I told you so

Led by the animated Sreesanth, the Indian pacers have turned the first game of the series on its head. Until 20 minutes before close of play on Day 1 of this first test between India and England, the match seemed to be in the firm grip of the hosts. The Indian bowlers seemed to have completely given up, and at 252/2, the match looked already lost. How things have turned around!

RP Singh got the initial breakthrough clean bowling the night watchman, Ryan Sidebottom. That was followed by a brilliant change of bowling by Rahul Dravid. Much to the annoyance of RP Singh, he was removed in the very next over and the bowl tossed to the fiery Sreesanth. The young man delighted the captain with 3 quick wickets, and Zaheer finished off the innings managing to get Ian Bell to play one onto his stumps.

In my last post, I had raised my apprehensions about India's habit of allowing the opposition to recover through their no.7/8/9 . Fortunately, that hasn't happened at Lord's. From now on, it's upto the big 4 - ST, RD and SG will have to ensure that we cross the English score, and by a 150-200 run margin. The pitch still looks good ; if Jaffer and Karthik can somehow manage to hang in for about 18-20 overs, and see the shine off the cherry, I don't much doubt the big 3 succeeding with the bat. It will then be all upto their 4th swansong partner, Anil Kumble to drive the nails into the English coffin.

It's BCCI vs Cricket Australia now

After inspecting the venues for the upcoming 7 match one-day series between India and Australia, the officials of Cricket Australia have raised one of the old bogies. They are not satisfied with at least 3 grounds including Kochi. The team led by Michael Brown, Cricket Australia's General Manager, Operations has raised the obvious issues of poor facilities and ground conditions. The BCCI on the other hand, as is to be expected, is not ready to give in easily to this demand for change of grounds.

Australia is slated to play one-day internationals from September 29 to October 17 at Bangalore, Kochi, Chandigarh, Baroda, Nagpur and Mumbai. Let's see how this latest fracas shapes up.

Off the ground cricket is getting more and more exciting - more content and stronger players compared to the dip in the quality of the other cricket. With both BCCI and the ICC already fighting for the top honours here, Cricket Australia throwing in its hat in the ring can only make the cricket more interesting!!

Some ideas:

- BCCI can raise the issue of the lack of practise matches for the Indian team on their upcomin tour down under. That way, Cricket Australia can be put on the backfoot immediately.

- A super one: BCCI can let Subhash Chandra's India Cricket League (ICL) take care of the on-field cricket nonsense. That way Pawar, Shetty, Shah & Brothers can focus their energies on the actual cricket. Now that the Presidential election is done with, Pawar will have plenty of time again and will need something bigger to keep himself busy with.

- BCCI announces its own World Cup. With bigger prize monies, it can put the ICC one to shame. And we can have one every 6 months. Once in 4 years is too few.

- Sharad Pawar accepts his failure on the coach issue. A guilt-ridden BCCI President then goes on take up the responsibility himself. What's a leader who ain't ready to take some repsonsibilities. ( Of course, the cash rich board announces a whopping billion dollars or so as the coach's salary. Jagmohan Dalmiya goes mad.)

- After India's success with raising the quantity of matches in ODI series to 7 now ( even England is doing that, where the Texaco Trophies used to be a two match affair) , the BCCI can get more ambitious. Continuing on the series of prime numbers - 3, 5, 7...the next one is 11. Pawar invites Ireland or Bangladesh or maybe both for a 11 match ODI series. A leaked e-mail from Pawar to Shetty reveals Pawar's humble ambition: A grand 111 match ODI series between India and Papua New Guinea in 2011.

India look favourites at Lord's - I'm serious.

Of all the English batsmen, the one i fear most, the one i think is capable of being the most damaging for India is undoubtedly Paul Collingwood. So, i was more than relieved to find that our potential nemesis ( he averages 68 against India ) was removed by Kumble for nought. That wicket has also almost undone the good work done by the English top order. Michael Vaughan would surely be disappointed to find the honours shared after the first day of the Lord's test, especially after his team had dominated much of today's proceedings.

When the Indian pacers don't look good, they look really bad. Zaheer and Sreesanth were insipid and wayward, and England got off to a rollicking start. ( they were averaging over 6 at the 10 over mark and even at the 20 over mark they were over 5). So, that's the second thing that would sadden Mr. Vaughan. At the close of play, the run rate has plummeted to 3.68 - not bad, you'd say, but in a match already being marred by rain, that may be crucial. One of the reasons for the Aussies relentless success has been their stress on maintaining a 4+ average, almost always allowing their bowlers plenty of time to bowl out the opposition. What's the point in piling up huge totals, if that doesn't help you win.

India has a way of letting one of the No.7, 8 or 9 pile up a huge score and let the opposition recover. If tomorrow doesn't happen to be one of those days, India are my favourites from this point. A tad optimistic that, but then I am a cricket fan, and that too a India one!*

*Cricket is a game of glorious uncertainties.

India vs England: Preview

The three of us were having yet another animated discussion the day before, on Indian cricket, when 'Citizen Shaker' made an obvious but an apt remark, "There are 2 regular openers in the side and one stand-by, and funnily enough it's only the stand-by who seems to be a certainty."

Dinesh Karthick has been the big find of the last year, impressing everyone, with his versatility of talent, and strength of character. Can you think of any other cricketer who threatened the position of two specialists in the team at the same time - one of the openers and the wicket-keeper. Quite an achievement, that!

It's been almost 2 decades now since Sunil Gavaskar last played for India, and a little under that for his long-standing partner, Krish Srikkanth, yet India's elusive search for 2 quality openers that began in the winter of 1987 continues without success. Barring Navjot Singh Siddhu and to some extent Virender Sehwag, almost none of the many, many openers that we have experimented with have had even a modicum of success. At best you may try and name Ravi Shastri, but he never really had a long run as an opener, and the only great innings i can recall are 2 - one apiece in Australia and the West Indies. Though I have a serious apprehension that BCCI's failure to find a coach for Team India might eclipse this failure very soon!

With India's batters very poor display in the tour games so far, the hope for the team actually comes from the opposite end : Freddy ain't playing, and so is Harmison. And if Hoggard joins them on the sidelines, Rahul Dravid & Co. will be facing a close to second string English attack. They relished a similar opportunity the last time they were Down Under ( Mc Grath and Warnie were both absent), and this challenge can only be easier. England has anyways been a favourite hunting ground for India's top troika. If Zaheer and Sreesanth can manage to get us the early breakthroughs, Kumble might be able to trouble the spinphobic English batsmen just about enough. I can't see Kumble causing considerable and/or quick damage, so the chief onus will lie with the experienced batters. Let's just hope that Ganguly, Dravid and Tendulkar sing for us a collective and beautiful English swan song.

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Own your own cricket ground for peanuts !!!

Can you dream of owning an Eden Gardens or a MCG ? Or if they sound too big, even something like the Mirpur or the Harare ground? ( I am assuming that Richard Branson or Bill Gates are not amongst regular readers of this blog) But here's a truly out-of-the-world offer for you - Own a cricket ground for just 25 $ !!

The moon's first cricket ground - the Dreamcricket Lunar Cricket Field - was registered with the Lunar registry this past week. The Lunar Cricket Field is located on the Near Side of the Moon in the Equatorial region, and is owned by dreamcricket.com, a US based company that is primarily into online gaming and media rights. And the price, all of 25 $ !!! So, if you are not too worried about the legalities of the sale and purchase of lunar real-estate, go ahead and own your piece of the moon, and get ready to jostle for the rights to hold the first cricket match on the moon !!

Rash of Blood

Inertia can be a dangerous thing. Ever since India's ignominious early exit from a World Cup which itself was no less ignominious, the ink in my cricket-pen dried up never to show signs of life, until today, when in an unlikely venue, in distant Ireland, Sachin Tendulkar showed life, after a long, long time.

However, what has prompted me to be back from this self-imposed hiatus was not the beauty of Tendulkar's strokes, but the high stupidity quotient of his opening partner, Saurav Ganguly. Everything was hunky dory, till Saurav began to display his regular mid-inning impatience. It's been happening for quite some time now...Remember the Bangladesh match ? India may still go on to win today's match, but that's beyond the point. What should have been a cake-walk has been converted into yet another unnecessary struggle.

I can understand one getting out at any point of time to a good delivery. I can also accept the occasional rash of blood! But a regular bout of stupidity from an ex-captain is not acceptable. If you were watching the match today, you could have almost predicted that Ganguly's fall was round the corner.

It's too late in the day to explain to Ganguly the merits of patience. Sadly instead it's time to show India's finest ODI southpaw the exit door.