Balloon head!

Anything can happen in Twenty / 20 cricket. Even scoring 36 runs in last over is possible. That is the reason T20 is so popular in cricket playing nations, and it won’t take too much of a time to have result. It is like a carnival show, people go to watch their home teams playing straight after the work. Support the home team, have some drinks, cheers, excitement, thrills and little dance show with few DJ tracks. Modern day entertainment after PS3 and Xbox Kinect!

IPL became food for thoughts for few neighboring countries. BPL is not British Physical Laboratories LLC as me and you identify with. It is representing Bangladesh Premier League! The latest buzz is that Pakistan also planning to have their own Premier League very soon, probably sooner than anticipated. PPL wannabe heads already hinting the possibilities of omitting Indian players from their game. The funny part is this discussion took place even before they could take decision on where to play the cricket!

I have hinted in my previous blog posts that Harbhajan Singh is a balloon head! Still if you guys are not convinced enough; just watch that match reply where Mumbai Indians played against Deccan Chargers. Bhaji was ramming towards the umpire and shouting, umpire was looking for a shield to avoid the saliva spray! At one point I thought he gonna slap the umpire like; you know he slapped someone in first edition of IPL?

Umpires make human errors, but a player can’t argue with umpire! Honestly; I was fancying Bhaji to slap the umpire, so his career would be in jeopardy. As again and again Harbhajan Singh is showing the world he is not only fit to play cricket but also any competitive game at large. Someone has to put this mentally gone case to a mental asylum as soon as possible for the best of the game cricket. He is the captain of Mumbai Indians, I am wondering how the hell an illiterate like Munaf Patel would learn discipline from the leader? Munaf can’t read, write or talk in better words. So only thing he can do is just watch somebody and try to learn from him. Unfortunately he got to look at very bad idol and that too all the time!

Virendar Sehwag is having a bad patch in his life. As soon as he got fixed his bald patch on his head all sort of bad patches start pouring at him left, right and center. His prolonged bad form successfully extended to IPL so far, been dropped from the national team, giving the chief selector Mr.Srikanth hard time to explain the media, his best buddy Gautam Ghambhir lost the vice captaincy to comparatively new comer Virat Kohli. Sehwag’s word of war with Dhoni didn’t improve the cause either. Cost him everything including his position in the team. He was probably too ignorant about the change of tide, initially the power shifted from Mumbai to Delhi, now Delhi to Chennai. Look at the opponent buddy; Chief selector Srikanth is from Chennai, BCCI secretary N.Srinivasan owns the team Chennai Super Kings, Dhoni is the captain of Chennai Super Kings, why Suresh Raina is so confident about his position in the team even after lack of form in recent international matches?, he too plays for CSK, why Bhaji is out and Ashwin is in?

Mera Bhai; tum dekha huwa book cover, poora kahani andar hai!

But one thing is for sure, nobody can mess with the HULK of Indian cricket, Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar! And everybody including foreign players are aware of his unbelievable popularity in India. Look at Greg Chappel, he has to say something about Sachin to sell his filthy biography, before coming to play IPL Brett Lee was more concerned about himself than Sachin Tendulkar by making a sweet statement about Master Blaster; consequences he may have to face from Indian crowd for blocking Sachin from scoring a run in recently concluded match in Australia could be pricy! Even Dhoni said Sachin is the ultimate batsman India can’t afford to miss, this came right after his statement about rotation policy and slow fielders. So Dhoni was hitting someone in Delhi by this statement, and he is making sure he meant particularly one player when he made that statement. Slow fielder? Ahum…. Harbhajan Singh is a real Chamcha of Sachin Tendulkar, if anybody come up with a statement against Sachin, Bhaji will be the first one to defend the little master, so what did he get out of this?, a permanent position in Mumbai Indians team, and now he became the captain of the Mumbai Indians!

100^th 100 ton in international cricket is unbelievable by any stretch of imagination; Sachin achieved that feat sighting nobody nearby to break the record.  Even Sachin puffed, huffed and gasped to reach there! If not against Bangladesh he was aiming at Zimbabwe, if not Zimbabwe then new comers like UAE or Afghanistan. Luckily he got there against Bangladesh. Now he can play free cricket as some critics says, that means they too not expecting Sachin to retire in near future! As an ardent fan of Rahul Dravid said; Sachin may hang the boot and hand over the bat to his son Arjun when he is ready to play international cricket!

A media person asked Virendar Sehwag “actually Irfan Pathan is what in your team?”

After a long pause Viru answered “you know, he is a bowler, he is fast medium slow bowler who can bat a little”

“Fast, Medium or Slow… which one?” the interviewer mystified completely, the answer was nothing but a burning stare!

Adios!

Why Sehwag looks ridiculous when he gets out?

First of all let me apologize for the brief delay caused by my untimed vacation. Frankly speaking I went for vacation to forget about everything that related to my hectic job schedule and recession that caused dear to my business. But unfortunately I was so worried and restless at the time of vacation than when I was at work; got back my breath only after I came back to work! No, I am not a workaholic by any stretch of imagination.

Lot of cricket happened during this time and still is happening. I heard a joke from Ravi Shastri during his interview to a sports channel – Amit Mishra should have played a lot of first class cricket before he play big test match like this against Sri Lanka. My question to Ravi, Amit Mishra is part of the team every where the team goes in recent time. He never got a chance to play but carry drinks and towels to the crease for the senior players, how the hell can he be picked for the domestic cricket when he is part of the national team?

On the other side; everybody felt Amit Mishra bowled in negative line throughout the match, not to take wickets but frustrate the batsman hoping any one of them will get fed up and hit the ball high to gift a catch. Sri Lankan batsmen were very clever and patient so who got frustrated are thousands of poor viewers who were expecting a good match and those ex-lads in commentary box. Eventually Mishra conceded runs more than any other bowlers! 200 plus runs! That is a lot!

India played against their new rivals Australia (now Pakistan can take rest) in their own backyards. Virtually second row team that Australia came up with, had a lot of passion and fortitude which Indian paper tigers failed to understand. Or did they underestimate? I still believe Indians would have won at least two matches that they eventually lost due to immaturity of few players.

Sri Lankans are in India to give a stiff competition and they are giving everything to win first ever test match in India. No big terror on the surface in Ahmadabad even on fourth day. If anybody wants to prove his batting ability that should be on this pitch, lovely batting pitch till the time I am writing this article. One will be wondering why the hell Virendar Sehwag hit that ball high and got out! Still One and half day left, that is four and half sessions of cricket. Definitely India is not playing for the win but a draw. Why did Sehwag kneel down to slog sweep at that point of time only to manage a skier?!

Answer – Sehwag never consider a spinner as a genuine bowler and never give the respect. When Sehwag scored 296 runs in Multan he hit a six to make it 300. When a press personality wondered and asked him why did he decided to hit a six instead of taking a single or double Sehwag replied in his own lazy way “ I predetermined to hit a six to make it 300 if I get a spinner on my 296!” Never had he thought about the fact that he will be the first Indian to score 300 in a test match and it requires a lot of hard work!

But it is the spinners who make Sehwag ridiculous and cheap when he gets out! Isn’t it?

India's World Cup Defeat – A butterfly effect!

There is stunning similarities between 1987 Indian one day World Cup defeat and 2009 T20 World Cup defeat. In 1987 Kapil Dev’s devils failed to retain the cup they had won so gloriously four years before in England. As installed as favorites the defending T20 champions India were eying for consecutive world cup title; but this time they were carrying hopes of a billion, unlike last time where nobody had put their money on India especially with the absence of Fab Four! Same cycle India had gone through 26 years ago as nobody had believed in a team that Kapil Dev led to their first world cup victory in England!

As I was not grown enough to watch or memorize a live match that took place in India and Pakistan in 1987, last night I had a chance to watch some of the recorded highlights of Indian innings, had a Goosebumps to see some striking similarities in few bowled outs and run outs! Those old fellows must have had the feeling of déjà vu when they were watching the last match that South Africa defeated India!

Almost all the countries have come to terms with niceties associated with Cricket’s newest and shortest form with so much of matches being played over last couple of years. T20 is not as former Pakistan captain Javed Miandad referred, carnival cricket or slam bang cricket. T20 has scope for matters of strategy, cunningness, and tactical planning. Not all Tom Dick and Harry can play T20; it requires massive power, timing and most significantly a huge chunk of luck! Seemingly a small error can get overblown in a result that goes down to the wire as we witnessed several times in IPL.

In India even Muthayya Muralidaran of Sri Lanka used to get mobbed, stunned spin wizard said nothing this sort happened to him in his own home country. I am not talking about Muralidaran here. Indians have this weird propensity to raise a mediocre player to the status of Super Man and praise him left right and center, build a temple and do whatever possible to magnify his good things and rip him apart when he make couple of errors of judgment. Definitely Dhoni is intelligent enough to know this strange behavior of Indian cricket fans well before. “I was told by a senior a few years ago. He said if somebody is appreciating you, don't hit seventh heaven. If you fall on floor, it wouldn't be good for you. So adopt a central path. I try to do so," Dhoni was visibly disturbed and upset by the large portion of the crowd which booed him in presentation party. I suspect that senior is none other than his predecessor Sourav Ganguly, he too had a nasty time to go through.

It was Dhoni’s over confidence that caused the defeat against South Africa in last super eight games though it was a meaningless match. Dhoni retained the same team including the real culprits of the previous game. He wanted to prove a point or two to his critics the defeat against England was just ” a bad day”, look I gonna beat the best team in the tournament South Africa with the same team, he even celebrated the win when India restricted SA for as little as 130 runs. Well, opposition had some other plan in their mind and executed them beautifully, Dhoni was once again on losing side when the game was over, giving more and more chances to the critics to stone him! By the way the Indian captain is known for taking risks isn’t he?

It is not surprising to see the captain is getting most of the brickbats; there are so many other factors also to be counted besides Sehwag issue that left bad taste in everybody’s mouth, Coach is not been targeted much in blaming game of former players this time around, may be because Gary Kirsten is less flashy character than the former coach. Then Dhoni was the one praised far above the ground by every one when he won the inaugural T20 World Cup for India!

Indian Cricket fanatics started shouting for Dhoni’s head just like how it happened to Kapil Dev 22 years ago when his team failed to retain the World Cup. Critics are busy to find and list down the mistakes that Dhoni did in this World Cup similarly what happened to Kapil Dev in 1987! The media reported Kapil Dev had indifferences with Sunil Gavaskar which later on both of them denied identical to the allegation about the rift between Dhoni and Sehwag, Kapil Dev was suffering from decline of his own form as a bowler similar to Dhoni’s own batting form. Kapil Dev couldn’t continue as Indian captain anymore after the world cup defeat….

Let’s hope history won’t repeat all the time or at least this time! Butterfly effect can cause a fraction of a change in same incidents. Remember Dhoni is yet to lose a test match as captain!

Thanks for visiting my blog, thanks a bunch for those who left the comments, I made slight improvement on the layout and included visitors counter as per the advice of a friend. Hope you all will like it, please continue to visit and leave comments.

Mysterious Injury of Sehwag!

T20 World Cup - first round of the game is over, pictures got clearer by now. We know now who all are going to play in super eight or who all are packing up and going back home. Australian team looked as if they are bit confused to play a ball or leave the ball. Apparently the coach of Australian Cricket team had asked their top order batsmen to hate the cricket ball as if it secretly had sex with their loved ones, poor fellow was hoping at least by convincing the team members this way; batsmen would hit from their view whenever they sight a cricket ball, but coach had mysterious problem here to solve which he ignored conveniently or missed it completely, when opposition team had fast bowlers operating from both ends, Aussies boys are not even seeing a ball to hit, they see a red round object with white stitches around only when they get bowled out! Sigh…, well; they are not quite prepared for this. So blame the lack of preparation.

While all these bizarre things are happening with Australia, there is an Indian batsman who just woke up in a fine morning to realize that he is badly injured for quite some time and can’t play T20 World Cup 2009 any more! Virendar Sehwag ruled out from the T20 squad due to shoulder injury that he picked up in IPL semi final against Deccan Chargers!

“There is little I can do. At the moment I would leave for London with my wife (Aarti) and son Aryaveer," Sehwag said. To my ever suspicious journalist friends, under line the word “there is little I can do!”

Will you blame someone who thinks "then why the hell Sehwag has been picked up for Indian squad for T20 World Cup!?" This is exactly what a journalist friend of mine asked the coach Gary Kirsten. The answer was very convincing for Gary himself and was constantly shaking his head as if he himself is making it sure first. According to Gary Kirsten the injury what Sehwag had developed is very strange and it can happen one in a 1,00,000,00 sports persons!!! So unfortunately our Virendar Sehwag simply happened to be that one in last 1,00,000,00 sports persons!!!! It is not over here folks, listen to Gary’s further explanation “A Grade 1 injury is less than five per cent damage to individual muscle fibers. It's a mild strain however, if the patient continues to play, the condition will worsen. If ignored, a Grade 1 strain has the potential to become a Grade 2 strain or even a complete rupture.”

My question here is then how Sehwag’s so called A Grade 1 injury became Grade 2 when he didn’t play a single match in T20 WC? He was not doing anything with his shoulder after IPL other than lifting his son. If every one knows that the injury can worsen up if he play further cricket then why has he been included in Indian T20 WC squad?

There is smoke, thick white smoke, yes, you can be dead sure about the fire underneath somewhere! Indian Captain MS Dhoni got a task in his hand, he need to explain to media why Viru has been ruled out, look after the team’s performance, improve his own batting form and fight with internal politics. Captain cool dude became a hot tandoori in last press meet, where Dhoni literally lost his temperament and had a verbal fight with a jurno! Yeah, right. You know these journalists don’t you? As I mentioned in my previous posts; they simply don’t know what to ask and whom to ask. Instead of asking a question to physio of Sehwag they asked Dhoni! What do they expect him to reply?

Right after the fight and heated discussions in the meeting room the whole Indian team came to the press meet to show their unity. Captain Dhoni said “we are as united as ever” and left the press hall leaving all the journalists open mouthed with stun. They were waiting for so long with “N” number of questions that they wrote in a white paper to ask Dhoni. Obviously the press people got pissed off by Dhoni’s act, and that is exactly what Dhoni was wishing and expecting!

Dhoni should have asked Viru to attend the press meet and clear the cloud if there is no bad blood between them, which would have been much better idea than bringing the whole team members to the press meet and keep them behind like zombies to show the solidarity!

Thanks for all your encouraging comments; they are the water and minerals for this blog.

"Dhoni v/s Sehwag" Assumption or Real?

There are a lot of speculation over MS Dhoni’s statement to the media when media asked him about Sehwag’s recovery from the injury that he developed during the IPL; Dhoni’s reply was as cool as cucumber

"May be you should ask his physio to issue a press release"

This is where he had gone terribly wrong. It was as if someone is asking an innocent and Ahimsa person; can you give me a stick so I can beat you up left right and center! Unfortunately being an Ahimsa dude Dhoni had gifted not only the stick but also with sharp thorns on it!

Immediatly Dhoni pressed the panic button and made a press conference to clear the cloud.

"This message is for the people of India and for Indian cricket fans worldwide and comes from the whole team, recent reports in the Indian media of a rift between me and Sehwag amounts to nothing but false and irresponsible media reporting,"

Mr.Dhoni, we hope you know the media better than anybody in the business, even you were a favorite kid of media at a point of time. They were just waiting for little bit of controversy or sensationalism to blow out of the proportion with a pinch of salt. To make a sheep a fox or vice versa is not a big deal for the press in any given time. So a statement that you said in the press meet is godsend for them.

On the other side of the coin; did we witness a curious case of “spilling the beans” here? Is there any substance in this gossip?

One could easily say yes!

Dhoni was tired of praising his deputy in each and every press conference he had recently, though Viru couldn’t show his real metal during IPL outing; his International cricket was on the rise; bettered his own position in ICC ranking as well. I would say it was media’s fault all together, why are they asking to Dhoni about Viru’s black mole on forehead or his deodorant brand all the time, not being gay partners it is very difficult to explain folks. If it let it go this way, press may ask next question why Viru is spitting on the ground always when he is out there to play cricket and making his own fielders to step on it to loose their balance resulting miss-fields or why is he losing hair despite of his uncluttered mind?! Instead why can’t you guys ask Dhoni something more interesting for him, about his lady body guards to protect him from ladies fans who suddenly appears out of blue to rush at him from all directions to press their boobs to suffocate him (it can cause a brutal asphyxiated death) or construction of his own temple in his native village? If not all these questions I mentioned above; at least you should have asked about his hair style that resembles electric shocked Simpsons.

On other side Viru is a man with steel testicles not bothers to fight for the captaincy or egoism just like his batting style, when it happens you can scream about it, if it is not then what the fuck, leave it and concentrate on the cricket what others play!

When I said something fishy going on in Indian cricket camp; my friend told me that is what they should not do while playing cricket, other wise it will be hard to find the difference between Andrew Symonds and the whole Indian cricket players?! I puzzled and stared at him in horror to know that he was referring Symond’s bunk over at a friend’s place for fishing during the practice session that earned him punishment from CA. Yeah, you are right; my friend was holding chilled Fosters can. Another real Australian!