Twenty Eight Years Later

I am glad that probably some , if not all the players have read my post about last world cup victory. I am not sure how many of them were even born by that time. Even if they were born, most  of them were too infant to be inspired by that victory.

The point is, this victory stands on its own. The players found their own way to the glory. To me, it looked almost ten years of constant journey. The path was shown by Dada.  Sehwag, Yuvraj, Zaheer, Harbhajan  and to some extent, Dhoni and Gambhir  too – were spotted and encouraged by Dada … Encouraged to fight, encouraged to believe in themselves , encourage to not only meet the challenges but to throw the challenges across.  I wish that Rahul Dravid , Laxman and Kumble should be the part of the team – just like Tendulkar. But no, we never missed them .These young guys stood up to the occasion. Look at the report card of the team. Every one contributed. If some one failed, others rushed in to plug the gap. That was precisely  what had happened in Final. The team does not depend on Tendulkar only , unlike it used to do in mid and  late nineties. So what if Sehwag was out in just second ball ! It was pity to see that guys like Pathan and Ashwin, who did not do any bad for whatever chances they got, were sitting on benches. Hopefully , that will enhance their hunger to do well.

Now, just a world of caution – please keep your feet on the ground. Still there are a lot of grey areas. Batting can not always hide the shortcoming of bowling. Fielding is still pretty ordinary. Running between wickets requires improvement. Team needs to learn how to handle batting power play – both while bowling and batting.

Now, Gary Kirsten will not be around. Most probably, BCCI will rope Fleming for the coaching assignment.

But let us hope Tendulkar with us forever. At least, till he completes tweny five thousand runs in both the form of Cricket.

The Classic Case of Brotherhood

I have never seen such a match – that too –that too at a  prestigious World Cup – that too – at knockout level – at such a high level of knockout when the distance between cup and lips are hardly one match away.

Both the teams were desperately trying to lose the match.The whole world, including their Prime Ministers were witness to that.

Let us begin from the team selection.

India picked Ashish Nehra at the cost of Ashwin.It was not Ashwin’s fault. He got two matches and he did well.No one was talking about Nehra. All they were thinking about Munaf, whether he should be iven another chance for the sake of winning combination or  should pave the way for Y Pathan or Sree Santh. No one expected that the axe would fall on Ashwin.

How about Pakistan ? Everyone knew that just the presence of Shoaib Akhtar was enough to make Indian batsmen jittery .That  too, when except  Sachin and to some extent Sehwag with effective upper cuts no one in the tp order of Indian batting had answer for fast, short balls.But he was not in the team.

The height of the brotherhood was, Sachin kept on giving the chances and Pakistani were just dropping them. He is such a great batsman that even one reprive is enough for opposition to sweat, then why he kept on obliging them  ? And they kept on humbly refusing his respectful offerings?

If you got a chance to look into any text commentary , you will find that Indian innings will full of two contradictory term- “almost” and “dropped (missed)”.

Some sample –

..” Saeed Ajmal to Raina, no run, confusion in the running! Raina chops to point, both batsmen set off, stop, look at each other, run again and the stop mid-pitch ... Raina turns and is back just in time! The is nervous stuff “

Mohammad Hafeez to Dhoni, no run, a weak walk across and he stabs this one way to the off. Very edgy

Mohammad Hafeez to Kohli, no run, Almost caught and bowled! Kohli was beaten in the flight and that bottom-hand took over completely as he went for the drive. He mistimed the ball back in the air but it falls short of the bowler

Lovely stuff from Hafeez! Beaten in flight and stumped! Gambhir went down the track but couldn't reach the pitch of the ball. Panic. He then tried to stab the ball away but is now beaten by the turn. More panic. The ball has gone past him and he looks back, trying to get back but no luck. Kamran whips off the bails. India two down.

When Pakistan Innings started,they kept on paying the respect to Munaf and Ashish. Patel even bowled a maiden over.

All the batsmen showed their trademark brilliance and then went into the shell.Pakistan opted for batting power play after 45 overs when 8 wickets were down.

In the post match conference, Dhoni admitted that he read the wicket wrong. Tendulkar confirmed that   never in his Cricketing life, he got that many number of lives in one match. Afridi confessed that they played irresponsible shots. Everything was drown in wild jubilation.