curious case of sachin and dravid...

nice that dravid raised his hand...err bat and agreed to open the innings today... though dravid would not have have been selected in the first place had sachin raised his bat too and said i will bat in middle order...

so who's doing who a favor...?

click to translate »

« back to original...

you are lucky fawad alam...

that your captain asked you to open the innings...

with such a fragile middle order...would you have scored this much...?

moral of the story...?

its better to be the opener of pakistan team...than a middle order bat...

just think about it...

click to translate »

« back to original...

who will bell sachin...?

so MI choked again...

hardly surprising for the one who has been following them since last season...what surprising is that though MI is placed just above the team, KKR, which has been criticized virtually from every corner...yet you don’t find anybody raising finger on mumbai indians...

the reason is not rocket science...who will bell the biggest cat cricket has seen...

sachin ramesh tendulkar...

it is now clear to every team that put any score on board and make MI chase...don’t do anything but to stroll in park coz they are more than willing to dig their own grave...

they are so top heavy that they are crushing their own team...with their sheer weight...

jayasuriya is finding to his disliking that what subtle change in conditions can do to ones batting...but rather than looking to dig it out he is looking to adopt easy route...that is attack...belittling his own vast experience earned by playing international cricket since ages...and hence letting his team down which has shown so much faith in him...

sachin...his is classic example of come what may i won’t leave this coveted spot of opening the innings...while its very very clear that MI want him in middle of innings to guide lesser mortals...specially while chasing...

if the stalwarts like jaya and sachin are struggling in these conditions...one can easily imagine the plight of some inexperience bats who might be playing in such conditions for the first time...and if combating conditions is not enough challenge in itself they have added pressure to score and score fast...no wonder they are caught in two minds...hence panicking...



sachin is putting too much pressure on duminy as well as other middle order bats...when his calm and assured presence in middle will only help soothe some nerves out there...but no...no one can bell this cat...no one can make him see the obvious...no one can make him come down to middle order...even for the team cause...which is facing elimination...

my order for MI, henceforth, will be...

jayasuriya
dhawan
shah
duminy
sachin
bravo
nayyar
harbhajan
raje / zahir (if fit)
kulkarni
malinga

click to translate »

« back to original...

did i miss something...?

why butt didn't opened yesterday? was he out of field for a while so he could not open the innings yesterday?

or it was one of those stupid move...of hoping against hope...?

otherwise what can explain doing away with opening partnership that in just one match before final match provided century partnership...with butt scoring century in that match...

must say some times the strategies pak comes up with are as unpredictable as the form they show on field...

Update (27.01.09):
it looks like i did miss something...butt didn't open coz he was out of field for a while late in sri lankan innings...smarting from this blip on my part...i will be more careful next time...

click to translate »

« back to original...

Wrong'ns

first of all let me say sorry for disappearing from scene...there were some urgent issue which kept me out of touch, forcefully, for few days...anyways....seasons greeting to all...

while i leave indepth analysis to more accomplished bloggers here are some wrong'ns from me...

time and again it is billed as our batting vs opposition bowling and considerable time and ink is spent on highlighting how bowling is our weak point and how our famed batting have to carry the burden of it...

if first two days of the test match anything to go by we must stop and ponder...are we putting too much faith on our batting...is our faith misplaced?? when we, literally with two bowlers, can restrict aussies to 9 wickets for around 300 in a day when other teams with much better and gifted bowling attack could not do so...and our batters with combined experience and pedigree could muster not even 200 on board...we must stop and ponder over it...

the way our 'great batters' gave advantage on platter gained by our 'weak bowling' almost saying sorry to aussies that they didn't meant to...is disgusting, inexplicable and pathetic...to say the least...how many wickets were taken by aussies?? where was the application needed??? where were batters when india needed them to guts it out in middle...???

we must sort out our batting order (in the second innings) and combination (for next match) quickly coz there's no one to hold on to in case of collapse like today...

this effort(??) has left india to the situation that now if we manage a draw from here will be nothing short of a miracle...its still early days yet but by the time test series will be over...some pretenders are definitely going to be sorted out there...

in know DK was not playing today but those who says so what he scored some half centuries in SA and ENG...should see dravid's innings today to know what those 'meaningless' half centuries meant to india...his innings was not going anywhere clearly indicating he was not enjoying or one must say willing to do the job he was doing over there...

one question which comes to my mind...if india have to gamble...than on which one we should gamble...

a reluctant genius or a willing mortal...??

click to translate »

« back to original...