitches.

WEAKNESS:

Their strengths can prove to be the weakness too, you never know.
In the sub-continent teams will depend heavily on the start the openers provide. In Hafeez and Kamran this doesn't seem to be a confident bet in any circumstance.
They have showed enough faith on Kamran Akmal and he has flopped big time behind the wickets. Lack of a backup might hurt them. Only, backup being the other Akmal donning the gloves.

OPPORTUNITIES:

Misbah might be handed over the captaincy from Boom Boom Afridi, and its a very good opportunity for him to lead the team .
Return of Tanvir, seems to be positive. Most players take a while in understanding his variations.
Saeed Ajmal is one of the best spinners at the moment. Add to that Afridi, Hafeez and Rehman will make life miserable for most batsmen in spin friendly conditions. Gul is almost always at his miserly best.

THREATS:

Shoaib Akhtar. Period.
Who's the captain??? Less than 4 weeks away from the WC and the team doesn't know who's going to lead them.
Hate to say this, with MATCH FIXING and player controversies it will be difficult for this Pakistani team to focus on the game. Hopefully, they finish the tournament without any black marks.

This team has all the requirements to make it to the top. With Pakistan you can never predict anything. So, we zip our mouths and wait for time to say if they are good enough or not .

ICC World Cup 2011 - SWOT Analysis : ENGLAND

2011-01-20T06:50:00.000-08:00

©Getty Images

The team thats going *goo goo gaa gaa* over everything at the moment (well thats not exactly a new feature). Current T20 champions of the world and the team holding "The Ashes", wow! By current achievements they are undoubtedly a force to reckon with.

World Cup Squad: Andrew Strauss©(capt), James Anderson, Ian Bell, Tim Bresnan, Stuart Broad, Paul Collingwood, Eoin Morgan, Kevin Pietersen, Matt Prior(wk), Ajmal Shahzad, Graeme Swann, James Tredwell, Jonathan Trott, Luke Wright, Michael Yardy

First look at the team and they have gone in with Swann and Yardy to do the job and Tredwell who really is not even par with the boys who bowl spin in the maidaans of Mumbai. No Adil Rashid here, no Samit Patel, if I may add Monty Panesar either. C'mon!! the world cup is in the sub-continent, as if they had nothing between their ears. The wicket-keeper's slot has been given to Matt Prior and no back-up which means Davies and Kieswetter get the axe. Which just makes no sense to me, with Prior's inability to play in slow, low tracks as we have witnessed earlier. But, the coach Andy Flower who once one of the best players of spin (in any condition) and a WK himself has backed Prior with the duty. Remember, "Coach knows best". So, lets leave it there. In the batting department most slots were taken on merit but, in a tournament as long and hectic such as the World Cup there is no real bench strength to this England batting. More on this as we proceed.

Strengths:

The team is on a absolute high at the moment. Ask them to fight against the Spartans, heck they'd think they can do anything and pull it off.
Swann should be able to bowl 10 tight in the spin friendly conditions and reap rewards.
Eoin the Morganator. Period. Is there a better finisher in the game today?

Weakness:

Absence of a genuine opener shows that Luke Wright is most likely to open the batting with capt. Strauss or maybe Prior will be given the role. Will this move really click?
Yardy is alright in small bursts but, Tredwell, KP who ever gets to bowl the onus is on the opposition to lose it from here.

Opportunities:

Perhaps, one last opportunity for Paul Collingwood to do what most Englishmen have failed.
Seam trio of Anderson, Broad, Bresnan would like to prove that they can perform and deliver even in sub-continent conditions.
Ian Bell, his midas touch during the Ashes will give him a chance to make a strong shout for a permanent role in the ODI team. Are you reading this, Jonathan Trott?

Threats:

No real threat to this England team. As I said they could fight the Spartans, Hercules and Zeus together thinking they can beat them.
Choosing XI from this squad of XV shows they have the men for the job. But, what in case there are set backs, injuries or complete loss of form(which the English are renowned for).

England have not been the best tourists to the sub-continent. 'Co-host' India, 'home for most Englishmen' South Africa, 'you never know which' West Indies, the 'not such a push over' Bangladesh, and their 'not very friendly neighbours' Ireland, Netherlands are in the same group, four of whom will proceed. The competition is right up there, if they can keep Swanny, KP, Jimmy and their "Twitter" accounts in check, you never know this team might just be the history in the making. Winner takes all!!!

ICC World Cup 2011 - SWOT Analysis : SOUTH AFRICA

2011-01-19T11:14:00.000-08:00

The South African Cricket Board announced its WC Squad couple of days back. Except for a couple of surprises it was more or less the squad which everybody expected.

The final squad looks like this :

Graeme Smith (Capt), Hashim Amla, Johan Botha, AB de Villiers (WK), JP Duminy, Faf du Plessis, Colin Ingram, Jacques Kallis, Morne Morkel, Wayne Parnell, Robin Peterson, Dale Steyn, Imran Tahir, Lonwabo Tsotsobe, Morne van Wyk (WK)

From the looks , it can be said that the team has beefed up their squad with all round bowling attack, getting off their conventional single dimensional pace attack. They are most likely to play 1 spinner + 3 pacers + Kallis. Maybe, at the Lankan grounds, where there isn't even an iota of help for pacers, they will go for 2 spinners + 2 pacers + Kallis. Their batting has looked consistent, though their middle order has wobbled without their 'Anchor-man' Kallis. Duminy has looked a lot better recently, his services will be key in the world cup. The inclusion of Peterson over Albie Morkel is definitely debatable. Both of them haven't proved themselves in the Int'l circuit in the recent past but, Morkel can be good with the bat comparatively. Dropping Mark Boucher was expected .

STRENGTHS:

The Awesome Twosome combo of Dale Steyn and Morne Morkel. Irrespective of the pitch and weather conditions, they are fatal.
Their batting is strong with Kallis coming back. Smith, Amla, Kallis, ABD are the Fantastic Four of SA now .

WEAKNESS:

They come along the tag of .. you know it .. "CHOKERS".
The spin department is very inexperienced and chances of getting the 'STICK' treatment is more if they don't adapt to the conditions.
They lack a power hitter at No.7. Faf du is expected to fill in that position and he doesn't look like a slogger. This is where Albie Morkel could have been handy.

OPPORTUNITIES:

They definitely possess a squad combined with experience and young legs and this is the time for them to lose their ~~CHOKERS~~ status.
Imran Tahir. Will he? Won't he? Period.

THREATS:

Most of their star players(Smith, Kallis, etc) are prone to injuries .Their loss might dent the team big time .
Their batting can be exposed while playing quality spin. Most of the teams possess a front-line spinner and playing in the sub-continent will definitely test their batting abilities.
Spin will be key in this world cup, the Proteas have heavily backed Botha to be their no.1 man for the job, the third seamer be it Tsotsobe or Parnell dint have much success during their last tour to India. Adapting to sub-continent conditions will be high on their agenda.

The team looks pretty competitive on paper and the same team pretty well when they toured the sub-continent. As Duncan Fletcher said, they are a team which can definitely make it till the end this time . They should hope that the LADY LUCK is with them and DUCKWORTH & LEWIS far away .

ICC World Cup 2011 - SWOT Analysis : INDIA

2011-01-17T03:53:00.000-08:00

Here at Wah! Cricket we predicted the selection of Indian squad for the upcoming cricket fiesta. And this is how the team selection as announced by the selection committee of the B.C.C.I.
The team: MS Dhoni ©(Captain), V Sehwag (Vice-captain), Sachin Tendulkar, Gautam Gambhir, Virat Kohli, Yuvraj Singh, Suresh Raina, Yusuf Pathan, Harbhajan Singh, Zaheer Khan, Munaf Patel, Praveen Kumar, Ashish Nehra, R Ashwin, Piyush Chawla.

Instantly, when we compare it is clear that we expected 2 spinners and a back-up wicket keeper. Which is clearly not the thinking of the national team selectors . They've gone for 3 spinners and 4 seamers and beefed up the batting line-up undoubtedly. Noticable absentees include Pragyan Ojha and Rohit Sharma. The latter was not really a contender considering India has rarely played all the seniors in ODIs in the last 12-15 months. Pragyan Ojha probably the most unlucky member, considering 3 spinners were picked and Piyush Chawla and R.Ashwin got the nod ahead of him.

Strengths:

The selectors have gone all out and picked a healthy combo of youth and experience.
The depth in batting should make it one of the title contenders quite easily.
Home conditions should suit the Indian team.

Weakness:

The team has a lot of consistency issues be it with the bat or ball.
Absence of back-up for MSD might go on to hurt the team combination.
Since the team was giving chances to many young players throughout 2010 the team composition and batting order will be a head-ache for the management.

Opportunities:

Virat Kohli had a dream 2010 season but, he played at no.3 which is most likely going to be given to a senior member in the team. Expect Kohli to make the playing XI anyways. He has the numbers, the game, you name it.
R.Ashwin, Piyush Chawla will play key roles acting deputy to Harbhajan in the spin department. Sub-continent conditions means both spinners featuring in their first world cup will have a major role to play.

Threats:

The fitness concerns in the Indian camp don't seem to end.Everybody from the great man SRT to the Viru-Gauti jodi, ace spearhead Zak even likes of Praveen Kumar is carrying a niggle or out of action due to injury. A big name down on the eve of the match can hurt India's chances severly.
MSD will have some major choice making to do. Whether to play 2 seamers + 2 spinners or play 3 seamers + 1 spinner and rely on his part timers.
Yuvi will have his neck on the line with Kohli's consistent show in 2010. Between Yusuf and Yuvi or even a 5th bowler the team management has to make a tough call.

Despite all the set backs, the 2011 World Cup being hosted in the sub-continent is a time for festive celebrations. A certain Mr. Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar will be playing his 6th World Cup and still in search of the one missing memorabilia from his cupboard. After a short and not so sweet 2007 campaign in the West Indies for India the home conditions will be added pressure or a bonus feature only time will tell.

Wah! Cricket wishes MS Dhoni and his league of extra-ordinary gentlement "ALL THE BEST" for WC'11.

Sloshed Prediction-Indian WC'2011 squad.

2011-01-16T10:10:00.000-08:00

The big daddy of all the ODI tournaments is just round the corner and its time for their cricket board to send their best 15 to the sub-continent .The strategic,head breaking decisions must have done already and its time for all the boards to announce it in the following week. We have already done it and its time for us to announce it ;). Here's a look at the pick of the top most players from the 30 probables who shall make it to the final 15 .

OPENERS-Virender Sehwag,Sachin Tendulkar,Gautam Gambhir and Murali Vijay.

Undoubtedly,the opening pair would be Viru and Sachin with Gauti batting 1 down.Considering the recent injury to Sachin means Gambhir shall come back to open with Sehwag.We don't see Murali Vijay making the cut as there are 3 openers already.

MIDDLE ORDER- Virat Kohli,Yuvraj Singh,Rohit Sharma,Suresh Raina,Yusuf Pathan.

I think except for Rohit Sharma, everbody else shall make the cut . Rohit Sharma has't proved much in the recent times for India. Maybe , he loves playing for Deccan Chargers . Yuvi has been useful bowling his pie chuckers and his half century in the previous match made his position strong. Yusuf too has been pretty good with his bowling , though not much with his bat ,except for his blazing ton against the Kiwis at B'lore.Kohli has been in supreme touch of late . Raina, by default is in .

WICKET-KEEPERS - Mahendra-Captain Cool- Dhoni,Parthiv-Mini bullet-Patel,Wriddhiman-Buddhiman-Saha.

Nothing to say about MSD. There will be a toss up between the other two.Parthiv Patel grabbed the oppurtunity with both his hands scoring consecutive half centuries and impressive keeping , while on the other hand,Saha did not impress with keeping and batting at all. Patel's batting is flexible as he can open and also bat in the middle order.

SPINNERS - Harbhajan-Bhajji-Singh,Pragyan Ojha,Ravichandran Ashwin.

Considering the spin options which the part timers provide , the chance of 2 front-line spinners playing is very less,unless played at very slow tracks .Chances are that , only 2 spinners will be picked in the squad. Bhajji, being an offie, and the off-break options provided by Yusuf and Raina ,chances of Ojha making the cut is more . Sorry Ashwin, not this time around .

PACERS-Zaheer Khan,Praveen Kumar,Ashish Nehra,Sreesanth,Munaf Patel.

Zaheer has been the leader of the pack. No doubt about him being in the squad . Praveen Kumar has always been consistent. Ashish Nehra has been pretty good in the recent past too, although he has had his fair share of screwups.There is a stiff competiton between Sree and Munaf . Sree was excellent against the Kiwis and ofcourse , in the tests against Saffers . Munaf has been pretty consistent , picking up a wicket or two in every match . But ,we feel Sree might just sneak through.

So that is it . The 15 players have been shortlisted and this is how it looks -

1)Sehwag

2)Sachin

3)Gambhir

4)Kohli

5)Yuvraj

6)MSD

7)Raina

8)Harbhajan

9)Zaheer

10)Nehra

11)Praveen Kumar

12)Parthiv Patel

13)Sreesanth

14)Ojha

15)Yusuf Pathan

The Good Bad and the Ugly

2011-01-09T20:52:00.000-08:00

Finally ,the so claimed next BIG thing after GOD(not read as sachin here), THE IPL is back and so are we . After all the hullabaloo,player retention controversies, team owner controversies,the IPL auction took place at Bengalooru without the ex-Kingpin-Lalit K Modi. There were a few good bids and a few shocking bids . Here listed are a few bids classified as the GOOD(total value for money),Bad( a little waste of money) and Ugly ( total waste of money ).

THE GOOD

1) Davy Jacobs - One of the best buy of the auction. It was one bloody hell of a steal for $190k. High stakes were expected of him considering his form in the Champs League . He is an opening bat as well as a keeper and an outstanding captain. Chennai almost bought him before MI raised the stakes and bought him. Well done MI!

2) Kumar Sangakkara- A steal for $700k, considering the way money was thrown around. He can double up as a keeper as well as a number 3 bat. Not to forget his captaincy skills . He is a major utility player . Well done Deccan!

3) Dan'The Man'Vettori- $550k! Can u beleive it . You cant get cheaper than that even in Clearance sale . World Class All rounder. Considering the fact that the matches are gonna be played in India,SPIN is the KING!. With his late order hitting and good captaincy skills , he is surely a match winner :).Well Done RCB!

4) Shakib-Al Hasan- Yet another steal! Bangladesh Captain, who has literally revolutionized the team was picked for $425k.Yes,agreed that he is a Bangladesh cricketer , but he is the No.1 in the ICC All rounder ratings . KKR!

5) Scotty Styris and Dwayne Bravo - Two match winners , having a tough time presently , but to get them $200k, who would say NO.Good job CSK !

6)Charles Langeveldt- At $140k , he was a terrific buy . He is one of the best bowlers at death presently , though , very underrated.

THE BAD

1) Umesh Yadav - $750,000. Who the hell is he ?? Seriously . Delhi Daredevils!

2) Subramaniam Badrinath-$800,000. Kochi sensed CSK's desparation after their strategy became an open book and started chasing Badri which finally ended up at 800,000.Happy New Year Badri.

3) The Pathan Bros. - $4million. Do they even know the number of 0s in it . Let them be good players , but 4mn is almost like half the total budget . A bad buy for sure . 2.1 for Yusuf and 1.9 for Irfy , who haven't shown much promise after the first IPL season.But thanks Irfy , you made sure CSK lifted the trophy :)

THE UGLY

1) Joginder Sharma and Sudeep Tyagi- What a waste of $390,000. Period .

2) Ravindra Jadeja - What were the numbskulls even thinking ? Do they even watch T20s? For $950,000, even his parents wont buy him.

3) Saurabh Tiwary- !!SHOCKER!! . Agreed he's a young talent and all other crap,but,$1.6million for a guy who bats at 6 . The Owners must be crazy.

4) Gautham Gambhir - Maybe the KKR team weren't off the hangover while bidding for Gambhir. A record buy of 2.4million for a single dimensional,injury prone player . Even Viru would be cursing him now .

5) Mahela Jayawardene- Again a front line batsman, overpriced at $1.5million.

6) Dan Christian - Who ???? Wonder what made them bid so much for him . His stats aren't impressive . Waste of $900,000.

And few more players add up to each of the categories . But the thing which we have to look forward is , Does any team buy Saurav ' Dada' Ganguly off the auction. Overall,the teams looks good . Kochi were mindfucked and were on lookout bolwers,forgetting T20( esp. in India) is a batsman's game.Chennai went on go for the same players, which was the smartest thing to do . Keeping their faith in their players(even Jogi and Tyagi). KKR and RCB opted for a totally new look team. Mumbai Indians look like a Juggernaut on the paper. Time will tell, which owner succeeded and which owner sucked.

Sri Lanka Vs West Indies 1st Test Galle - SL Report Card

2010-11-22T22:28:00.000-08:00

Mendis caused few problems to the Windies
© Associated Press

   The Islanders returning from a successful tour down-under undoubtedly go into a home series with high expectations. Rangana Herath misses out, Mendis making yet another come back which meant Suraj Randiv continues as Sri Lanka's spin based attack now looking a lot humane. Batting nevertheless, full strength with home conditions to boost their level of confidence. A look at the Windies report card for the match over here.

Tharanga Paranavitana - 7
Played poorly in the first innings. Out after playing 53 balls for 10, second innnigs though he missed out on a well deserved century.

Tillakaratne Dilshan - 6
Out for a duck in the first innings to debutant Russell, looked lot better in the second innings with a hundred run stand for the opening wicket with Paranavitana.

Kumar Sangakkara - 6©
King Kumar had a quite game. Mainly due to watching Gayle take the game away in the first two days of play. His batting however, looked solid in the first innings. In the second innings Roach did him in. Playing just two seamers in Thushara and Prasad, should have used more of Mathews as the third seamer and perhaps Dilshan to test of Gayle.

Mahela Jayawardene - 7
Twin fifties in the match. Made sure the game dint go out of hand at any point. Definitely needed to score big and bail out the team when it needed the most. But, the rain helped them out.

Thilan Samraweera - 6
Yet another fifty for Samaraweera in Sri Lanka. The man relishes playing under home conditions. That run-out seemed to be the only way he could have been dismissed. Unfortunately, dint help his team avoid the follow-on.

Angelo Mathews - 5
Did not get much to bowl watching the Gayle was going. Batting cant say much either. Was merely playing a waiting game, trying to get Sri Lanka out of the woods. Got out and the tail was left to fight out to avoid the follow-on.

Prasanna Jayawardene - 6
Sri Lanka's man for the job behind the wickets in test matches. He did well with the bat in the first innings helping the team reach 378 miserly close to avoiding the follow-on.

Suraj Randiv - 4.5
3 wickets to his name. Dismissed Chanderpaul when he was looking to settle in his game. Got the stick treatment from Gayle. With Mendis faring better, and Herath round the corner he will need to improve his performance given he plays.

Dammika Prasad - 3
The seamers lacked soul in their performance. Without Malinga, the seam attack looked spineless. However, Sri Lanka does have some names in Kulasekara and Fernando who will be in the running for the next test. Hopefully, perform better for the team in the absence of Malinga.

Ajantha Mendis - 7
At one point when all seemed to be one-way traffic. Mendis picked up wickets and brought Sri Lanka back into the game. Picked up 6 wickets in the Windies innings at an average of 28.17 perhaps light at the end of the tunnel for the islanders.

Thilan Thushara - 3
Nothing new to be said about his match performance. Went wicketless, could reap results for the team and his captain with the new ball or the old one.

   So, thanks to a merciless innings from Gayle, contributions from the rest of the Windies batting helped them post a huge first innings score of 580. In reply, Lankans missed the fact that none of their set batsmen were able to score big and bail them out. Missing the follow-on mark by 2 runs meant, Sammy asking them to bat again. With rain eating up some playing time the home team made sure the test had no ultimate winner.

   First test clearly heavy on the bowlers with 1199 runs being scored for the loss of 24 wickets in 340 overs bowled. Should be interesting to see how things move from Galle test to the Premadasa in Colombo for the second test.

Sri Lanka Vs West Indies 1st Test Galle - WI Report Card

2010-11-21T23:41:00.000-08:00

All hail King Gayle!
© AFP

Sun, Sand, Sri Lanka. The Calypso Kings playing the Emrald Islanders at home, some sparks sure to fly! Windies are perhaps one of the few teams that have performed well in Sri Lanka and that is mainly due to "Brian Charles Lara". Lara single-handedly dented the hopes of Murali few years back when most considered Murali to be in his prime.
Pre-match the home team were expected to dominate play after a really good series down-under and lack of results for the Windies recently. Sri Lanka resting Slinga-Malinga ahead of the world cup'11 and the hectic cricket schedule. Murali has retired from test cricket, which meant the absence of these two would find an all new spine in the Lankan bowling attack. Windies under the captaincy of Sammy, ready to play for pride.

Chris Gayle - 9
Played 653 mins thats almost 11 hours of cricket in his knock of 333(half of 666 not a surprise). And not one minute in that the home crowd could complain. Runs were leaking from all corners. Played a perfect knock, in the series opener. He's not the captain but still a leader, the senior player the team looks up to. And he blasted his way, dominating the Lankan attack from ball 1. He deserved a 10 for his performance but, a minus 1 for he could have easily shattered Lara's 400 without breaking a sweat.

Adrian Barath - 6
Gave a good start to the innings. 110 runs opening stand with Gayle. Played cool with Gayle going bezerk at the other end until he was done by Randiv.

Darren Bravo - 6
Signs of BCL, sadly only signs. Has the same style and bat lift like Lara but, needs to work a lot more to improve his game. Played well with Gayle, 196 runs stand. Windies taking the game away from the islanders.

Shiv Chanderpaul - 5
5 is as good as fail for the likes of Chandepaul. Had a start, spent lot of time at the crease and then threw it away. Will be looking to redeem himself in the next test.

Brendan Nash - 6
167 runs added for the 4th wicket. Nash provided further pain to the Lankans. Who had given up all hopes of dismissing Gayle.When Nash was finally out the Windies score was 559/4.

Dwayne Bravo - 4
Failed with the bat and ball. Gayle looking for 400 needed Bravo to stay at the other end. Unfortunately Mendis was just beginning to finish things.

Carlton Baugh - 4
Cant be blamed for Gayle missing his quadrple cos, Mendis removed him soon after Bravo was dismissed. Baugh replace Ramdin behind the stumps. Nothing really impressed.

Darren Sammy - 3©
First ball duck with the bat and wicketless with the ball. Let Sri Lanka easy from 295/7 to 367/8.

Andre Russell - 4
Started brilliantly, his maiden test wicket of just his second ball that to of Dilshan! And from there on went wicketless. Enough said.

Shane Shillingford - 6
Question marks against his action already, picked 4 wickets in the first innings but, mainly the tail-end of the Lankan innings. Helped enforce the follow-on they were looking for. Struggled against the top-order batsmen who can play spin very well. Left us asking for a lot more.

Kemar Roach - 6
Bowled with pace and lots of heart. Picked up 5 wickets in the match even in conditions not favouring pace and swing. Looked the best of the seamers, throughout the match.

Pakistan Vs South Africa 1st Test Dubai : SAF Report Card

2010-11-18T22:51:00.000-08:00

Can anyone crack this nut?
© AFP

After crushing Zim without mercy and beating the Stanis in the T20s & ODIs, Proteas started favorites in the 2-match test series as well. Smith opting to go with 2 spinners in Botha and Harris along with Steyn, Morne in the pace department and Kallis to bowl his share(senior citizen quota). Clearly, Smith struggled with his 5th bowler options. But, it was the Proteas top-order that made merry in the first test against an unimpressive Pakistan bowling attack. Check how the Pakistanis fared in the match here.

Alviro Peterson - 6
Brilliant 150 run opening stand with Smith on day1. Set the mood for others coming in.

Graeme Smith - 7©
Started slowly, took his time at the crease. And by the time you knew it took the game away from the Stanis. As a captain dint use his bowling resources all that well. His decision to declare in the 2nd innings was to provide a result to the test and it almost did go very wrong for him. Bold but the bowlers lacked the skills to take wickets on a day 5 pitch. He may have used Kallis a bit more and perhaps Peterson's bowling just to test the Stanis.

Hashim Amla - 8
198 runs in the game. He's turning out to be the run-machine Proteas would have dreamed to replace Kallis at the no.3 slot. Runs in limited overs has helped his confidence overflow with aggression. Tendulkar, Ponting, Sehwag loyalists beware!

Jacques Kallis - 7.5
208 runs in the game. Played the Pakistani spinners with ease.Dominated the old-school style caution with aggression.

AB De Villiers - 4
Had a game to forget. Got out in the 1st innings when Gul, Rehman just pulled things back for Pakistan. Dint get to bat in the 2nd innings.

Ashwell Prince - 4
Had the same fate as that of De Villiers.

Mark Boucher - 5
Dint flourish with the bat. Was neat behind the stumps.

Johan Botha - 5
Got into the Pakistani middle order in the 1st innings getting 3 wickets. Failed to do so in the 2nd innnigs.

Paul Harris - 4.5
Picked up just 2 wickets in the game bowling 56 overs! But dint leak runs at a miserly rpo of 1.86 for the match. Ideally Smith would like the wickets column show some life.

Dale Steyn - 5.5
Bowled well but, could not finish the job for his captain. The Stanis played him very cautiously infact, in the Pakistani 2nd innings Misbah faced Steyn for 34 deliveries scoring zilch!

Morne Morkel - 6.5
Stuck to the task and earned a well deserved 5fer in the 1st innings. However, couldn't repeat the performance in the 2nd innings and Pakistan played it easy.

Pakistan Vs South Africa 1st Test Dubai : Pak Report Card

2010-11-17T23:41:00.000-08:00

Younis along with captain Misbah and Azhar helped save the game for Pakistan
© AFP

Once again Pakistan playing a home series away from home. But, better than playing in England I'm guessing. So, the Mid-East serving up as home conditions. Not completely unfair I guess. The T20's were a one-sided affair. Saffers beating Stanis quite comfortably 2-0. The ODIs however were a completely different tale altogether. Some really closely fought games but, Saffers clinching it in the end 3-2. Almost felt sorry for Pakistan and then Haider mania caught the world napping. Lesser we speak on that the better. So time for the test matches and enter a new captain for Pakistan, come-back kid Misbah-ul-Haq. Also Taufeeq Umar, Younis Khan returning and Hafeez getting a test call after consistent performances in the LOIs. MoYo again unfit so left out of the side.

For a team that's been in the news for all the wrong reasons and too many at that, to come and play good competitive cricket is a treat. We know how passionate the Stanis are when it comes to sports like hockey and cricket. From being in no-man's land to almost winning the test thanks to Graeme Smith, this test had it all.

Mohammed Hafeez - 6
A hundred run opening stand on come back with Taufeeq. Gritty 34 in the second innings as well. Looked solid with the bat. Misbah however, dint use him effectively with the ball.

Taufeeq Umar - 5.5
Good comeback.Struggled against pace of Steyn and Morkel. Was keen to fight it out there.

Azhar Ali - 6.5
50+ scores in both innings. Deserved a ton atleast. His innnings set the tone to the Pakistani fight back.

Younis Khan - 6.5
Spent valuable time at the crease on come back. Gritty ton in the second innings made sure any signs of collapse is averted. Could have taken the attack towards the end against the tired Proteas' attack. (-1)

Misbah-ul-Haq-6©
Good knock in the second innings after a forgettable first innngs failure. Captaincy still very unimaginative. Having 7 wickets in hand should have put more pressure on the Proteas.

Umar Akmal - 4
Had a poor outing, out for just 4 in the first innings and dint get a chance in the second.

Adnan Akmal - 4
Another Akmal, another wicket keeper for Pakistan. Not very impressicve with the gloves or the bat. Got the job done on debut.

Adbur Rehman - 5
Got 4 wickets in the match from 68 overs a S.R. of 102 per wkt. Can do better.

Umar Gul - 5
3 wickets in the first innings and wicketless in the second. Struggled to make any in-roads for his captain being the strike bowler.

Wahab Riaz - 4
2 big wickets of Smith and Amla. Both looking good for long innings. Then got injured and increased the tension for Misbah.

Saeed Ajmal - 4
Bowled plenty of overs, just 3 wickets in the match. Din't trouble any of the top-order batsmen.

ICC Awards 2010

2010-10-06T07:04:00.000-07:00

    Yet another gala nite organised by the ICC or was it, the 2010 ICC Awards had the makings of a special kind. The sheer emergence of India as the no.1 test playing nation and some super performances had seen Sachin, Sehwag dominate the nomination list for the top honors. So was 2010 gonna be the year when Sachin was finally receiving something new, after he has claimed several man of the match/series honors across the lengths of his playing career, apart from that the top honor he received from the state and central government, the wax statue at Madame Tussads and most recently the the honorary rank of Group Captain by the Indian Air Force. Ah! the list can go on... So, easy to say the focus of the awards nite was certainly the little master.

   Dutchman Ryan Ten Doeschate won the associate player of the year hands down. England's 21 year old, 6 ft 7 in fast bowler Steven Finn was named the Emerging player of the year, ahead of the likes of Umar Akmal and Angelo Mathews. It was surprise indeed. T20 performance of the year was a close one with two big knocks from Mahela Jayawardene and a match winning effort from Mike Hussey but, it was Baz who stole the honor for his whirlwind knock against the aussies. The Kiwis took the Spirit of cricket award, where I felt the Lankans deserved to have played India so so so many times their spirit needs to be applauded the most. Umpire Aleem Dar won the Simon Taufel award of the year, and Billy Bowden dint even get a nomination. Sachin bagged the people's choice award needless to say.

ODI team of the year : Ponting©, Tendulkar, Shane Watson, Michael Hussey, de Villiers, Paul Collingwood, Dhoni, Daniel Vettori, Stuart Broad, Bollinger and Ryan Harris.

Test team of the year: Dhoni©, Sehwag, Kumar Sangakkara, Graeme Swann, Tendulkar, Hashim Amla, Simon Katich, Dale Steyn, Jacques Kallis, James Anderson and Doug Bollinger.

   AB De Villiers won the ODI player of the year after scoring 855 runs @ an average of 71.25. phew! Virender Sehwag took home the Test player of the year honor with 1282 runs to his name and figures that will blow your mind. Shelley Nitschke was named the women cricketer of the year. So, with 2 big awards already out of the way Sachin had the biggest baddest award left to fight for. So, it was Sachin, Sehwag, Swann and Amla fighting for the top honor of the nite and Sachin swept it and made it one more happy moment for the millions of Sachin fans. Another feather added to the humble man's cap. Take a bow!

The Winners:

Associate Player of the Year - Ryan ten Doeschate (Netherlands)
Emerging Player of the Year - Steven Finn (England)

People's choice award- Sachin Tendulkar (India)
Spirit of Cricket Award - New Zealand
Umpire of the Year - Aleem Dar (Pakistan)

T20 performance of the year- Brendon Mc Cullum - ( 116* v Australia.)

ODI player of the Year - AB De Villiers (South Africa) 855 runs, 71.25 avg, 103.38 S.R., 4 100's
Test player of the Year - Virender Sehwag (India) 1282 runs, 85.46 avg, 97.34 S.R., 6 100's, highest score - 293

Women's Cricketer of the Year - Shelley Nitschke ( Australia)
Cricketer of the Year - Sachin Tendulkar (India) 1828 runs, 9 100's (Tests + ODIs)

Australia tour of India '10 - Test Squad announced

2010-09-20T04:25:00.000-07:00

Following multiple attacks on Indians down-under which were claimed as a "friendly bash" by the Aussie govt. and described as "racist attack" by the Indie counterparts, which then led to Emraan Hashmi going ding-dong with blonde chicks in his latest flick aptly titled "Crook". Now, the selection committee of the B.C.C.I. have announced no free perks to the visiting Australian team. In a very rude yet, not so shocking announcement it was cleared that Yuvraj Singh will not be a part of the Indian test team for the upcoming 2 test match series. Meaning, Chappelli and co. will have to come up with new lines at the last minute to ridicule the fitness/form of the Indian team. No more "MRF BLIMP" jokes to be poked on Yuvi. Alas.. the selectors over looked Bhajji, Zak and their ponchos! So 1-1 already.

Cheteshwar Pujara(Che) gets his maiden call up to the test squad after being in the Saurashtra NEWS radar forever. Same guy who played for KKR in the IPL, now you remember? Also, Free! Sreesanth was also named in the squad, we are now waiting for an injury update on the same. The regulars in the Indian team since 90's SRT, RD, VVS did not fail to make it either. Sehwag - Gambhir should look forward to their re-union after both being out regularly due to injuries. Captain MSD, Suresh Raina, Murali Vijay seamer Ishant and trio of spinners Bhajji, Ojha & Mishra named in the test squad. Why three spinners? No one has an answer to that one. Balanced squad I guess, 3 seamers + 3 spinners that is, if you count Bhajji as a spinner.

Notable absentees: *drums roll* Dinesh Karthik and Subu Badrinath. Aaaah! Who would have guessed?

India squad: MS Dhoni (capt. & wk), Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, VVS Laxman, Suresh Raina, Cheteshwar Pujara, M Vijay, Harbhajan Singh, Zaheer Khan, Ishant Sharma, Pragyan Ojha, Sreesanth and Amit Mishra.

Board President's XI (Vs Aus): Gautam Gambhir (capt), Shikhar Dhawan, Ajinkya Rahane, Jaidev Unadkat, Umesh Yadav, Abhinav Mukund, Cheteshwar Pujara, Virat Kohli, Wriddhiman Saha (wk), R Ashwin, Piyush Chawla, Abhimanyu Mithun, Sreesanth, Ravindra Jadeja.

Rest of India squad (Vs Mumbai): Yuvraj Singh (capt.), Abhinav Mukund, Shikhar Dhawan, Virat Kohli, S Badrinath, Saurabh Tiwary, Parthiv Patel (wk), Piyush Chawla, R Ashwin, Jaydev Unadkat, Umesh Yadav, R Vinay Kumar, Manish Pandey, Abhimanyu Mithun and Ravindra Jadeja.

Quick Updates : India Vs Sri Lanka Test #1

2010-07-22T06:05:00.000-07:00

Ah! thus we witnessed yet another Indo Lankan encounter , but this was a very special one for obvious reasons. Needing 8 wickets to reach a tally of 800 wickets, there can be only person who can be sure of making it, and rest is history now. It has taken him almost 7500 overs to get to this near impossible record. Well, this is not the only record, his record list goes on and on . The one thing which baffles me is how does Sri Lanka produce unorthodox bowlers, Murali, Mendis, Malinga and many more to come.

Getting back to the test, Sri Lanka elected to bat and the bad times started for India. Sri Lankan were milking the impotent(not literally!!) Indian bowling. Their bowling was so pathetic on day I that the rain Gods got angry and came down so hard on day II and the day was called off without a ball being bowled. At the start of day III, Ishant was at his very best and 3 wickets fell quickly. Enter Herath and Malinga , they made the bowling look miserable yet again. They sent the ball screaming to the boundary. Lankans declared at 520-8 at tea on day III. Paranavitana, Sangakkara notched centuries while Malinga and Herath scored their first international half century. MSD's captaincy skills were hitting an all time low. A draw was expected considering the strong Indian batting line up, but not to be. Unlike the Lankan innings, wickets kept falling at regular intervals, Sehwag yet again at his aggressive best scored another century and UV scored a fluent 52. But, was done in by the man of the moment, Mooorali. After yet another batting collapse, Indians were bowled out for 276 and couldn't avoid the follow on and they were batting again.

Sehwag and Gauti were removed quickly. I dont remember when Gauti had actually earned a pair in a test match. Wall and Tendlya came to the crease and steadied the ship. Dravid almost had built a great wall of India but, Malinga found cracks in it. Sachin was again a treat to watch, a river flowing smoothly which was blocked by ... once again, Malinga. Both of them put on a century partnership, and broke the record for most number of century partnerships. Indians were 5 down at the end of day IV. MSD fell early on the final day. Final day's play was all about survival for the Indian team, surprisingly none of the senior batsmen nor the captain had the game for it. Laxman along with the tailenders showed heavy resistance. Although, Laxman was more keen on getting to the non-strikers end and exposing the likes of Bhajji, Ishant, Mithun to the potent Lankan attack. Murali was made to literally plead for his 800th wicket, which was the last wicket of the Indian innings. So, with that Ojha entered the record books edging Murali to his favourite slip fielder. Indians were bolwed out for 338 and set a target of 95 . Dilshan and Paranavitana raced away to the target and won the match by 10 wickets. A fitting end to the LEGEND's career. Malinga was the obvious choice for the man of the match for denting the Indian batting line-up with his swinging yorkers and bouncers and his cracking 64(75). So Lankans lead the Micromax series 1-0 with two more to go. We will surely miss the Lankan lion, Chennai Super King, Smiling Assasin, 'Muthiah Muralitharan'.

Dhoni to enter the wedlock

2010-07-03T15:22:00.000-07:00

Yes, you heard it right . Indian Skipper M.S.Dhoni is getting married.It is with his school friend,Sakshi Rawat.They have been in an affair for a couple of years now .The date of the wedding hasn't been decided yet .Their parents thought this was the right time for them to get engaged. It MAYBE because of the rumours about Dhoni and the Indian Celeb ASIN getting closer and having an affair.So,to put off the rumors the engagement must have taken place.It was a very low profile ceremony.Raina,Bhajji and Nehra attended the function.Sakshi Rawat is a hotel management student in Aurangabad.Well, we just hope it does not become a drama like the Tennis Star Sania Mirza , who called off her engagement with her childhood friend and made one of the most brilliant decisions ,marrying Shoaib Malik. All said and done, we wish Dhoni all the best . Well,its obvious that this news may pierce the heart of his female fans.Don't worry chicks,we heard that Bhajji is single again ;)

Quick Updates : Pakistan Vs Bangladesh ODI# 5

2010-06-21T10:39:00.000-07:00

This was the fifth match of the tournaments and both the teams had nothing to lose as they were out of the finals . Only thing left to play was the the PRIDE. Pakistan made 4 changes to their side . Difficult to rememeber the names . As a matter of fact, even Boom Boom forgot the name of the replacements . How Pathetic !! Bangladesh made the best change ever possible , they dropped CrashaFool, whose brainfreeze never melts. Afridi won the toss and elected to bat without hesitating because the lighting is poor at Dambulla. Indians haven't complained about the lights yet as they havent lost a match yet . So, Pakistan were off to a blazing start with a quick fire 50(38) by S.Hasan. Farhat played patiently and notched a half century to his credit . Malik,Amin and Shafiq got out quickly without doing any damage . Enter U.Akmal & Boom Boom, Bangladesh's fielders were made mere spectators . Afridi terrorized the bowling attack .The ball went screaming to the boundaries . Akmal supported him excellently from the other end . Afridi got his first 50 in 35 balls and his next 50 in just 18 balls ! Uuh that must have hurt the Bangla Tigers . He broke Jayasuriya's world record of 270 6's in ODI . While Jaya took 440+ matches , Afridi broke it in just 295 . His knock definitely demoralized the Bangladeshis . He departed after scoring 124(60). Cameos by Razzaq and Kamran at the end propelled the score to 385.Terrific hitting ain't it ? Tamim and Kayes took strike for Bangladesh and Tamim,as usual BANG BANG BANG OUT!. Scored 34(27) and got out . Kayes and Siddique put on a P'ship which should be awarded the "THE BEST TEST PARTNERSHIP IN AN ODI". They never showed any intent of chasing down the score . They were happy rotating the singles , defending the balls . They seemed to be on a mission " COME WHAT MAY , WE ARE NOT GIVING OUR WICKETS AWAY!" and it was a perfect execution. They were so much keen on not losing wickets that they even forgot to score . Imrul Kayes scored a boring 66(110) . Siddique , never deserved a century and rightly so, got out on 97(114).Even after that , no batsman showed an intent to reduce the margin of victory . They managed to score 47 of the last overs .Not to forget Pakistan's sloppy fielding , dropped chances and missed run outs . According to Bangla, they had successfully drawn the test , but then reality is that Pakistan won by 139 runs . MOM was undoubtedly Shahid Bhai for his blitzkrieg . Right then, Pakistan however finished on III place . The next match is a rehearsal for the finals . India play Lanka in the last league match and then meet them again at the finals . Wonder, if they arent bored playing against each other for atleast half an year , every single year. :)

Match Summary

Pakistan 385/7
Afridi 124 Shafiul 3/95
Hasan 66

Bangladesh 246/5
Siddique 98 Akthar 1/22
Kayes 66

Pakistan bt Bangladesh by 139 runs.

Quick Updates : India Vs Pakistan ODI#4

2010-06-19T14:09:00.000-07:00

Phew! Its been hours since the match ended and I am yet to get over it . What a finish !! No wonder Pakistan Vs India gather so many spectators around the world . I can definitely say that Indo Pak rivalry is more than the Oz-Poms ( Cricket rivalry , No Politics here ). The rivalry was truly showcased on the field today when Gauti got hyper yet another time with Kamran 'Butter' Akmal. It reminded me of the Styris -Johnson head bang . Talking of rivalry, how can you keep Bhajji and Akthar out of the scene . Both of them were involved in an altercation just before the match ended . and There is so much patriotism involved when these two teams meet head to head . So this was the 4th match of the Asia Cup and it was a knock match for the Stanis. Pakistan won the toss and elected to bat . Imran Farhat and Salman Butt took strike . Farhat departed early . Malik and Butt steadied the ship. Butt has scored 5 of his 8 centuries against India ( Phew!!) and was looking good for another one . Both of them fell in quick succession and then wickets kept falling , though Afridi did play a cameo scoring 32(25) . It was Mr. 'Butter'Akmal 51(41) who made use of the batting power play and boosted the score . Eventually,Pakistan were bowled out for 267. It was a tricky target for India ,considering the Poor Lights @ Dambulla . Viru and Gauti opened for India . Viru was looking a fish out of the water. He was struggling to get the ball away . It was a very Un-Sehwag innings . Can you believe it , he scored 10 runs of 32 balls :O.Kohli didn't make a big either . MSD and Gauti put on yet another brilliant partnership of 98 runs . When Indians were looking to seal a comfortable victory , they lost 4 wickets for less than 40 runs , requiring 45+ of the last 5. Raina and Bhajji stole the match away from them. It was a gem of an innings from Raina. He proved that he can bat at any position. The winning shot , the six over the leg side, bought back the images of Javed Miandad and Chetan Sharma . Wonderful innings by Bhajji too , under pressure. He reiterated the fact that SINGH IS KING! Thus, Indians have successfully butt-kicked Pakistan and Bangladesh out of the series. Its India V SriLanka in the finals.

Match Summary
Pakistan 267/10 (49.3 overs)
Salman Butt 74(85) Praveen Kumar 3/53
Kamran Akmal 51(41)

India 271/7 (49.5 overs)
Gautam Gambhir 83(97) Saeed Ajmal 3/56
Mahendra Singh Dhoni 56(71)

India bt Pakistan by 3 wickets

Quick Updates : Sri Lanka Vs Bangladesh ODI#3

2010-06-18T10:33:00.000-07:00

Well, today was the III match of the Asia Cup.It was the fight of the animals , i.e Lankan Lions and Bangladeshi Tigers , at least they call it so . The result was kinda expected . Lions are better than tigers any day, isn't it ? Sangu won the toss and chose to bat first .Tharanga and Dilshan opened and were off to a blazing start (Courtesy : 70% Dilshan 30% Tharanga). Both notched up half centuries. Is there anything which Dilshan cannot do on a cricket field ? He can bat well, handy off spinner , brilliant fielder at any position, a good enough wicket keeper , can lead a side ( Won the Zimbabwe tour ) , water boy too ( Initial stages of his career :P). He is definitely any captain's dream . Today , he took the attack to the bangla bowlers right from the start . He scored a brilliant 71 of just 51 balls and headed to the pavilion . Tharanga departed soon after . The captain and ex-captain , Sangu and Jaya steadied the ship and guided the team till the slog overs stage . Mathews and Kapugedera took the baton from them and rocketed the score to 312 in 50 overs . Quite a difficult ask. As usual Tamim and Kayes took strike , and as always they lost a wicket first up. Tamim was at his own best , belting the ball to all the parts of the ground . Junaid Siddique gave him a good support . Junaid departed , with the score on 77 . Tamim completed yet another well compiled , blazing half century and joined Siddique and Kayes soon after . Nothing worth mentioning about the other batsmen.Typical Bangladeshi Wrap up.They were bowled out for 186. Dilshan was the star with the ball , picking up 3 wickets .

Tomorrow is the BIGGEST match of all.Yes , you guessed it right , INDIA Vs PAKISTAN . We Miss You GOD( read as SACHIN for the atheists :P)

Quick Updates : India Vs Bangladesh ODI#2

2010-06-16T16:53:00.000-07:00

Today was the second match of the Asia Cup,played between India and Bangladesh . Both the teams were coming out freshly after defeats . India after getting thrashed in World Cup and Zimbabweans . Bangladesh lost against the Poms,but did show some character and of course the World Cup. So the teams were eager to fight it out and find out who was the Biggest Loser. Bangladesh won the toss and chose to bat first without any hesitation . TONim Iqbal and Imrul Kayes took strike .TONim looked in quite a hurry . Post Lunch problem I guess . They started BANG BANG BANG and Out ! Within no time they reached 35 and lost Iqbal.CrashaFool was trying to stick on without going for any extravagant shot early on . Then , as expected his brain froze and got out followed by Kayes and Shakib in quick succession. Mushfiqur and Mahmudullah put on a decent partnership of 55. Now call it Dhoni's thinking or magic or luck, he bought on Viru .All hell broke loose for the Tigers. He let the ball rip and picked up 4 wickets in jus 2.5 overs . It looked like the doctors over worked on his shoulders .Indians were set a target of 168. With the present line up , you never know . Gambhir and Viru opened . Viru departed early without causing any further damage . Kohli dint do much either . Dhoni and Gambhir played sensible cricket and steered India to victory .Gambhir piled up 82 and yet and NOT OUT innings for our Indian skipper which will boost his average further . So , the blue billion stamped their authority in Dambulla. The Man of the match went to Gambhir for his sensible knock.

Look who's on the bike . Its Rohit for change . Dhoni must be angry . Look out Nohit , you may be bench warming the next match. All the best

Match Update - Pakistan Vs Srilanka

2010-06-15T14:12:00.000-07:00

The fight for the King of Cricket in Asia has started . The first match was between the ever predictable Sri Lanka and the never predictable Pakistan.This match marked the entry of the Rawalpindi Express for the n'th time and ofcourse Mr.Sania Mirza, oops Shoaib Malik.Sri Lanka won the toss and elected to bat.Murali was back into the team after getting his groin repaired ;).The SriLankan innings was yet another boring encounter.Shoaib Akthar was the star of the innings for Pakistan as he picked 3 wickets giving away 41 runs in his quota of 10.He has to definitely improve on his fitness . You could see him limping after bowling 7 odd overs. Jaya scored yet another classy half century before getting out to a bad decision. Mathews anchored the innings till the end and got a half century to his credit . Nothing else worth mentioning . Pakistan had to chase down 243, which was kinda tricky target on the snail slow Dambulla pitch. Hasan and Butt took strike for Pakistan. It seemed like they had no idea about the target . Their scoring was slower the cricket pitch. They were struggling to the bolwers away . They were in deep shit as the third wicket fell with just 32 on board after 13 overs. Enter Afridi. The match turned upside down.He started smacking the ball left right and centre.All his sixers were clean. SCREAMERS!!. He played a magical knock.It was a single man battle as the other players kept falling .

Cramps were holding him, but he kept on going . Reminded me of Fat Smith :).He deserved a century and got it in style . Finally Murali got the better of him and it ended one of the best innings of Boom Boom . It was a very mature knock.Razzaq was holding the the team after afridi's departure until Slinga Malinga came and wrapped up the innings in a jiffy. Pakistan lost by 16 runs . Malinga with his unplayable swingers and Afridi with his clean hitting were the real stars of the night :).The Man of the Match was undoubtedly Boom Boom.
Next up is the Indo-Bangla encounter.Considering the form of both the teams , I suggest the Punters to place the money on Bangladesh. Aint it Obvious! :)

P.S- 1 )Can some tell me if its Mohammed Aamer/Amir/Aamir/Ameer ?Why are the names in Pakistan so complicated ?
2) How do Umar Akmal manage to get sunscreen matching the jersey ? Is it Custom made ?:P

Trivia- Afridi successfully ran out both the brothers < Umar and Kamran Akmal>

Sourav Ganguly is a world-leading Twenty20 cricketer

2010-06-11T00:10:00.000-07:00

No, it's not a joke! According to John Stephenson, MCC's head of cricket. No pun intended but, HOW WHAT WHEN WHERE.. Exactly from which angle was John Stephenson referring to when he uttered this. In the same news, Ganguly a.k.a. Dada is going to lead the MCC team against the touring Pakistani team in a Twenty20 game to be held at Lord's near the end of june.

The MCC side also features the one & only "BCL". Yes, you guessed it. Brian Charles Lara. The three names put together for one man and the rest as they say is caribbean calypso.

Also starring are Ian Harvey, Chaminda Vaas. Going by the age trend, MCC missed Sir Boycs. Almost no one is looking forward to the game. But, Ganguly is in the news. So, have a laugh. *Cheers*

Celebrating Cricket à Trois

2010-05-25T22:40:00.000-07:00

Continuing our series on "Celebrating Cricket" here are few high adrenaline moments.

Once the grandfather clock in the English dressing room, he sure knows how to work on an appeal.

Harwood goes "Quick Gun Murugan" Style.

Unforgettable? This one sure is. Dada-giri @ Lord's.

One of the few to watch out, Md. Aamer goes ballistic every time he gets a wicket. Keeping up with the Pakistani tradition.

Gambhir seen here, living up to his name.

But, if you are more of a spiritual kind. Agarkar shows you how it's done.

Stay tuned for more only on "Wah! Cricket".

Celebrating Cricket - Continued

2010-05-24T23:52:00.000-07:00

The celebration continues, we see few CLASSICS!

The Awesome twosome! Warner man-handled.

Unforgettable moment this for KP, after English finally solved the puzzle to glory.(Get the foreign recruits to do the job)

Who can leave out Lee in celebrations.. his famous fist punches and other variations such as:

This one thanks to Achettup. (not really a celebration though, it demands its space here)

And this coming courtesy Purna, describes the feeling Sreesanth is going through personally. You can't really blame him.

But, why run when you can FLY!

Wah are not done with that, Wah will be back with more "Celebrating Cricket". Keep tuning in, till then say "Wah! Cricket".

Celebrating Cricket

2010-05-24T00:12:00.000-07:00

Wah are celebrating cricket, and what better way than the cricketers showing us how to do in ishtyle!! Weird that, ever wondered how these egoistic super-natural beings let their real selves out in the flow of things.

Exhibit A: Shahid BoOm BOom Afridi - Crickets very own SeX Symbol

C'mon Picky, I mean Ricky celebrate! U just won another trophy, rest is Ashes.

And talking of Ashes, remember when Freddie almost became Jesus!

Gayle trying to be as cool as the Lighting Bolt!

Or have you ever done the Full MONTY!

My eyes bleed with this one.

Some just let the animal in them take over.

Wah are not done with that, Wah will be back with more "Celebrating Cricket". Keep tuning in, till then say "Wah! Cricket".

Captain Cool on Fire

2010-05-14T02:41:00.000-07:00

Dhoni, is on the firing line after India's yet another disastrous performance at the ICC World T20. I don't seem to understand the fact that, why should a captain be blamed, when its a called a "TEAM" game. Isn't the whole team responsible for the loss. Finally, India showed some team work, it was not one or two guys out of form, the whole TEAM looked out of place. Agreed, Indians cant handle short stuff, but how long will they keep saying the same old stuff. It cant be said that India played badly, the opposition played exceptionally well, which made India looks like, cats on a tin roof on a HOT day. What amazes me is the fact that, just few weeks back, when Dhoni lifted the IPL, adulation reached the peak and now they have turned the other way, courtesy : MEDIA. Fitness has definitely been a major concern. After playing 14+ matches in a span of 8 weeks and flying to Carribean two days later can definitely take a toll. People may argue that even foreign players played IPL. The main difference is that not all the International players played 14 games excepting a few. The others players had enough time with them, which was not the case for Indian players. Rightly so, Gary has hit out against the players as well, saying there around 8 people who are overweight to name a few: Yuvraj 'MRF Blimp' Singh, Rohit 'can take a paunch' Sharma and Zaheer 'I may be fit' Khan. Their paunch is EXPLICIT! This has resulted in the team failing in all 3 departments of the game. The batting looked miserable facing pace, bounce, swing. The bowling attack never really attacked or even started to look like one. The fielding for so bad that Afghanistan will be proud of their efforts.

Right now, in case Dhoni is dropped, wonder who will replace him... Viru couldn't handle the pressure of Double D's and looked like fish out of water when ever the national duty has beckoned him, he will lose his implanted hair too, if he captains India once again. Gambhir, no way! Earlier, there was captaincy material in him but, post IPL3 he has shown some serious attitude problems and lacks leadership skills. Plus he doesn't know what he is speaking during the presentation. Yuvi and Bhajji, ha ha , Cricket is(was) a gentleman's game, isn't it? Raina flopped in the IPL so, lets not go there again. Only people left are PK, Zaks, Nehra which seems highly unlikely. Otherwise, Subu-Badrinath / Dinesh Karthik will have to take over the reigns. And that will only make matters worse with Srikkanth being the chairman of selectors. So its better if BCCI stick on to Dhoni rather than looking out for another lame ass.

ICC World T20 - Semi Finals Preview

2010-05-13T02:43:00.000-07:00

Alas, the semi-finals are here. Australia, England, Pakistan and Sri Lanka the final four surviving teams. Here on, the loser doesn't get another shot at the title. No more depending on results from other games. Every man for himself, rather every team must now win. The line-up suggests Sri Lanka take on England in the first of the two semi-finals and "defending champs", Pakistan face off against Australia in the other encounter.

England Vs Sri Lanka

Poms have looked very strong and only bad weather has resulted their only loss in this tournament. Form of KP, finishers in Morgan & Wright, seamers, spinners they have had it all. If there was a run the Poms ever dreamed of it would not be better than this. Facing Lnaka will be a sigh of relief for them. They need to crack the top-order early and apply pressure on the inexperienced and naive Sri Lankan line-up. Malinga-Mendis will have to be negotiated. Should play Mendis positively and as late as possible. With the Ashes still a while from now, we could have a T20 treat if the two teams Aus and Eng make it through. England clearly have the upper-hand in this encounter.

Lankans have fought hard and made it to the semi-finals once again. The semis being played in St. Lucia will give them some high. But, they are still struggling with Jayasurya's form with the bat. Batting still depends on Sangakkara, Dilshan and Jayawardene. They have dont well till now(not all at once) and would like to carry on for two more games. Malinga was been used by S'kkara in one over spells against India. Not sure if that is effective enough. Sure he got the breakthrus but, as a batsmen if Malinga goes off after bowling 6 balls I'm more than relieved. King Kumar might have to think on those terms. Mendis most likely to play against the Poms, as they haven't seen much of him. As always the islanders should give a tough fight to any opposition and on their day triumph.

Australia Vs Pakistan

Ozzies clearly ahead of the rest as far as form is concerned. Coming into the semis crushing every opponent by huge margins, Aussies would like to continue the juggernaut. Already faced Pakistan once in the competition, the Aussies were cruising at 10 r.p.o. until the last over where Aamir bowled the WWWW0W over. Nevertheless, Aus had a huge total and pushed aside any hope from the Pakis of an upset victory. The Aussie bowling attack probably the most feared at the moment. Dirty Dirk + Sloon + Itchy Mitch + Twatto and spin from SPD Smith, Pup and DJ. Batting looks top notch as well, even White Bear and Mr. Cricket have bailed out the team when Twatto, Warner, Pup, DJ miss the bullet. Champion stuff!

But, Aus will not take the defending champs lightly. No team will take Pakistan on basis of current form. They are one unpredictable side and lift their game when one least expects them to. Boom Boom Afridi the capt. in charge, leads the team on his own terms and conditions. He will take any steps that are required to win a game (read "even take a bite"). Batting however hasn't been their strength of late. Looks brittle, but with the Akmal bros., Butt, Misbah, Boom Boom, Hafeez, Razzaq there is some depth. Bowling has been the key, Ajmal Aamir leading the attack, Hafeez, Boom Boom and Razzaq/anyone who can roll his arm. But like Deccan Chargers did in IPL3 the defending champs mite just bite the dust in the semis. Or will they?

ICC World T20 - India beat Sri Lanka & make it to semis

2010-05-10T23:08:00.000-07:00

In the final game and must win situation, the Indian team did wat is the best kept secret around the world *WIN*. Batting first Ind put on 144 and then bowled 20 miserly overs giving the Lankans just 73 runs and picking 9 wickets. So, win by 71 runs means Ind go through to the semis thanks to a brilliant performance.

Now that the eves have qualified it remains to see if the "Men in Blue" follow suit. What a co-incidence?!! I dint see that coming... Honestly! They too similarly have to face the islanders in their final super 8 match and win by a margin of atleast 20 runs batting first. Not so tough huh?! Lankan men though, will not be as easy as the Lankan eves and will try India dont sneak in the semis like the Pakistanis did yesterday. Oh, yea! we told you it will happen.. Dint we?

Despite all the numbers and calculations it will depend on whether Aussies bt Windies in the final game of the super 8 stage. So, once again a billion hearts will have prayers on their lips, only strangely supporting the obnoxious Ozzies.. Ha! Its so simple, Aus bt WI and Ind crush SL and they're through. Only they have to do it now.

So, lets not shift focus from the eves, after all it is their moment. "India beat Sri Lanka and qualify for the semi-finals". Hope, we get to read this once again. Till then let me hear you say.. WAH! (one more time)

ICC World T20 - How Pakistan are better placed than India

2010-05-10T00:26:00.000-07:00

Final four games and most people don't realise that the race to the semis is still alive for all super 8 teams. It has been helped by the fact that Australia and England have been unbeaten and this in fact will be very crucial in the last few games as well. Pakistan the defending champions still have a ray of hope, and a very glossy one that! same time ex-champs India have also lost 2/2 but, are not as comfortable as Pakistan are.

So, why is Pakistan better placed than India to make it to the semis you ask.. simple "Net Run Rate" dear, the very three words MSD would pay to remove from the Englsih vocabolary. As of now Pakistan hv a NRR better than SAF, NZL who are ahead only because of points. So, all Pakistan need is a victory over SAF today and hope that England remain unbeaten in their match against the Kiwis. That should do it.. Pakistan once again from no where will go through, with the biggest baddest grin you'll ever see but cant see-see.

Meanwhile India has to think on parallel terms.. They need to pray Aussies bt host Windies and then Men in Blue go and beat Sri Lanka by a big and I mean BIG! margin. That's unlikely but, never say never.. India should be happy to be getting away from Barbados for the time being. Last game at St. Lucia where they beat Saffers should give them some positive mind-set. But Lankans wont be sad either, they can definitely play the quality of spin India is providing them. But, no Murali will definitely be a positive for Indians. So, some exciting times ahead. Lets hope the unexpected happens and we are in for a treat! Till then let me hear you say.. WAH!

ICC World T20 - Super 8 Group F preview

2010-05-07T00:35:00.000-07:00

The story in Group F of the super 8 its more likely the same. Lets have a quick look at the teams.

Australia - *Ozzy desperate for T20 success*
Ex-world champions in every format of the game. Wait a minute.. not T20! But, they did beat the defending champs quite convincingly. Got the best pace attack and use SPD Smith and Puppy Clarke as frontline spinners!
Since 2 of their 3 super 8 games are in Barbados their weak spin dept may not affect them. Look good to cruise into the semis despite the loss against Zimbabwe in the practise match and sudden slump against Bangladesh in the previous match. Hunger to win in this format is bringing the best out of them.

Wah say, "Better late than never" No.1 finish

Sri Lanka - *Lanka living in the Past*
Very well balanced side but, seems to lack the ability to give the final blow when the opposition is weak. After Sangakkara the batting looks like crockery, looks good but the cracks cant be hidden.
Lankan attack sans Moorali will make life tougher, Slinga Malinga will have too much riding on him. Dilshan, Jayawardene, Sangakkara have their task cut out. Jayasurya needs to bat higher probably no.4.

Wah say, "Surprised?" No.4 finish

India - *Incredible India*
Will have to play out of their skins to restore lost pride after the humiliation that defending champs of '07 could not go past the super 8 stage in '09. MSD will look to senior players to play with responsibility. But when Yuvi, Bhajji are among them its Dooms-day!
Nevertheless, Indian contingent looks balanced. Should be able to give a fight. The road ahead is difficult and the journey still a long one. The opening pair is still in search of some calmness, the fielding needs to lift the game. Yusuf should be tried higher in the batting order probably ahead or Yuvi at no.4.
Praveen Kumar is injured and Umesh Yadav of the Delhi Daredevils is his replacement.

Wah say, "Thou shall fight on the beaches, Thou shall fight on the cricket grounds, Thou shall fight ... Thou shall never surrender." No.2 finish

West Indies - *Curry-Bean flavour*
The home team will have the advantage of knowing the conditions but, it comes down to performance and Windies look iffy at best. Good range of allrounders available for the captain in Sammy, Bravo, Pollard and himself.
Sarwan needs to click soon. Big-Benn will be crucial and how Gayle uses him. Rampaul is better suited in the dressing room and nowhere near the field.

Wah say, "If u play the perfect host.." No.3 finish

ICC World T20 - Super 8 Group E preview

2010-05-06T06:19:00.000-07:00

When the top 8 teams are the ones playing the super 8 games expect, fire crackers! It's top-notch at its top-notch best. Very difficult to choose right now. When I say, Kiwis the only team unbeaten in this group that says it all. With bad weather and two gentlemen, Mr. Duck-worthless and Mr. Lew-ass one has to be brave and call out predictions. So, here is the Group E for you.

Pakistan - *Defending Champions*

Carrying the burden of being the best team in T20's. Losing finalists in '07 and one big step in '09. Undoubtedly expectations are high, so far have played on expected lines. They tend to be slow starters (lost to Ind in 07 & Eng in 09 in grp stage).
But, this is where Pakistan lifts their game and probably takes it to ionosphere. The Super 8's. Team has looked mixed so far. Kamran Akmal opening not my ideal choice same for Hafeez playing at crucial 1-down(no.3). Umar Akmal yet to live to expectations. Razzaq, Md. Asif left out!

Wah say, "Not this time folks." No.3 finish

New Zealand - *Kiwi Fresh*

The one team who is unaware of their own potential. Smooth sailing so far, beat Lankans in a closely fought group match. Baz Mc'Kill-em yet to fire since the aus-kiwi game(IPL included). Bro Nathan Mc'Kill-em can't seem to put a foot wrong. Bond has been getting the stick treatment too long.
With Jesse back, Rosco, Baz+Bro, Guptill, Scotty 2 hotty, Oram, Dan the man team looks good.. might give Poms a run for their money. But, the black caps wont be favorites to go the distance.

Wah say, "Bottoms-up" No. 4 finish

South Africa - *Chokers*

Not fair to call them chockers already, the side looks good but, depending on Big Jake(Kallis) for too long will hurt them. Not used spin as their weapon unlike other teams. Struggled to keep India low in their first game will want to send some strong signals to potential rivals.
Langeveldt hasn't been played.. Albie Morkel is way past his fake-prime, thats 4 overs of buffet bowling to the opposition. Gibbs warming the benches as Bosman takes all the Loot!

Wah say, "Still have time to choke" No.1 finish

England - *Pretty Poms*

Potential "Dark Horses" this year no matter how fair Stewy Broad or Eoin Morgan are. Eoin Morgan the "Deshdrohi" of the west. Rain has played bigger part than cricket has in England coming in to the super 8's.
Most likely that will continue and the Poms will be singing "Rain, Rain go away..".

Wah say, "English is a funny language." No. 2 finish

ICC World T20 - Super 8's fixtures

2010-05-04T22:45:00.000-07:00

The ICC World T20 championships moves into the Super 8's stage and here are the top 8 teams that have progressed so far:

Group E:

Pakistan
New Zealand
South Africa
England

Group F:

Australia
Sri Lanka
India
West Indies

Here's how the games are likely to be played:

May 6 - Barbados

Pakistan v England
South Africa v New Zealand

May 7 - Barbados

Australia v India
Sri Lanka v West Indies

May 8 - Barbados

Pakistan v New Zealand
England v South Africa

May 9 - Barbados

India v West Indies
Sri Lanka v Australia

May 10 - St. Lucia

Pakistan v South Africa
New Zealand v England

May 11 - St. Lucia

Sri Lanka v India
West Indies v Australia

The top 2 teams in Group E and Group F will move into the semi-finals. So, now that we are past the minnows or any possible upsets. We are in the business end of the world T20 thingy. Hoping the battles will be fierce and not affected by rain so, we don't have to swear on Mr. Duckworth and Mr. Lewis in the upcoming games.

Zimbabwe Beat Pakistan. WOW!

2010-04-29T15:46:00.000-07:00

Lo' and behold! Zimbabwe on a roll. This time its the defending champs, Pakistan! yes, you saw it right.You never know with the Stanis, they may lose to Zim and beat the top team the next day. Anyways, coming to this match, Zim piled on 143 in their 20 overs. Chigumbura was the hero again scoring 49(35). Coventry and Masakadza also chipped in with handy runs. Boom Boom was the star with the ball picking 4/24. The target seemed pretty easy but not to be .Except for Kamran Akmal, Alam and Misbah , no one even reached double digits. They were "BOWLED OUT" for 131. Prosper Utseya really prospered with the ball , picking up 4 wickets. Chigumbura cleaned up the tail, picking up 3 wickets. Mind blowing performance. Its good to seem them taking these practice matches seriously. It would be nice to see them giving a tough competition in the league matches. The advantage is they seem to have the right bowling . Slow medium pace and spin is the need of the hour and that is helping them big time. Way to go ZIM! WAH! WAH!!

In the other matches, Chokers lost to Poms and Australia butt-kicked Windward Islands. WTF!

DLF IPL - HOME TEAM

2010-04-28T23:56:00.000-07:00

Early 2008 when talks about starting the Indian Premier League were raised. The one good reason(besides stealing the limelight from ICL) was that local talent will get a platform to play with greats of the game, international exposure and opportunity to get noticed. On those lines, the 3rd season has not been disappointing as most teams realised that besides having 4 quality intl players in the team, it is very important to have 7 talented local guys, who can steal victories for them. Some teams could not get the combination right like DD and KKR where some like RCB and MI had headache with whom to bench. But, these local guys have to be the toast of the third season of DLF IPL. Here are the xi players who well truly define the term "HOME TEAM".

Naman Ojha
Murali Vijay
Tirumalasetti Suman
Faiz Fazal
Saurabh Tiwary
Ambatti Rayudu
Kedar Jadhav
Ravichandran Ashwin
Vinay Kumar
Siddharth Trivedi
Murali Kartik

No surprises for the choice of openers, both Ojha & Vijay performed 2 notches above expectations. Suman won games for DC and helped the defending champions restore pride. Fazal looked quite good in the Royals outfit. Played a very significant role in the top order. The Mumbai Indians duo of Tiwary & Rayudu probably played their best cricket together. Caused lot of problems in the opposition's game plan. Jadhav had one really good knock for the Daredevils but, there on the Double D's couldn't figure out whom to play. Ashwin opened the bowling and did some serious damage for the Chennai Super Kings. His ability to mix it up and be very unpredictable was sheer class. Dint look like a rookie was in action. Vinay Kumar bowled very well initially and later got the stick treatment. But, in parts was good. SidT also bowled within his limits but mixed it very well and reaped praise from his captain and team mates. Murali Kartik showed with his county experience and Indian conditions was very effective but, was not used all that well.

Many others impressed. Of course, there is not room for all. We pick just eleven but, here we must mention a few. Ashoke Dinda once again showed signs of a smart bowler. Old Horse, Romesh Powar was very good but lack of wickets and 2 spinners already in the list meant he was left out. Badrinath, faced lot of criticism but had few good knocks that saved CSK the blushes. Mithun Manhas, Sarabjeet Ladda, Iqbal Abdulla, M.S.Bisla, Hameet Singh showed that domestic strength is very vital for the IPL teams.

DLF IPL 3.0 - Nightmare Team

2010-04-28T02:23:00.000-07:00

When everybody is busy thinking about the IPL 3.0 Dream Team , we thought the other way and with great difficulty made a IPL 3.0 Nightmare Team. This team consists of the high profile flops of this edition of IPL. JUST THIS EDITION OF IPL! So here's the FORGETTABLE XI (4 overseas players only). This elite group of players have given nightmares to their franchisee owners, team sponsors and worst of all cricket lovers. So, sooner they are forgotten the better and they must hope this doesn't affect their value in the next player auctions.

Openers Haydos and Gilly make it to the team by default. The famous Aussie opening jodi back together like the good ol' days only not good anymore. The mongoose man showed the power of mongoose just for a match and that's it, his Mongoose died. On the other hand Gilli's koobaburra dint fly high. They played every match and failed in most of them. Next comes in Tillakaratne-Dilscoop-Dilshan. He was one of the T20 sensations, but failed to dominate this time. At no.4, its none other than our very own MRF Blimp a la UV Singh. Stripped off captaincy, no hugs from preity, etc etc.. can really demotivate any player and UV wasn't an exception. Don't worry UV, you are the captain of our side. *Cheers* Next is UV's best friend Md.Kaif. Though he dint get many chances, he would have screwed it anyways. Next is Johnny Bravo oops Dwayne Bravo. MI put in more faith in him than KiPo but he failed to grab the opportunity. His batting and bowling sucked equally. Next comes the ICL sensation, Chennai Superstars Captain, Rajagopal Sathish. Had chances to prove himself with the bat and ball, failed to capitalize. Only consolation was his fielding. Next is Lakshmipathy-C'mon Hit Me-Balaji. A pretty consistent bolwer who bowls full-toss & short wide outside off-stump at 110ks. Next is the deadly duo Ishant Sharma and R.(i).P Singh. Lesser said the better. The last player, no prizes for guessing, its Shanthakumaran Sreesanth and you all know why. This list could never be complete without him.

So here's a quick look at the team once again.

Matthew Hayden
Adam Gilchrist(wk)
Tillakaratne Dilshan
Yuvraj Singh©
Md.Kaif
Dwayne Bravo
Rajagopal Sathish
Lakshmipathy Balaji
Ishant Sharma
Rudra Pratap Singh
Shantakumaran Sreesanth

To hell with this team :)

Zimbabwe beat Australia... AGAIN!

2010-04-27T16:45:00.000-07:00

Its not the first time this is happening, a similar thing happened in SAF in the league match during the 2007 T20 WC. Brendon Taylor gave Aussies sleepless nights in the first edition. This time, the venue was Beausejour Stadium, Gros Islet, St Lucia. Aussies would have loved to take revenge against ZIM , but not to be. ZIM batted first and were rocked by OZ full throttle pace attack. 4 wickets down for 36 after 6 overs Enter Chigumbura and Craig Ervine(B/O Sean Ervine)and they countered the OZ attack excellently. Chigumbura sent the ball screaming to every part of the ground.Watson and Christian were murdered. They bowled 2 overs each and their sum of 4 overs cost 63 runs. Phew!! Chigumbura scored a rapid 76(35) and was well supported by Craig Ervine 39(30). Mitch Johnson dint disappoint his fans,he picked up 4 wickets and Lee surprisingly bowled well.Zim set a target of 173. Warner and Watto took strike. Watto's poor run in the match continued and he departed early. Warner and Clarke then got off to a flier and tables started turning when they required 42 of 18 balls. Wickets fell in desperation of runs. It all came down to the last over when they needed 13 runs. Clarke, who steering their team to victory till then,was bowled by Mpofu. Johnson was run out immediately and Lee scored only 1 run of the final delivery. That's it !Australia lost by 1 run. It was party time for the Zimbabwe guys. Its a wake up alarm for the OZ. Guess, they took the match pretty lightly and it cost them badly. Warner scored 72(49) and Clarke scored 49(42).

Lalit Modi kisses Goodbye!

2010-04-26T04:05:00.000-07:00

CSK !! All the way!!

2010-04-25T13:04:00.000-07:00

DLF IPL - GRAND FINALE

2010-04-25T03:06:00.000-07:00

DLF IPL - Wahs at War III

2010-04-21T23:57:00.000-07:00

Alright, another semis game up tonight.. After Mumbai Indians ate the Kumble pie, not to sure any of these will bother to face them in the finale. But atleast they automatically qualify for the Champions League 2010, rather than face RCB in the play-offs game. The wounded tiger is sure to give a fight for the Champions League spot. So, Kollywood takes on Tollywood in the second semi-finals at D.Y.Patil stadium home of the Mumbai Indians and also the Deccan Chargers (get the clue?). Battle is heatnig up nicely, DC coming in with 5 straight wins and CSK pulling a humdinger of a match against KxiP to qualify for the semis.

CSK

The Sooper Kings made their entry with a Bang! and thus, ended Delhi Daredevils hopes of making it to the semis. With Capt. MSD in ominous form their batting seems have got a new lease of life. Hayden problems continue. But, most teams have attacked him with a spinner at the start. Gilly might not waste his best bowler and purple cap owner Ojha so early. So, Mongoose man can expect some off-cutters from Vaas at the most. Raina, Vijay have been in great touch and undoubtedly they are the linch-pins once again.. CSK will expect a big start from the top 3. Badri's knock against the Zintans has recouped his chances in more than one ways. MSD may look to send him ahead once again. Bowling worries continue for CSK with Albie Morkel getting the STICK treatment. He's most likely to save his place as there is no Flintoff or Oram to give him competition, only Kemp who did play against KxiP but bowled just 1 over. So, MSD would most likely go for Bollinger, Morkel, Haydos, Murali. Just keep Balaji/Tyagi in the playing xi(big case of What-Else, But-IF) bowl Bollinger, Morkel, Jakati, Ashwin , Murali, Raina. But, 4 spinners is a risk and might not be taken and the batting depth lacks due to this. So, Thushara Mirando may start in place of Murali. Albie, Hayden cannot afford to disappoint once again. Win toss bat 1st à la Mumbai and score BIG! and use spinners later in the game when they are more effective.

The Chargers have literally charged their way in with 5 straight wins and look re-charged from the way they started this season. Honesty, they dint look defending champion material until, the local boys came to the party. Suman, nearly the find of this season along with the Rayudus and Tiwarys. So, in case CSK bring their spinners into play, DC should easily tackle that with their domestic strength. Mishra, Suman, Rohit. Gilly better not fall for Ashwin as that is likely on the cards.. But, a Déjà vu of last years semis should make Gilly the MVP in this game. Symonds selects himself and the batting position, whether Gilly plays Vaas or Harris will be keen or he plays both and drops Mitch Marsh is an option. Gibbs still not the 1st choice and may sit out once again. Pragyan-Purple cap-Ojha, Harmeet-fake seamer-Singh, RP-Ex-Indian team-Singh should help out Vaas/Harris who ever plays and Roy can bowl his crap as well. Marsh if playing can be useful as well. Win toss, bowl first and restrict CSK. Bowl Rohit against Hayden early in the game. Chase down the target with ease. Have defeated CSK already twice this year so should look to repeat the task. Just in case invite Trisha for the match. Cos, she supports CSK they are sure to end up as the losing side. Qualify for CLT20, defend the title against Mumbai in the finals! Period.

DLF IPL - Wahs at War II

2010-04-20T22:46:00.000-07:00

So the first of the knock-out games and a mouth watering one that promises to keep the water boiling till the very end. This is WAR! and we like to keep it that way between the bat and ball.

MI-Mumbai Indians were the favourites to win the IPL 3.0 even before it started and they haven't disappointed so far. Yes, a few hiccups here and there , but looks like its all sorted out. Questions were raised after the MI-CSK match when the wickets fell like 9 pins as soon as GOD(read SRT)retired. From then on,its been a collective effort from the batting side.Ambati-Did the Selectors notice my batting-Rayudu , Saurabh-a la MSD-Tiwary have been in good form right through the tournament. Keiron-10 ball wonder-Pollard has shown what he is capable of with the bat and ball. Duminy has found his long lost form. He is the new "Man with the golden arm", breaks important partnership. Proven and tested. Mclaren has been consistent with the ball. Coming to their bowling, its easily one of the best attacks. Zaks and Mclaren share the new ball and they hardly get hit.More importantly they uproot 1 or 2 wickets . Bhajji has been tremendous with the ball(even with the bat a couple of times). Lasith-Slinga-Malinga is easily their trump bowler with his pace, swing, variations. He is difficult to get through. I am sure he is a part of everybody's fantasy team :) Pollard is good for a 5th bowler. ~~Satish~~, Duminy can be handy too. Their fielding has been fantabulous. They are a truly 3-d team. Jaya and Bravo have been the disappointments and are likely to sit out. Dhawan may open with SRT. The toss doesn't really for this team as they have an excellent bowling to defend the target and they have an explosive batting order which can chase down any target. Thier main strategy is remove KP and Uthappa ASAP, they are ones who change gears and up the ante. Jumbo has been in terrific form too, so its better they play away Jumbo without losing wickets. Its a knock out match for both the teams. MI would want all their 3 departments to fire and fire BIG TIME. If it does happen, there's no stopping the MI.

RCB- Dr. Mallya's merry men not in a very merry mood after the last few games giving them a scare of being knocked out before the knock-out stages. But Aal izz well in the RCB camp except they now face the table toppers Mumbai Indians enroute to the grand finale. RCB might be considered the under-dogs especially after the home ground conditions being stolen from them and gifted to their semi-finals opponents. Nevertheless, RCB being the under-dogs has to be a good sign(As that's what the IPL is all abt). Team strategy should ideally be - Win toss, elect to bowl first and get Sachin early. With Sachin in the hut, half the job is done. But, don't let the likes of Tiwary, Rayudu settle getting a couple of wickets exposes the chink in Mumbai's Armour i.e. their middle order. Restrict the Mumbai Indians and then beat them all over the park with a batting order to boast. C'mon Kallis, Dravid, KP, Rosco, Robin, Kohli.. hahaha. Mumbai may have a bowling attack on the sheets as well but, expect some buffet bowling and you shall be granted. Bowling needs to be extra-tight not sure if Pankaj Singh will get another game, expect PK to be back and Jumbo, Vinay, should support Kallis & Steyn very well. The pitch will not assist pace a lot but, when you can bowl @150+ you really don't need the pitch to help you. RCB should look to get ROFL Merwe in if you ask me. That will change a lot in the match. So, Kallis, KP, Merwe & Steyn can be the 4 maximum overseas players allowed. And if everything else goes by the plan RCB would have pulled an upset victory over the Mumbai Indians.

Carribean T20 - Attention Indian Fans! Vijay replaces injured Sehwag

2010-04-20T05:41:00.000-07:00

As expected , an INDIAN player is injured. Courtesy: IPL. It is none other than the swashbuckling opener, Virender-JATMAN-Sehwag. The details of the injury is not known yet,must be the usual hamstring/ribs/shoulder injury or maybe mental disorder because of the fact that Double Ds dint make it to the semis. No prizes for guessing who flying to the Carribean to replace him, its Murali-Now you know why I scored in IPL-Vijay. Its a great oppurtunity for the guy to make a mark in T20s and thus make it to the ODIs too. The advantage for Vijay is that there are no other backup openers in the Indian Squad. So,even if he doesn't perform he still plays, but we hope it doesn't happen.Ya, we know people may say Rohit Sharma may open. Cut the Crap right now. Period. Vijay entered the test arena as a replacement for Gambhir too. Viru's loss is Vj's gain. All we can say is ALL THE BEST to VIJAY and GET WELL SOON, WE WILL ~~NOT~~ MISS YOU to VIRU. To show your love & affection send your best wishes directly to Viru @sehwagvirender.

P.S- Sehwag has injured his shoulder , now don't ask if its Left or Right :)

DLF IPL - Wahs at War

2010-04-15T04:11:00.000-07:00

Wah are at War and it aint smelling like blueberry pies. Sooper Kings take on the Double D's today in a crucial encounter. The loser is not necessarily out and the winner not surely through as we said here. But surely both teams are desperate to win and will be happy with points in the bag rather than prayers on their lips. So it is simple, go out there and win 2 games and the next 2 and be crowned champs. CSK hv a neat record against DD, now going 3-2 head to head. So, that will mentally get them ready for the challenge. For DD Viru has been at ease against CSK and Chepauk is his one of his favorites undoubtedly. So, this is what the two teams must look to do.

CSK- It should be an easy outing for the Super Kings considering their current form. Finally after several FAILED experiments, the bowling department seems to have clicked. Though not attacking , but definetely better. Batting has always been their strength. Its good to see that the batting is not dependant on Haydos. Its good to see the young Indian guns firing. Murali-I can Fkn hit DLF Max too- Vijay has been a revelation. Suresh -IPL- Raina has been the backbone of the team in all the 3 editions. MSD, you never know, when he hits, it stays hit! If one of them clicks,its PARTY TIME for CSK! Last time when these two teams met, it was a run feast at the Feroz Shah Kotla. We all got to know the reason for the MEGA HYPE for Mongoose. Double Ds scored 185, thanks to Joginder-Golden Arm- Sharma. Haydos and his pet, Mongoose murdered the DD bowlers. The problem which CSK faced in the first half is now faced by DD. Their bowling looks weak after the exit of Nannes. It still seems an area of concern. Of late, their batting seems to be breaking too. Looks like they have their IPODs on when batting, they just dont listen to their partner's call. I hope they continue this way for CSK to make full use of it. Playing in Chennai doesn't really matter to any team because they cheer for everyone, even you and me. Its more like a neutral venue. I feel CSK should stick with the same winning combo. 3 spinners and 2 pacers looks perfect . Their main strategy is to remove the openers as quickly as possible. Gambhir has looked dangerous, but he will run himself out, no worries there. Nothing much to say about the rest of the batting, maybe Karthik will try to impress the crowd. CSK should bat first, it should be a belter of a pitch, score an assload of runs. Bowlers should make sure that Viru and Warner get back to the pavillion within the powerplay and the Double D's will succumb to the pressure automatically.

DareDevils - The Double D's are in woeful form and they know it. They haven't settled into a stable team combination and the absence of Dirty Dirk is proving crucial. Play to win, has to be the plan here. Probably bringing back Dilshan into the xi will help. He has been kept away for too long one feels. McDonald was given the treatment so we hope capt.GG learnt not to bowl his happy meals, in the last few overs like Raina did earlier captaining CSK. Viru has to get going and not towards the dug-out. DK just cannot bat at no.4 that is just insane! Probably go in with Warner, Dilshan, Collingwood and Vettori will make sense and bringing in Bhatia will provide some depth. Also if Viru can bowl a couple will surely help the cause as the wicket in Chennai is sure to assist the slower bowlers. Last time around Haydos unleashed the Goose. That shouldn't happen again, getting wickets early exposes the likes of Badri, Morkel and that should help DD buckle them and strangle them. It would be a good toss to lose. But, an important game to win.

DLF IPL - How KKR are still in it

2010-04-14T04:01:00.000-07:00

48 games and the semi-finalists still not decided. What is happening here? Someone surely knew watching 56 league stage games is going to be boring as shit. But, what we have here is completely bizzare. Even Lalit Modi could not have written a better script. Only Mumbai Indians have booked their seat for the knock-outs. The rest are just are mastering the art of hara-kiri. Believe it or not, despite yday's massive loss KKR can still make it to the top 4. This is how 6 teams can end up at exact 14 points after the league stage is complete.

49th match - Rajasthan Royals v Royal Challengers Bangalore
50th match - Chennai Super Kings v Delhi Daredevils
51st match - Deccan Chargers v Kings XI Punjab
52nd match - Royal Challengers Bangalore v Mumbai Indians
53rd match - Kolkata Knight Riders v Rajasthan Royals
54th match - Kings XI Punjab v Chennai Super Kings
55th match - Delhi Daredevils v Deccan Chargers
56th match - Kolkata Knight Riders v Mumbai Indians
* teams in BOLD win

which means the points table looks like this:

MI - 18 pts
CSK - 14 pts
RCB - 14 pts
DD - 14 pts
RR - 14 pts
KKR - 14 pts
KxiP- 10 pts

**Red- already in semis
**Blue - already knocked out

So, what KKR needs now is 2 big wins. Just go out there, and kill the opposition. They have nothing to lose except lose what they are already losing. NRR will play a major part again in this years IPL. Some team is surely to end up in tears and ex-performances will flash in front of their eyes.

Also have been hearing KxiP still have a chance.. I'm sorry I don't see how that is possible. Given they win both their games they still end up at 12 points only and surely other teams will end up higher. But, they can surely try and get rid of the 8th place finish.

So, who's it gonna be? No one knows yet.. Looks like a very close race. DD look in trouble, RR look good, DC are unpredictable. Will CSK, RCB hold on in the last leg? Aaaaah... Who ever is writing this script is doing a fine job.

DLF IPL Semi Finals -The Line Up

2010-04-12T03:11:00.000-07:00

You can throw away your calculators cos I've just solved the puzzle that will lead us to the semi-finalists in a jiffy. First to remind all that the World T20 Championship starts on the 30th of April. Yes! and that plays a big role to how the IPL is going to be decided. Remember, how it all began. MSD takes a bunch of 22yr olds to South Africa on a fully-paid vacation and end up winning the T20 championship and then hell breaks lose. ICL happens and quickly Modi and his merry men introduce "IPL". Banks go broke as players mint money during auctions. Md. Kaif gets more than Ricky Ponting! People soon relate it to the perfect entertainment formula.. Bollywood+Cricket+Parties= $$$

And so, when the IPL happened again this time in SAF and soon after Ind go to England to contest as the defending champions in World T20, yea.. yea that shit. They somehow make it to the super-6 and get taste of reality w/o Viru. West fucking Indies, Chockers Saffers, even the Poms beat India. Not quite sounds like the best team in the world playing T20's. So, this time the 2 tournaments are even closer than before. So, why injure the players and go thru all the crap once again. Viru, Gauti, Raina, Yuvi, MSD they sure realise it but, they dint see me catching them red-handed.

Lets see among the IPL teams which teams will not be affected by the World T20 champs and vice versa.

DD- Viru+Gauti enough said! (add DK to that, DD semis hopes look bleak.)
CSK- MSD+Raina (Big money on these two. As we know Yuvi is pregnant. CSK will put on a fake fight.)
KxiP- Who are u kidding? They're already outta the semi's race.
KKR- Not a single Knight Rider in the Squad to West Indies. (possible semi spot)
DC- Rohit (He doesn't seem to be interested in performing for the national team prefers the 50 days a year format. Might give KKR a run for their money)
RCB- Rahul+Jumbo+Robin+Kohli+Pandey (none in the T20 team, quite easily into the semis)
RR- YPathan (Has he ever performed for Ind; even 25% of what he has done with the Royals. Semis more likely)
MI- The team solely dependent on Sachin and no one else in the radar to the West Indies (Sachin no longer plays Intl. T20's so, easily in the semis) and so, they already are.

This means the like of Yuvi, Viru, Gauti, MSD, Raina et all are going to be out of action much before you and I think they are. Which is around April 18th. Which gives them 10 days before they play the warm up games in West Indies. Period!

p.s - this post was written primarily with a batsman's perspective. That is completely fair and unbiased.

Ton Tana Ton

2010-04-08T05:17:00.000-07:00

Not so long ago we gave u this. And as Sachin would say "Go out there, get the start, reach the 50, pile on that 100." and Viru would add "don't you forget to score the triple." and here we are. It's the time to lift the bat and acknowledge the support we have had from all of you. The fire still burns and the desire to thrash some Sreesanth is more than ever. We have couple of other good stuff to share. Blokes at "World Cricket Watch" recently announced the 40 best cricket blogs around the world. No, we dint make the list but, they dint mention us in the recommendations. w00t!!

We are finally, thinking on taking the blog to newer levels and reach you all better. So, this is the official FB page on Wah! Cricket. And this is the FB group for all Wah! Cricket fans.
There's lots more in store that we are going to be busy with in the next few days. But, we'd seriously like to hear more from you, the readers, the followers, the fans, the bored visitor :) So, tell us via comments, or Facebook or Twitter what ever u feel like. As it's all happening @ Wah! Cricket.

DLF IPL - DC CSK mixed fortunes

2010-04-06T04:13:00.000-07:00

We know DC are the defending champs but look at the mess they've got themselves into. First, they don't play at Hyderabad which is the official home ground for the DCs. They end up playing their home games at Cuttack, Navi Mumbai, Nagpur and their horror run of losing home games continues. Their last home game against the Raj Royals, who have stressed on building that fortress for opposing teams when playing at home. RR have the best home games record. Mumbai Indians this season have set the same tune. So, how crucial is it playing at home and more importantly winning!

DC bowled well, played with a plan and executed it. They really needed the win to equal CSK, RR, KKR on points and fight to the semis. 159 still seemed a lil disappointing as they managed to avoid some serious beating from the hands of their old pal Yusuf-cant-play-short-stuff-Pathan who has won 4 M.O.M's in 5 games they have played. Shane-can-whack-Watson's knock helped RR post a target of 160 for the DCs. And from there DC batsmen switched their brains off. They managed to go from 137/5 to 157 all out. This with Rohit-I'm-going-to-WI-Sharma hitting 73 from 44 and not able to hit 3 runs from the last 2 deliveries and DC were all out. Only CSK could have managed to lose it from there (Remember chasing 139 against KxiP). So, their fate now looks stuck above the KxiP but, they still can make it due to weird calculations.

So, we see how did DC actually perform ala the Sooper Kings. This is what we can understand from the team's fortunes up to now:

Gilly = MSD : Capt and WK - both have come and gone, hit a few but, missed mostly. (MSD was injured in between)
Gibbs = Haydos : Both have swished the bat like Harry Porters wand, the spells seemed to backfire very often.
Rohit = Raina : Both have played some good knocks, looked curious for more but then disappointed.
VVS = Badri : Two batsmen who seemed to be in wrong place at the wrong time playing the wrong game.
Symonds = Morkel : All-rounders for their teams, never really performed to potential or previous performances.
Vaas = Murali : Both had good beginning to IPL this season, Vaas eventually ran outta gas, Murali on the way?
Ojha = Jakati : The two left-armers have picked wickets but have gone for plenty.
Rahul = Ashwin : back-up spinners hardly looked vicious in batsmen's paradise.
RP = Gony/Tyagi : Jaskaran = Balaji : Harmeet = Joginder They have been in a league on their own. No matter who is picked the result doesn't change.

CSK have recovered with Vijay clicking at the top. Murali has been resonable and with MSD back they look better placed than DC who need to win all from here and hope the others don't. Interestingly, CSK-DC have to play each other in the remaining games to come. CSK have 8 pts from 9 games and DC have 6 pts from 9 games. Just 5 matches each, its a fight to the death for each one of them. RR and RCB will their main threats, considering KKR like to goof it up when someone takes them seriously.

Innovations in English Domestic

2010-04-01T11:02:00.000-07:00

England is known for its innovations in cricket like the T20 which has revolutionized the cricket. So the much hyped Pink Ball and Night test match has become a reality . Here are a few pics of the pink ball and the night match.Hope it becomes a hit too.

Chennai Sup(CK)er Kings

2010-03-31T08:14:00.000-07:00

CSK is definitely one of the best teams in IPL. Somehow its managing to screw it up big time leaving even the cricket pundits confused. It is definitely not a team which should be at the bottom of the table. Their bowling has been pathetic, but then its the same bowling attack for 3 years now. So what is the problem?

The bowling has become more pathetic with at least 2 bowlers going for 40 runs of their quota. CSK has the weakest bowling attack of all the teams. Every team has a Fast 'Sting' bowler like Steyn for RCB, Roach for DC, Malinga for MI, Lee for KXI, Nannes for DD, Bond for KKR and Tait for RR. These are bowlers who can hit the 145ks+ consistently. Speed does help in T20 and we can see it. Albie Morkel is CSK's fastest bowler who barely touches 130. CSK's pace bowlers are Morkel, Balaji, Gony, Tyagi, Joginder Sharma, Ganapathy, Ntini, Perera & Thushara.

Morkel has been lucky ,with his pace with the new ball he should be whacked all over.
Balaji gets the right treatment every match.
Gony and Tyagi play alternate matches and its even stevens, both get creamed.
Joginder Sharma, only God knows how he makes it to the playing XI
Perera bowled 5 full-toss deliveries on his debut game, 4 were to God. Got spanked, let the game shift to Mumbai Indians. Obviously not returned to the team since.
Thushara , haven't seen much of him yet and with whatever seen ,he isnt impressive either.
Ganapathy bowled just one over, not enough to rate him.

Chennai's only saving grace has been the spin department comprising of Murali, Jakati and Ashwin
Murali is Purple Cap holder with an economy of less than 7. Period.
Jakati has been impressive with his line and length.
Ashwin has been disappointing.
All over ? wait a minute..
Makhaya'Fast bowler-converted-Joker'Ntini, where the hell is he ?
why isnt he playing ? If MSD needs a fast bowler y is he still waiting for Ginger Bollinger.
Bolly can be vicious and very useful but he too has his limits and bowls under 140k's and in Indian conditions will be a big question mark. So, y hasn't MSD tried Ntini when he had so many opportunities.. remains unanswered!

ps: more on the batting and champion-like fielding later...

Indian squad for World T20 in West Indies

2010-03-24T03:36:00.000-07:00

No it hasn't happened yet but, we look into the gloomy future ahead of the jokers running the selection panel. So, we can say "I knew that would happen...". Injuries have been the toast of IPL this season. Either it is Yuvi, Bhajji, Zak coming out of injuries or MSD, Gauti, Bhajji getting injured. So unless the BCCI share confidential fitness reports with us it will be difficult to strike the exact squad they are likely to pick. But we'll have a go at it anyway.

LIKELY SQUAD STUDY:

Certainties: MSD©, Viru, Gauti(subject to fitness), Yuvi, Raina, Bhajji, Zak, PK, Yusuf.

Hopefulls: Virat Kohli, Manish Pandey, Robin Uthappa, Dinesh Karthik, Rohit Sharma, Sudeep Tyagi, Ishant Sharma, Vinay Kumar, Pragyan Ojha, Amit Mishra, Ravindra Jadeja, Irfan Pathan & Saurabh Tiwary (both not in the announced 30 probables list)

CASE I: It seems like a choice between a specialist spinner a part time spinner and a genuine batsman from the looks of it. Gambhir's fitness will play crucial. Pandey has done well as an opener for RCB so he may benefit from the body blow to Gauti.
Ojha, Mishra have lots at stake in the their next games. One spot or maybe no spot available if selectors go with Jadu and Yusuf. Or we must pray Bhajji can pick another injury soon.

CASE II: Be-sharam Sharma(s):
Rohit Sharma probably the only notable name we are bold enough to drop courtesy Robin's innings last night against CSK. He just won the lottery! Could not have come at a better time Robin! But the tournament is a long one, Rohit is one the leading performers for DC in IPL he should just let his performance do the talking. And he can bowl better than Virat and Robin so, hopes are alive. Ishant Sharma will have to do some magic à la Robin to get back his mojo.

CASE III: The plot thickens with Irfy and Tiwary who have impressed all with their show in the IPL so far. But, whether BCCI can pick outside the 30 probables is still not clear to us.

So, under these circumstances the squad is most likely to be --> MSD©, Viru, Gauti, Yuvi, Raina, Bhajji, Zak, PK, Yusuf, Jadu/Ojha, Pandey, Kohli, Robin/Rohit, Karthik*, Tyagi, Vinay Kumar (if Irfy can't make it)

FINAL CALL: Kathik's wicket keeping ability should get him the ticket. Pandey has been a revelation, would be sorry if they left him behind. Virat has not had time in the middle thanks to the RCB top-order stealing the show but, his ODI form was good and hope selectors show faith in him. Vinay Kumar is a doubtful pick but, (with Nayar injured) playing in West Indies and as a back up seamer he has shown promise!

DLF IPL - CSK rope in Doug Bollinger

2010-03-23T03:54:00.000-07:00

Not much of a surprise, after the horrendous run chase against the Zintans, CSK have been on repair mode ever since. If you do remember a certain member of the team Jacob Oram a.k.a delicate doll was injured and ruled out from playing in the IPL this season. Following further damage caused due injuries to MSD and Kemp, CSK have roped in Doug Bollinger. Looks Santa gave them their X-mas present quite early this year. This will definitely boost their chances to make it to the knock-out stage of the tournament. Bollinger is said to join the team from Apr 1st following the aus-kiwi test series.

DLF IPL CSK-Chennai Super Krap

2010-03-22T02:43:00.000-07:00

Well, for people who believe they witnessed one of the best matches ever, I pity them. It was one of the worst matches I have ever seen. And only teaches how teams should not screw up a chase. First of all, it was a contest between a team with a poor batting and a team with a poor bowling. CSK seemed to have an upper hand as they had the momentum with them after 2 consecutive victories. Raina won the toss and elected to field, quite a good decision considering the dew factor and also the fact that KXI were playing 2 spinners.

It was quite a surprise to see Irfy opening alongside Bopara. CSK suddenly, from no where got brains and dropped Joginder Sharma. KXI kept losing wickets at regular intervals. Yuvi and Irfy showed some resistance. CSK's bowling was pretty ordinary . KXI batting was even worse. Wonder what was going through their minds.Everyone got out with poor stroke play and lack of application. If I was Md. Kaif's father/mother/wife/child I would lock him up in the dungeon for eternity. The guy should not be allwoed to hold a cricket bat ever again! It was a terrible batting display by Punjab and they managed to score 136. Moorali getting the better of his two countrymen (Sanga & Jaya) BRILLIANT!

Then the Mongoose Man and Mini bullet took strike for CSK. They were scoring briskly at a steady pace and KXI , by the looks, were all down with drooping shoulders thinking that the match was slipping away from them. But with the fall of Haydos everything seemed to slip out of CSK's grasp. First a horror run-out of the capt. Raina and then the crumble. Vijay, Badri have hardly impressed and it seems with Srikanth their chances of wearing the national cap will also disappear. Kemp injured himself with a side-strain so, he could not come in to bat as well. With Parthiv out after making his half-ton Gony made it to the crease. With just a run-a-ball reqd. all that was needed was sensible batting, pushin the ball into the gaps and giving Morkel most of the strike. But, it was not to be. Gony wanted to become Super Gony in no time and ended losing his stumps and CSK reqd 10 off the last over. Albie hit a boundary the very 1st delivery to make it 5 from 5 and then 3 from 3. Here the final twist. Ashwin hits the ball and they run 2!!! Why would you want a bowler to face the final 2 balls of a match Albie. Even if it was 2 off 2 with Albie on strike it would be the smarter choice. Alas, Irfy bowled a dot ball and Ashwin hit the final ball straight to Kaif. Match tie = SOOOPER OVER

KXI chose the rookie Juan Rusty Theron, who bowled a superb spell earlier in the game. Not looking rusty at all. so the CSK managed 1,W,2,6,W just 9!! So 10 to win for the Zintans and they got there with a slight hiccup but, when you have the quality of Yuvi, and the two Lankans in your side you are more likely to win from these situations. Had MSD been there it would have been a sight! Well played to both teams to make an interesting match out of shitty batting performances. Lalit Modi will be very pleased!

DLF IPL 3.0 Dudes to Duds

2010-03-19T07:40:00.000-07:00

The IPL is everywhere... everywhere you go, everywhere you see, and mostly everywhere you don't want it to be. Among all this hara-kiri some expected IPL heroes have disappointed. This post is dedicated to them, thanks to restore sanity and help us waste time just hoping today you will fire.

K xi P - yea, the entire team has been a tad disappointing. I'm sure the boys know it themselves.

Haydos - the Mongoose man is yet top breathe fire like he did in the previous IPL's. (this post was drafted way before Hayden tore apart the Daredevil attack and left them crying like babies. I take credit for his knock.)

Dilfan - Considering Delhi's majestic line-up. It is hard to expect a knock from each of the top5. But 0,0,17 (15 against CSK) is just hard to digest.

Yuvi - The last time he hit it was 2009!

Che Pujara - First lack of opportunity, now lack of patience from KKR.

Poppadom Smith - Yet another finger injury, end of the road for him.

Jayasurya - If he's in the team for his bowling then pardon me but, his bat has not done the tonking it promises.

AB DeVil - Was found under-par when DD needed him the most.

Sangakkara - Has not been comfortable, lacked imagination couldn't defend 200+ score! ahem..

Freefanth (Aapam choo..) - I duno why anyone has expectations from him.

Sloon Tait - Fast & Furious, all over the place.

Dada - Captaincy may have been inspiring. Still a lot left to cheer, a long way to go.

The tournament is alive, still a lot to play for. It is difficult to judge too soon. It may be too harsh on a few, DC haven't played too much so many DC players get away. Rajasthan Royals look to be getting into deeper mess with Smith, Dimi being ruled out. Martyn not performing, Lumb flopped as well. Captain Warney now is bit to follow on twitter.

DLF IPL 3.0 DareDevils tame the Zintans

2010-03-15T07:10:00.000-07:00

It's finally happening, not just the 3rd edition of the IPL and Lalit Modi shimmering in the Indian heat. But, the first ever IBIB... ummm .. Inter-Blogatic IPL Battle.

Yes, we are the latest to join the rest of the bunch . We maybe last but its God given.. cos we now support the one n only Dilli Daredevils. Oh, the joy and fulfillment bla bla bla.. as u can see i'm running short on the buzzer. Just 15 mins to go for their nxt game and I need the points secured. So, this is wat hapnd in the opening game for Delhi. Zintans bat 1st. Screw up to make a good total (it was less even on a green track). Dirk Nannes breathes fire! 4 overs 2 wkts for 12 runs! Whoz da man now !!?? Mahroof & Nannes dont allow the Kings from Punjab to build partnerships. Bopara get 56(48) Punjab end at 142. Dilshan, Viru, AB, dont seem to be interested in a low scoring match which means capt. G does the rest himself!

DD were at 45/3 and then 79/4 but,Mithun Manhas played along with his capt. not sure whether he got recognised. DK got a start too. Capt. G fined 20,000 $ for slow over-rate. 1st win and 2 points in the bag. Gr8 start to DLF IPL 3.0 Period!

IPL 3.0 DEVILS PARADISE

2010-03-11T03:02:00.000-08:00

DELHI DAREDEVILS

The only team in the league whose name and game is pure EVIL! Batting order that excites the ladies and a barrage of left arm bowlers that make any ordinary man facing wet his pants. Its quite disturbing that this mean side has not won the IPL yet. Missing out on both times in the knock-out phase. Perhaps, bcoz every member in the team seem to be on a suicide mission and is looking to hit every ball for a DLF maximum!! This has resulted in upset victories for the opponents and despite topping the table in season by a mile. One Gilly performance ended the journey for the Daredevils in the semis.

The Virender Sehwag left-arm fast bowler fetish just seems to have gone too far, they purchased yet another Lefty - Wayne (not Rooney) Parnell! Oh yea, Sehwag might not be the one leading the team but, he surely has got the men he would rather not face at the crease. Nannes will have stiff competition from Parnell, while Warner's form will be sweet poison for the Delhi team whose batting order already boasts of Sehwag, Gauti, AB DeVil, Dilshan, Karthik. Choosing the 4 foreign players may become a new concern for the team which has already kept the likes of Glenn Mc Grath, Paul Collingwood & Owais Shah on bench. They have also got in Moises Henriques from KKR in trade. No worries, no regrets as far as the squad is concerned. Champion stuff!

SQUAD:Amit Mishra, Ashish Nehra, AB de Villiers, Avishkar Salvi, David Warner, Dirk Nannes, Gautm Gambhir, Joginder Singh, Dinesh Karthik, Kedar Jadhav, Mithun Manhas, Moises Henriques, Farveez Maharoof, Pradeep Sangwan, Rajat Bhatia, Sarabjeet Ladda, Sarandeep Singh, Dilshan, Umesh Yadav, Virender Sehwag, Yo Mahesh, Wayne Parnell, Yogesh Nagar.

STRENGTH: Explosive Batting order. Captaincy of Gauti.

WEAKNESS: Success or failure is just decided by the man on the boundary. HIT or MISS strategy!

WATCH OUT FOR: Warner, Dilshan, Parnell, Nannes... we shall just stop there.

WAH'S XI:

Sehwag
Warner
Dilshan
Gauti©
DeVil
Karthik
Bahtia/Manhas
Parnell/Nannes
Mishra
Sangwan
Nehra

WAH SAY:Anything less than winning the championship will be tagged as failure. That pressure is sure to be on the players. Most likely to see Nannes & Parnell fight it out for one spot. Would have played both if Warner consistency is a question. Gauti playing lower will steady the team if needed. Overall, Excited from the looks of it. Dare to beat the Devils anyone?

p.s: Just a reminder of the famous bench-warmers the side has produced. A small tribute to those guys!

IPL 3.0 Sooper Dooper Kings

2010-03-10T22:12:00.000-08:00

Chennai Super Kings

Alas the Chennai Sooper Kings, the side that lost the championship in the inaugural season and then lost in the knock-out semis in the second season, look like they are on the downslide. They rely heavily on Aussie giant Matt Haydos and from there the problems begin. MSD has played Parthiv-mini-Patel as he is free from the wk duty that has already given him enough back issues. But this means Parthiv who can(read should) be playing lower down the order opens the batting with Hayden. If MSD is going to take IPL seriously, as equal to winning World Cup. Then he may have to strain his back a bit more and stand behind stumps and accommodate an extra bowler in place of mini Parthiv. Otherwise Parthiv has to lift his game, or bat lower down the order so, Vijay can open the batting. The CSK are marred and scarred by injuries to Jake' Oram, Al' Morkel has his line of fitness issues, Mike Huss wont be available initially. Losing Flintoff was a big blow for them. But, the replacements for Freddie and Stephen Fleming were just not enough. So now they have Justin Kemp their new recruit along with a few Lankans whom they dont miss to buy at every player auction.

CSK do look like a formidable opposition but, seriously not the top-3 in the competition. In Balaji and Gony their bowling can fall apart anytime. Add Tyagi to that, MSD will have some serious cardiac issues while fielding. Raina, Badri, Vijay should help MSD post big, bigger, biggest totals everytime so, he wont worry about the bowling too much. Ashwin, Jakati & Murali give him added tension of whom to drop and whom to play. It will take a few games initially to find the balance in the team and sort out fitness issues.

SQUAD:R Ashwin, L Balaji, C Ganapathy, MS Gony, SB Jakati, M Muralidaran, M Ntini, S Tyagi, KB Arun Karthik, S Badrinath, GJ Bailey, ML Hayden, MEK Hussey, SK Raina, M Vijay, T Thushara, JA Morkel, JDP Oram, NLTC Perera, JM Kemp, MS Dhoni, PA Patel.

STRENGTH:Hayden opening, Depth in batting.

WEAKNESS:Bowling in death overs.

WATCH OUT FOR:Lankans could well prove to be strong plus for CSK, Ganapathy, Bailey. Justin Kemp.

WAH'S XI:

Haydos
Patel*
Raina
MSD©
Albie
Badri/Vijay
Perera/Thushara
Ganapathy
Murali
Balaji
Jakati

WAH SAY: Bailey replacing Pup in the Kiwi tour mid-way will hurt CSK. Mike Huss will have to play in a cramped batting order again. I will have to stick my neck out and say CSK are most likely to miss the bus to the semis. DD, MI, RCB clear favorites right now. With KxiP, DC, CSK fighting for that final semi spot. But, dont count them out completely! Like MSD would say it "MIND IT!" Period.

Ijaz Butt & the 7 Dwarfs

2010-03-10T04:43:00.000-08:00

Well, if you thought only the Pakistan Cricket team was unpredictable,hold on! Their cricket board is a step ahead. Ijaz Butt's decision has shook the cricket team and others concerned. Agreed Paki cricket was not doing well, but its nothing new. Its been happening for ages now. Every team goes through a slump. Lets look at the fellows who faced Butt's fart..oops wrath!

1) Kamran'Butterfingers'Akmal: Well, he single-handedly won the game for Australia. He dropped catches which came his way and helped Aussies win it easily. Rs. 3 million fine and under probation.

2)Umar'Poor Acting'Akmal : He alleged to have feigned an injury in order to miss the test for his dear brother who had been dropped.He did ended up playing the match though. His mom would have been proud of this act, but not the PCB. Rs 2 million fine and under probation.

3)Shahid 'Once Bit Twice Punished'Afridi: If Adam bit the forbidden apple, our Boom Boom bhai bit the cherry umm... ball. Satan hit both of them. ICC banned him with a heavy sum and a 2 T20 match ban. Ijaz went a step higher and fined him Rs.3million and is also under probation for 6 months.

4)Rana Naved and Shoaib Malik: On disciplinary grounds. Banned for a year from the national side from all the formats of the game and a sum of 2 million.

Here's the shocker :
5) MoYo & his accomplice, Younis Khan: Final nail in the coffin for both of them. Seems their attitude let the team down. Well, I do agree in the case of Younis, who , whenever he needs, takes rest citing stress and too much cricket, when they play once in a blue-moon. He stated that 20-20 was a fun game... maybe for him! That statement surely raised a few eyebrows. Luckily, they went on to win the WCT20 else he would have been doomed long back.

Well, with T20 WC coming up shortly, I don't see it as a wise decision by the PCB. Could have checked their performance in the T20WC. With the ban of these players,the Pakistan team is like a human being with just a head and legs and nothing in between. Its gonna take a long time to come over from this disaster.

P.S: I hope WICB doesn't take it seriously and dissolve the whole team considering the way they are performing!! :)

P.P.S: All above mentioned nominations are in PKR currency - Pakistani Rupee.

IPL 3.0 Fully Charged

2010-03-08T23:30:00.000-08:00

DECCAN CHARGERS

When the Deccan Chargers ended rock bottom in the inaugural season of the IPL, it shocked quite a few how a team that had Gilchrist, Symonds & Afridi not succeed in this format. And to come from a season full of disappointments to be crowned champions in the very next premier league season is a serious achievement. They had a new skipper in Gilly new team management new team colors. As to say, they almost had a new beginning. And what a beginning that was to be. Beating the Royal Challengers Bangalore by 6 runs and becoming the 2nd under-dog team to win the champions title. The Champions League T20 was a disaster for them. Getting knocked out in the 1st round of the competition.

Citing the success Fidel Edwards had, the Chargers have roped in Kemar Roach to boost their pace attack. They have also been swift in getting the Aussie u-19 world cup winning captain and brother of Shaun Marsh, Mitchell Marsh. Whether the rookie lives up to the hype is yet to be seen. Overall, a well balanced side. Defending champs need to press their authority from the very start.

SQUAD: Tirumalasetti Suman, Herschelle Gibbs, V. V. S. Laxman, Arjun Yadav, Azhar Bilakhia, Rohit Sharma, D.B.Ravi Teja, Monish Mishra, Anirudh Singh, Adam Gilchrist, Ryan Harris, Mitchell Marsh, Dwayne Smith, Yalaka Venugopal Rao, Andrew Symonds, Ashish Reddy, B.Sumanth, R. P. Singh, Harmeet Singh, Chaminda Vaas, Kemar Roach, Pragyan Ojha, Rahul Sharma.

STRENGTHS: Gilly's batting, Gilly's leadership, Gilly.... It's all abt him here.

WEAKNESS:The part time bowling of Venu and Suman worked, may not be the case this time. Gibbs form is hit & miss.

WATCH OUT FOR:Mitchell Marsh the new boy from down-under. Kemar Roach's deadly few. Roy will wanna prove he's still among the best in the world.

WAH'S XI:

Gilly©
VVS/Gibbs
Rohit
Symonds
Venu
Suman
Azhar
Harmeet/Harris
Ojha
RP Singh
Roach

WAH SAY: Ideally will want to try Mitchell Marsh opening with Gilly. If that fails there is always VVS solid as ever lost in the world of just 20 overs a side. Gibbs form should get him a ticket into the playing xi. The defending champs have to lift their game as all other sides have boosted their camps with some ICL recruits. The domestic strength still a worry. Looking good nevertheless.

Wah! Cricket

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IPL Season 4 - Group A Preview

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ICC World Cup 2011 - Grand Finale : India Vs Sri Lanka

ICC World Cup 2011 - Semi Finals 2: India Vs Pakistan

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ICC World Cup 2011 - Quarter Finals 4: Sri Lanka Vs England

ICC World Cup 2011 - Quarter Finals 3: South Africa Vs New Zealand

ICC World Cup 2011 - Quarter Finals 2: India Vs Australia

ICC World Cup 2011 - Quarter Finals 1: Pakistan Vs West Indies

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ICC World Cup 2011 - SWOT Analysis : SRI LANKA

ICC World Cup 2011 - SWOT Analysis : AUSTRALIA

ICC World Cup 2011 - SWOT Analysis : WEST INDIES

ICC World Cup 2011 - SWOT Analysis : PAKISTAN

ICC World Cup 2011 - SWOT Analysis : ENGLAND

ICC World Cup 2011 - SWOT Analysis : SOUTH AFRICA

ICC World Cup 2011 - SWOT Analysis : INDIA

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Pakistan Vs South Africa 1st Test Dubai : Pak Report Card

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DLF IPL 3.0 Dudes to Duds

DLF IPL 3.0 DareDevils tame the Zintans

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IPL 3.0 Sooper Dooper Kings

Ijaz Butt & the 7 Dwarfs

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Why South Africa should consider losing to Bangladesh