Elite readership?

Is it possible that Rahul stumbled upon the last "Pavilion View" blogpost? After painstaking innings in the first two Tests, a new avatar of Rahul came out in this Test and scored his first 20 runs off 5 boundary hits. Wonder if it is a first for him in any cricket - leave alone Tests.

Dunno, but the haughty b*****d in me would want to believe that this somewhat Sehwag-ised (or Vir-ile) edition of Dravid may be a fallout of "Pavilion View" playing Bagger Vance and requesting him to 'stand out of his own way' and 'let his shots find him'!
Had there been an answer in the affirmative, we won't hesitate to close this blog in that blaze of glory. We (PV) are surely not going to reach a greater high in the next 400 years of operation.
Jokes aside, let us see things practically...Rahul was probably playing to the team vision. Indians were focussed on forcing a win and the purposeful batting of the entire order reflected that. They can take credit for their current position in this Test#3. They have approached 3rd Test like a team that deserves their current Test ranking. They have left a lot of time for this Test to be decided.

Our 'imagined' R Junnuh probably plays one final Test innings in the Asian Emerald Island to improve his contribution to this series at the moment of reckoning (SL are having a 130+ 2nd innings lead at lunch with 2 wkts in hand)


As I close this post, Sri Lanka lead India by over 170 now with no further loss of wicket. Great rescue act from Samaraweera for 2nd consecutive time, this time with Mendis in supporting role. Got to bid good bye, get back to TV and help pick up the last two. [Again the same b*****d in me thinks he can play a role in changing not only Dravid's batsmanship but also the fate of his team...]

Back in the space of an sms

I sent an sms to some of my friends on today, the 4th morning of 3rd Ind-SL test at the P Sara stadium. I started keying into my non-qwerty pad at 45 mins point after start of day’s play when Sanga and Mahela were batting, managing to send it about10 mins later.

"Ishant looks like Perth'08 bowlg brillntly 2 Sanga who is takg blows but protects wkt. Grt climax, result jo bhi ho (whatever be the result).
23 kiya (made 23) but RD is finally lettg his strokes find him, looks he will score now. Mahela looks doing(sic) good - hurray, Ojha picks Mahela as i sms. Both morng wkts by Ojha.
Keep Saturday free, it is Sanga's genius vs Indian 4th inngs on a grt pitch fr spn & pace. Aah, Ishant not givn extra ovr like Perth....Viru comes on, so going 2 be interestg. Nothing like Test on a pitch like ths...
Sanga out 2 Ojha fr 28 to a flat pull straight to fieldr. Pinch me awake - Mahela and Sanga go within the span of an SMS!!!"

Well that was not exactly an sms (‘short’ msg) but I bet you would feel similarly if you are in front of TV at the time.

Stats lovers: I would have provided links to the individual series & career stats of Mahela and Sanga up until this innings but for the torment to Indian minds.


[Acknowledgement: Thanks AD, for sending the message back after I had deleted it]

"Why India are number 1 in Tests": the batting part

Steve Waugh was asked during his recent India visit if the Indian Test side deserved to be ranked number 1 even as it is struggling to bag 20 opposition wickets. Steve responded, tongue in cheek: "If the team continues to struggle to take 20 wickets, there will be no wins and top position will automatically go away".

I agree..and see it happen soon if things do not change.

However the current exercise is not to explore the future of the #1 team in Tests. We only are trying to find out what got them there.

Let us look at this list from cricinfo's S Rajesh. It shows the top 10 Asian batsmen in terms of 'averages in Asia'. We can see that 2 of the current Indian players are in the top 5, and another is hobbling just outside that list (Rahul with current Asian avg of 50.52). Enough reason why India have been scoring heavily at home in recent times.

Now look at this list. This is the list of Asian batsmen with highest 'away from Asia' Test averages of all time. You can see that out of the top 15, India has 4 current batsmen and another one (Ganguly) who retired fairly recently. In other words, 5 out of the six batsmen in the batting order for better part of post-2000 performed remarkably well offshore.

Probably this rare combination of batsmen succeeding both at home and away, along with the A-Z bowling combo in away Tests (Anil-Zaheer, before you assume I am hinting at hidden bowling riches), led to India's consistent successes culminating in the number 1 ranking.


Rahul back to his post-35 struggle (something that keeps itself away from Sachin):
At the top of the heap on this 2nd list is the currently struggling Rahul Dravid with a run'away' average of 57. I am surprised as a Sachin-Dravid fan. The surprise is not exactly because the average is still so far ahead of everyone else's (including Sachin's) away average, but because I had seen Rahul's away average touch 65 odd about 4 years back and this is quite a fall from those standards. Probably the failures in 2007 in SA & England took their toll.

I was also checking Rahul's recent series averages to check if he is struggling to keep his place. It appears he has done rather well in all Test series since that post 26/11 England team's visit of India in late 2008. He has kept his Test form up till he landed in Sri Lanka a few weeks back. These long gaps between Test series are surely no help to a 37 year old batsman who is picked only for Tests. But like it or not, Rahul looks like having another personal battle on his hands going into the 3rd Test.

He beat the 'final demons' once in end 2008, just after I made this near-farewell post on him. Can he do it again??


Update 1: Perhaps on SL tours RD needs a 'Bagger Vance' all of his own who can clear the webs in his mind so that RD can 'let the shot find him’ and ‘get out of his own way’.

Cricket, the Aussie way

Here's Andew Hughes' fun take on the Aussie cricketers' own rules of the sport. Besides enjoying the humour, many of us would admiringly agree with Andrew's findings from the last day of Australia's recent loss to Pakistan:

"Why don’t they give up? Every other nation on earth would have gone through the motions this morning. Where does it come from? It certainly isn’t a genetic inheritance. The English way is to give up properly and give up early, before mounting a completely futile rearguard action when all chance of victory has gone."

To be fair about that second part, it seems to be changing since the millennium turned. The days the English are formidable 'pests in Tests'.

But coming back to Aussies' approach to cricket, I recall Steve Waugh visiting India last week. He was asked about Australia 'slipping' in recent times. Steve named South Africa, England, India, Sri Lanka and Australia as the simultaneous 'almost number 1' teams in Tests. However he also said some more words that communicated a quiet confidence that although times will keep changing Australia wil never be found close to the bottom of the heap.

You never do in Test cricket unless you keep giving up.

Update 1: Here's an interview of another guy who never ever gave up - and in fact did way better than just doing that. He is the one man you don't want to see in your opposition team even if you have Bradman, Richards (both Viv & Barry) and Sunny playing for you. You can be Alexander the Great and yet with him on the other side you will end up giving your most famous (albeit disputed) quote:

"I am not afraid of an army of lions led by sheep but an army of sheep led by lions."

In the interview he narrates how he came back from his 1987 retirement lured by the prospect to win a Test series against the 1980's WI side in their backyard. He was seeing a win where other 35+ guys would be relieved to have retired and thus avoided ignominy. That is more like the Imran Khan I know. Suits the man far better than coming back to aim for a less impressive 50 overs World Cup win.

No wonder Immy is the only man I can stand inspite of using as many 'I's as he uses there. I never see him painting a halo for himself. He already has one, so he does not need to.

Update 2:

My orkut profile showed a 'thought of the day' that looked like a nice summary of some immortal-yet-forgettable Australian test innings from the late 80's and early 90's...innings that came mostly from Alan Border and Steve Waugh barring one - the best one - from Dean Jones:

"Many of the great achievements of the world were accomplished by tired and discouraged men who kept on working."

And Afridi retires...again

Afridi has done it again - from being the Pakistan Test skipper, he has retired from Test cricket after the 1st Test of a 3-Test series.
Today's quote on the cricinfo page happens to be:

"I wasn't good enough"

Shahid Afridi doesn't mince words when announcing his retirement from Tests

And he goes on to drive the point home:

"I took the decision in the best interest of the team and hope a youngster with a Test temperament takes my position. I also feel that there are other players who are not fit for the longer version of the game and my advice to them is to concentrate on the shorter forms."

Anyone unintroduced to Afridi retirements could be forgiven for thoughts like "Phew - this man shows more patience in T20 games than in making career decisions." Probably true, but history shows that this charismatic 'King of T20' takes these retirement calls backed with a sound knowledge that unlike onfield hit-or-block decisions the retirements can be reversed pretty easily, within a very short time, and without asking for referral. Request you to go through some earlier Afridi retirements if you think I am being unnecessarily sarcastic.

That opening quote was pretty blunt for a self-assessment. Having seen Afridi for over a decade now, we can expect that to be a real call, of him calling a spade as he sees it, rather than an excuse to 'leave the battlefield' or 'insult Pak cricket establishment' that some people are accusing him of.

His ex-Pakistan teammate and skipper Moin Khan is relatively moderate. He opines:

"If he was not prepared for Test cricket then he should have thought about this before accepting the captaincy. His decision has come at a wrong time for Pakistan cricket and will complicate issues in the team."

Poor judgement, Moin. Did you truly expect him to have so much 'thought'-fulness alongside a strike rate close to twice that of the next fastest player???

The point is: It can change in the near future - by the 3rd Test, or by the next Test series...or even further down the months, say after the 2011 World Cup.

Why? 'Coz he does not have Test temperament, you see. For most others a career is like one long Test match. To Shahid Afridi, a career probably looks like a series of numerous T20 matches, each dissociated with the other. You never know what the next match throws up!

Take a well earned rest, smiling assasin

This post aims to clear a few 'Murali' cobwebs and let the sunshine come in at the time when this great cricketer most deserves it - on the eve of his Test retirement.
His action first. Here is a frank and reasonably fair assessment of the great Murali's action from that other great Warnie:

"Murali's action has been passed by scientific tests, I always thought it was probably legitimate," Warne said.

"But because of the way he bowled, I was worried that young spinners would try to copy his action and end up bowling illegally."

I loved those last words from Shane Warne. I find it quite possibly the main reason for various umpires outside Sri Lanka crying foul on his action repeatedly even though his bent elbow looked all right to me (and Warnie) by remaining bent till the end of delivery. These umpires, catastrophising on the impact that his action could possibly have on young minds, probably desired to stop Murali more as a precaution than to punish his actual bowling action.

Now to his achievements and the other 'calls' on his reputation. This cricinfo feature, apltly titled "An Unparalleled Match Winner", dwells on various notable career stats of Murali. It reminds our forgetful minds of the magnitude of achievement he is leaving behind, besides the small matter of returning a ratio of almost six wickets per Test.
For starters the man has taken 560 Test wickets since 2000.

We often hear a lot of comparison with that other spinning great Warnie of the 700 plus club. At times partisan cricket followers suggest that Murali's stats are inflated ONLY due to Bangladesh and Zimbabwe tours. S Rajesh does a favour to Murali's argument by presenting a stat for "Best bowlers between 2000 and 2008, excluding Tests v Zim and B'desh (Qual: 150 wkts)".


Under that particular stat Murali still comes out tops over Warnie in the averages, while Warnie returns a better strike rate. Considering quality of Murali's bowling support compared to Warnie's, a better strike rate for Warnie is expected as he found more favourable situations to take wickets and was seldom used as a stock weapon. Murali's better average is still a credit to Murali.


[Note: Bagging more wickets per match is an advantage Murali derived from having lesser bowling partners, and tha is why we are not discussing that. I believe Warnie too would have bagged close to six wickets per match had he bowled for a lesser bowling side than Australia - but perhaps his average and strike rate would both have been worse]

PS: This link has another post on Murali's retirement.

Update 1: If you are a Murali fan you may like to go through Rob Steen's excellent piece on the 'Ultimate MVP'

"Should Murali retire now?"

A nephew asked me this question on Facebook. His personal take was that Murali could have continued as he had more to offer.

This is always a difficult question - to 'foretell' what could have been for a top cricketer depending on his advancing age and his diminishing form. We did that once or twice earlier (most notably with Dada in 2005).... we did not spare Sachin in 2006 either...(hard to believe now) - and look what happened.



Nevertheless this was my reply, and it is based mainly on Test matches:

As per my observations for the last 1 year it was time to go for Murali. I checked the stats in cricinfo and they supported me: From 1st Jan 2009 till date (18th July 2010), Murali has taken only 23 wickets in 8 tests against opposition (excluding Ban or Zim). His average in these tests is 47+ (almost double his career avg) and his strike rate was 89 (much increased from the customary 50's). He was too great a bowler to be bowling to ignore that year-and-a-half long signal - getting to milestones matters less than being of value to the team. In this case, probably he is only just holding his place in the team (but still not a burden) - and a great cricketer needs to step back when it comes to that stage.

As usual I backed myself up with stats there. But I confess that I would not have been able to state the above with any conviction had Murali himself not called it a day.
 
And what about limitd overs cricket? Well I believe he may just have a role to play in the 2011 50 overs WC. but T20 is also going beyond him...at least that was my first thought while watching Murali a few times in Chennai Super Kings matches of IPL-3. He was not quite the Murali we saw in the first edition of IPL.

Sachin: Then, now and forever

This video shows how a sixteen year old Sachin spoke in front of TV in 1989, just before international cricket happened to him.

And this one shows how he spoke at age 36 in an interview with Boria Mazumdar in 2009, celebrating completion of Sachin's 20 years in international cricket.

180204 AD:
Manidus (descendent of humans, but more advanced) have found a 21st century relic. After research work they find it is related to the greatest sportsperson of the most populous country of that time, India. The man had lived till the exact age of 100. As a special honour to the man, 21st century society had stored Sachin's face and his smile for posterity using a technique similar to the one used to save mummies in ancient Egypt.

The Manidus people had also restored and watched video records of some on field performances as well as off-field interviews of this man. All agreed on one point: it was amazing that the man's smile remained the same at age 100 (as seen in the relic) as it used to be at age 16. Textbooks of the time confirm that the Sachin the person indeed remained remarkably unaffected by all external factors, including the numerous major developments he saw in his personal life as well as in the world he lived in. The people find it amazing that the story in the textbook can be so readily understood by one look at the expression on his face.

Within months of its discovery "Sachin's smile" becomes greatly popular as an old world relic in the Manidus world, surpassing the fame of Indus Valley civilisation relics - like the bust sculpture of Mohenjodaro priest, the bronze dancing girl from Mohenjodaro and bull engraved Harappan seals - amongst the earlier humans.

Some interesting quotes came through in that 1989 interview, by the way. He liked fast bowling (even the 80's West Indies variety) as 'the ball comes straight on to the bat'.
-------------


On an unrelated point, I watched this 'rare' video on recordings of Don Bradman's strokeplay. Some of the comments referred back to the suggested similarity of Don's game to Sachin's before degenerating into a pointless debate - and I must confess I got drawn into it to leave a comment or two.

Looking at the shots I believe the first one (cover drive, recorded from a match) reminds us most of Sachin. In two other shots - the 2nd one (step out and drive straight down) and 4th one (square on the off) - the initial movements of Don remind us of Sach but then the Australian ends the shots very differently. Our seasoned eyes just cannot imagine Sachin stepping out to drive the ball down the ground and yet NOT play a lofted drive.

UPDATE: Just found a better video of those 4 recorded Bradman shots. Also no ugly debate going on in the comments there (not when I read it), hence left no comments...

The Foliage

Some weeks back I clicked this picture with a cellcam while waiting at my daughter's skating classes. This plant had an interesting arrangement of foliage. Younger leaves were coming into their own from below the dark shaded older ones at the top even as the youngest lot could be seen emerging further down. 

An analogy had struck me as soon as I saw the pattern in those leaves. I am trying to put that vision pictorially here.

Jayasuriya

Peter Roebuck writes a piece on Jayasuriya who rose above himself as a batsman but never added the negatives that people often inbibe in their nature on that treacherous journey.

Who else can fill your mind if you try to think of a Viv Richards who is not throwing attitude, a Sehwag who is even less complicated than Sehwag on seeing bad balls and knowing what to do with them, a great player who always carried out the orders of his various skippers like an excited schoolboy right through his journey from twenty to forty in international cricket?

We see him so less these days... and I thank Peter for reminding us that another great career is coming to a close andwe should be ready to stand up and cheer with gratitude for what he did to the game.

Here is another old post of mine on Jayasuriya from his amazing days.

Greatest cricketing moment of this decade

2009 is coming to a close. Rahul Dravid chose to play an uncharacteristically racy knock against Sri Lanka in the first Test started today. Certainly a memorable knock.

Or is there another cricket-memory that you recall far more vividly than Rahul's 27th Test ton, something that effertlessly defines the decade of 2000's for you?

I fancy some of you writing back on the comments section of this post on the event or moment that you consider as the greatest cricketing event or moment of this decade.

You can give us a line on either "The cricketing event / moment of the decade" or "The Indian cricketing event / moment of the decade". As you wish..
But please put just one entry per person - the most favourite entry for you.

I guess my "Cricketing event of the decade" was the masterful match-saving 150+ by Ricky Ponting in the 3rd Ashes Test of 2005. It was scored on the 5th day in daunting conditions. A critical series was at stake, and he needed to keep out the best fast bowling attack that Australians faced over a whole Test series in the current decade.

My Indian Cricketing moment of the decade? Laxman-Dravid returning unseparated after a complete day's play at the Eden Gardens in 2001....

Cric photo blog on cricinfo

Cricinfo has started this new and absolutely lovely blog on some memorable snaps of live cricket. Those are from the collection of photogrpaher Hamish Blair of Getty Images. As fascinating as the pics are the technical and situational descriptions that go with it. C'mon Hamish, we are waiting for more, lots more.

Se7en

You are sitting on a couch with your 7th bowl of masala popcorns. It is the final ball of the final session of the final Test match of an unusual series of close matches yielding no results due to various cricketing and atmospheric reasons. This last match was a close affair till the end, which is why you have taken a day off and latching on to the television. Your team is bowling the last ball of the day.

The opponents came close enough to winning it but a flurry of wickets claimed by your quickies in this final session had them gasping for survival. They are 6 runs behind your team's score. The best they can do is tie the match - which does not change the match or series situation in any way.

Your skip ambles to the bowler and customarily asks him to avoid delivering no-ball or wide. He then yells at the fielders to back up and ensure no overthrows. Skippy winks at the 'keeper - no words needed for that man. Bowler runs in to close out the series.

And then this happens..

[Statutory Warning: The setting is imaginary; the result of the series on this video was 5-0 against the bowling team. It is the possibility, my dears..]

20 yrs of passing Tests, and 22 yrs of keeping his head

As the comments under this 21 year old Harsha Bhogle article on Sachin explain, the republication of this old post has taken back many readers to their younger (or youngest) days.

It takes me back too, but not that far. A not so memorable afternoon from 2002 for Sachin the batsman which happened to coincide with one of the greatest moments of this decade for Indian cricket. The Natwest final, where India successfully chased 326 on the shoulders of 2 young men called Yuvraj Singh & Mohammad Kaif even as the top order stars had all departed with more than half to get. One of the stars was our little big man. Sachin was dismissed at 14 playing an awful shot that put an end to a scratchy innings in front of a summer crowd at Lord's.


He hung his head on his way back. To his horror (or so we thought) some atrocious 'lily livered landlubber' ran into the field and kept speaking to the dejected man all the way to the boundary rope till the security folk found the action close enough to rise from their seats and act. We waited for something to snap in the greatest batsman in the world (unarguably, at that point of time anyway). But Sachin did not respond to the guy even once. He did not even betray any sign of being aware of the existence of this 'sea-gherkin' hovering and blabbering around him. It stayed that way till the end. No complaining to the security, no gestures. Sachin went straight into the dressing room as if it never happened.

I was in no mood to stand up and clap as India were in dire straits in another final due to a silly innings from Sachin. I wish I had applauded. Applause means the most when accorded at the right time. I still keep making up for that non-appreciation somewhere deep within whenever I recall the restraint that Sachin displayed that 2002 evening. It came to him as effortlessly as the straight sixes during his unforgettable "turning back the clock" 175 against Australia on 5th Nov 2009.


Ramakant Achrekar, being a concerned guardian to the 15 year old genius under his tutelege, had expressed his fears in that old article:

" This (publicity) is ridiculous. These things are bound to go to his head. He will start thinking he has achieved everything. I hope all this stops he can concentrate and work hard."

The publicity and distractions never stopped. They only went from one plane to another. And he (Sachin) never stopped concentrating and working hard. And it never went to his head. It is quite possible that he read this 'Sportsworld' article and remembered his 'guru's words as clearly as he remembered the sledging from Aussie bowlers during his 1992 tour Down Under.

I doubt if we will see the likes of him again. The batsman, maybe...the complete man, I have my doubts. I wish I could be what he is even without his 12000 & 42, his 17000 & 45, his numerous other records. At least I would be nice to the people around me, good and not so good. And I would be at peace with myself. That's worth envying in these times, isn't it?

Achrekar sir can rightfully ask his share of our gratitude in making Sachin the man he is. Certainly as much as Merv Hughes can claim the gratitude of the world for making Sachin an eternal Aussie baiter.

And how could I miss this....I wrote a post in 2005. It was on a sporting champion I dreamt of, an ideal sportsman. I did not have any real sportsperson in mind when I wrote the post. Sachin mark-2005 had his little quota of blemishes. His refusal to come out to field after skipper Rahul declaring the Indian innings ar Multan '04 with Sachin on 194* was then a recent affair. He would still be slowing down a little after passing 80 to pick up his next ODI hundred....

But then they disappeared; not my memories of his ever-so-slight indiscretions but the indiscretions themselves. He never did anything unbecoming of his stature after that Multan affair. He came back to the slip cordon to help India win more matches. He stopped loitering around to pick up another ODI ton. So what if he lost form? So what if he was struggling and looking over the hill? So what if his flowing runs of 1990's were distant cousins to his workmanlike tons of the 2000's? So what his erstwhile art work was looking like an artisan's work? With more failure as a cricketer than ever before, he strangely kept emerging as the champion I envisaged in that post.
That he has turned a corner in the last 2 years and inexplicably recaptured so much of his past glory after passing his 18th year at the top is but a footnote to this tale.

On the occasion of his completing 20 years in international cricket, I dedicate the post "To our Champion" to the man who, on this day, is every bit of the champion I described in that post. It was surely written for you, Sachin Tendulkar. Please take my bow.
[cross posted on Amber Kaleidoscope]

Update: This thought provoking article was written by Anand Vasu of cricinfo way back in 2000. It appears on Sachin Tendulkar's player page on cricinfo (as on today). In this article Anand too is wondering what can possibly go on in the mind of a champion while going out to perform under an immense burden of expectations.

"He is no statesman, no politician, no religious leader. And yet he holds sway with as much power of as any one of the above. Whether he faces it or not, he is one of the few Indians who binds the whole of this country. Probably, no other person in the country is as uniformly admired as him. He is in a position of immense power. Did he choose to get to this position and work towards it? One reckons not. The price he has had to pay as an individual is incomparable to the rewards."

Still the team to beat

For the last few years we are speculating on the decline of Oz from their lofty standards. Much of it is true.

"Australian cricket team is on a downward spiral" - I bet you heard that before. They lost major players in a succession. The other teams were catching up. Their two major contenders for the top position, India and South Africa, were taking turns at putting the once invincible Kangaroos on a frying pan. 2008 was a particularly bad year for them.

This is October 2009. They have beaten South Africa in their own backyard earlier this year. The away Ashes was once again a poor campaign for the 'declining team'. They did excellently in the ODI series against the old foes though. The mid-year struggle returned to haunt them at the T20 World Cup. They fared poorly.

But then they came back and grabbed the ICC Champions' Trophy while the other two major contenders struggled. The just concluded Champions' League T20 Cup at India also had a similar story to unveil. Home teams (Indians) struggled and petered out before semis. South African Cobras were upstaged by dark horses Trinidad & Tobago - oh-so-familar. New South Wales, from Down Under, stole the thunder and ended up at the finishing line.

Australia's Test supremacy is no more a given. There was not an iota of that awe-inspiring dominance of recent past in their Oneday or T20 wins of 2009. Their form has been on a swing ever since the Glenn-Shane combo walked away into their glorious sunset.

Yet they still are the team to beat. Dhoni and his men would have done a world of good to their abysmal limited overs performances of past 3 months if they manage to put up a good show against this team. And he will do well for himself if he can take a few tips on his opposite number Ricky Ponting on how to 'turn tides'. Ricky hasn't quite done it as grandly as that term suggests, but he has done enough to keep the hope afloat for his team and have his mates believing that they are still at the top. That is what you need for your next moment of glory.

Spirited cricket

NDTV were interviewing Lalit Modi and Ravi Shastri on the exciting prospects of Champions' League T20. Rahul Dravid joined in the interview. Though ke kept looking like a fish out of water in the interview aimed at exhorting the newest thing in cricket's entertainment avatar, Rahul came up with the two best quotes of the session.

Rahul reflected back on the way his T2o team Bangalore Royal Challengers (BRC) had come back from being down and out at half way stage to reaching the IPL2 finals. Lalit Modi took this opportunity to pay compliments to Rahul's cricketing abilities in his self-styled vocabulary, mentioning that Bangalore Royal Challengers were such a bad shape at half way stage only because Rahul was away at the time 'having a baby'.

Rahul is good at hiding his spontaneous expressions. We know that from his countless post-defeat press conferences as Indian captain. We could not trace if he pulled back a chuckle at Modi's words but he certainly returned a good line of his own: "Some things are more important than cricket."

A while later, the interviewer asked Rahul about his team owner, liquor baron Dr. Vijay Mallya. There is a background to that question. Ugly incidents followed the bad show of BRC in the inaugural IPL, eventually leading to sacking of Rahul as skipper in IPL2. Rahul again managed to hold back and yet not sound boring. He said a few words which went like: "He wants us to play in the right spirit. Spirit is the key word here."

One of these days, Royal Challengers may just happen to collect the maximum points for gentlemanly conduct on the field in some T20 tourney. That won't be surprising at all with Anil Kumble as the team skipper. As a result we may actually find Dr. Mallya accepting the spirit of cricket award at an ICC awards function.

Far from the dais and away from his candle-lit table at the awards nite, the first BRC skipper would be guffawing away uninhibitedly in front of a wash room mirror even if he might have won nothing.

Spin it to win it

They used to say that South Africa was the deathland for spinners. There were as many good spinners in the SA team of the 90's as there were fish in the Dead Sea. It slowly started changing since the middle part of the current decade. The pitches in SA did not change much. However the spinners around the world have gradually started realising what Shane Warne always demostrated when he used to bowl in Australia and South Africa - that bounce could be as much an ally of spinners as turn.

The modern spinners have since worked with an objective to use the South African bounce. The bigger grounds in South Africa (certainly bigger when compared to the average sub-continent ground) compliment the spinners in taking help of the extra bounce. The great return of spinners in the 2nd edition of IPL showed that a new world awaited quality spinners in Springbok Land.

The available results and team performances in the current ICC Champions' trophy, in particular the India Pakistan match, spell out in no uncertain terms that the show from a team's leading spinners is going to decide the team's progress in the qualifying stages of the trophy. And with pitches likely to get more ragged durin that phase, the better spinners are likely play even more important roles in their teams' progress as the tourney nears its business end.

There is also a possibility of the script unfolding in a different fashion. The bounce is likely to go out of the pitches in latter stages. It will take some adjustment for the spinners to adopt more of a sub-continent approach (more turn, less bounce) to avoid being found out by batsmen.

Eleven XI's

I found some thoroughly enjoyable selections in the eleven greatest XI's in ODI's.

Some of the nippy comments made to support the various selections:

Brian Lara (in All time World XI): "Not many can guide a waist-high Waqar delivery outside off-stump over fine leg for six. Fewer can make a massacre look beautiful."

Glenn McGrath (in All time World XI): "No bowler makes batsmen more doubtful of their judgement. He wrecks confidence in inches. He knows that two inches are all you really need."

Azharuddin (in The most elegant XI): "The Nizam batted like one. We must display his wrists in the Salarjung Museum (after he departs, of course)."

Bishen Bedi (in The most elegant XI): "Sent the ball on a beautiful loop, which, long after the batsman had departed, left a rainbow on the pitch."

David Gower (in The most elegant XI): "(C) If Michelangelo were alive, he would have sculpted this David, in cover drive position."

Glenn McGrath (in the most boring XI): "What a great bowler! And with just that one delivery: the ball swinging away a wee bit from the off-stump."

Ravi Shastri (12th man in the most boring XI): "That this man once hit six sixes in an over in a Ranji match makes us believe in miracles."

Jonty Rhodes (in the fielders' XI): "Do we need to explain? Was the first superstar of fielding. He redefined the art. He did to fielding what the Wright brothers did to transport."

Shane Warne (in the Fielders' XI): "Despite the fervent text messaging, his fingers were always up to the responsibilities of fielding."

Wasim Akram (in the Left handers' XI): "Because we swear we saw him bowl an inswinging outswinger. And because he planned—and succeeded at—a dismissal involving a set batsman and a full-toss."

National Anthem by South African Singer

I thought this was a rather sweet rendition of the Indian National Anthem by a South African singer. This guy did another good job some time earlier with the Pakistani national anthem as well. That is when I decided to record the Indian anthem from the telly with my camcorder. I liked it enough to upload it on youtube.

FUN FACT: Notice how Ashish (Nehra) and (Rahul) Dravid appear both in the words of the anthem as well as in the video, but in converse association! Ashish Nehra appears on screen as the anthem goes "...Maratha DRAVID Utkal Banga", while Dravid appears on screen soon after the anthem goes "taba shubha ASHISH maange".........

The two ODI comeback men probably needed to swap their positions on the queue to make more appropriate tele-appearances in tandem with their names getting sung as part of the national anthem. After all, not everyone is fortunate enough to have their names in the national anthem - ask others in the Indian cricket team.

Holding the hands of greats

A little over 20 years back, I was dreaming of becoming a national level cricketer some day who could play 70 odd Tests and finish with 300 wickets and 3000 runs in Tests. That dream disappeared pretty soon afterwards.

Before start of the 2009 ICC trophy India-Pakistan league match today, the players of both teams were escorted out by young boys and girls. Some of them, including Sachin, were actively chatting with the kids who were holding their hands as the cricketers walked out into the ground. These kids were much the same age as I was when I used to harbour those Test cricketing dreams. Actually even Sachin & Dravid too would have been of similar age in those days. They are a little more than a year older than me.

They - Dravid, Sachin and other great cricketers like them who are close to my age - too must have had those dreams, and they have since done enough to go ahead and live their dreams. In fact, some of them have done so much that it is a dream for kids of same age of present times to be walking hand-in-hand with a Sachin or a Dravid and find him not only smiling but also showing a keen interest to chat with them.

And why just kids? The old fella in me turned back the clock at that sight and became the cricket enthusiast of yore for a fleeting moment. I felt goosebumps at seeing kids getting a chance to hold the hands of some of the greatest cricketers today. I envied some of those kids when I found them being indulged by cricketers of the stature of Sachin. Even at this stage of my life I could have done with such an unforgettable minute or two of indulgence!