The first one

The recent comments made by Rahul Dravid about the report presented by Indian Cricket Team's manager for the tour of South Africa, Chetan Desai , did not come to me as a surprise. Not that I was expecting such a comment from him but its more a question of capability of doing such a thing or making such a comment, which might be considered silly by many. Talking about one person's credentials in the Indian Cricket History, who is doing a managerial job with the team, is at best laughable. Furthermore, since the comments made were more about general attitude of Sehwag's and not about batting or bowling technicality, they don't seem unfair either. No cricketing knowledge is needed to gauge general attitude. And I think, Mr. Dravid erred in criticising a person while batting for his player. Defending your player is one thing and questioning managers credibility is quite another. So, why am I not surprised given Dravid is a nice guy and all that? Simply because he has...

Finally, England have their first win against Australia during the ongoing travesty called the "Commonwealth Bank Series " after their miserably botched Ashes campaign where the only thing that they won was the toss a couple of times. And by travesty, I meant for the English. They have been generally deriding one day cricket during their build up to the Ashes. How very stupid of them.. I mean, I can understand Australians deriding one day, tests or whatever form of cricket. Hell, the guys win most of the games, any form of it and win every single one that matters. What I don't understand is how can England, so miserable in anything which says limited overs or any cricket in general these days, have such a complacent attitude . Specially, with the World Cup barely few months away. Till the Ashes were comfortably snatched, every other English player seemed to be in Ashes dreamland. Anyways, Ashes have gone to dust now and the English need wins like the other day to boost/ s...

I have good amount of optimism about India 's chances in World Cup 2007. I believe the pieces of the puzzle are slowly falling into place. So, here is my eleven for the World Cup given present form and fitness. I will give the reasons for my optimism later on in the post. 1. Sourav Ganguly 2. R. Uthappa 3. R. Dravid 4. S. Tendulkar 5. Yuvraj Singh 6. MS. Dhoni (wk) 7. V. Sehwag 8. Irfan Pathan 9. AB. Agarkar 10. Harbhajan Singh 11. Zaheer Khan The rest to make up the 15 are as follows: 12. Dinesh Kartik (wk/middle order bat) 13. S. Sreesanth 14. Ramesh Powar 15. VVS . Laxman Let me give you my opinions about each one case by case: 1. Ganguly has done enough till now to be included in the squad as the first choice opener. He has scored runs regularly since his return in all conditions home and abroad. Also, the fellows unquestionable thirst for the bigger stage will hold India in good stead. If I were the coach, I will tell him not to throw away his wicket and build his ...

Alan Wilkins doesn't make too much of a lawn tennis commentator. Sleepy and irritatingly at loss of words. Of course, he doesn't seem to know the game well enough. V- ee -jay Amritraj is better. Or shall we put him in the cricket commentary box??

Now that selectors have finally got rid of Ganguly, all I can feel is a bit sad about the whole thing. Although, I am not one of Ganguly's maniacal Kolkatan supporters, I am not one to disregard him as well. So, I think the selectors have been a bit hasty in chucking him out of the squad. He might have been given another go in the third test, if not as a number 6 then at least, as an opener. If Indian team management can send Irfan Pathan as an opener then why not have Ganguly open as an experimental move. Gautam Gambhir has looked a wee bit low on confidence in the recent inings. Also, I do not buy the selectors and some past players logic that as a senior player, he must be played. IMHO, he might be kept in the squad and the better person on the day might be taken in the playing eleven. And this might be made clear to Ganguly beforehand. Bad behaviuor, attitude and all, no one can question the guy's fighting qualities. So, probably, he should have been let to live one more da...

Well, the title refers to a Hindi word meaning commotion. And thats what seems to be the state of Indian cricket journalism, post Chappel selection. There is too much being written about him and his methods, even before a single match has been played under him. He has been regularly touted as The Professor (there goes your invention, Deano!) who has come in and now will teach all cricketers out of form/luck/attitude/technique/health/prime/etc, correct methods to acquiring cricketing excellence in four simple steps. This is completely mindless. And mindless aftermath it would be when India again loses despite having a master tutor like Chappel riding with them. As for Chappel himself, I don't think he has been handling media well himself. He is certainly not helping matters by touting Sehwag as the future captain and branding Sachin as past his prime. Though, he is fully entitiled to his views, he must learn to keep them to himself and work with the players concerned through individ...

Looking at the rate at which Brian Lara is raking up centuries, he would get to that 35th century mark, much desired by a certain Sachin Tendulakar, first. He has been in sublime form right from the start of the South African tour and is running full steam ahead into the Pakistan tour as well. On top of that, Lara doesn't seem to be habouring any injury worries as well. With Sachin out for at least four months and West Indies scheduled to play about 5 tests(2 vs Sri lanka, 3 vs Aussies) by the year end, the mark doesn't seem entirely out of reach. And Lara might not be playing for that 35th century as Sachin seems to be these days. So, that might give him a slight mental advantage. Anyways, we spectators are in for a good race for sure :-)

I was appalled by some of the comments that the aspiring coaches of Indian origin made on the selection of Greg Chappell(/them being not considered) as Indian cricket teams coach. Sample some of the comments by Ajit Wadekar, Ashok Malhotra, Amarnath etc at cricinfo http://content.cricinfo.com/quote/content/page/156062.html. I fail to understand why they are raving about an Indian not been given the opportunity to coach. Before John Wright came along, there were only Indians all the way. And what did they achieve? Did anyone know that the Cricket Team HAD a coach before? If anybody knew, how many attached any importance to it? Not many, I guess. All these stupid comments are a further testimony of their incompetence. The only Indian worth considering, Sandip Patil, quietly rejected the offer without making any hue and cry about it. And he was worth considering only because he had proved it. He had taken a far lesser team to the World Cups semis, Duckworth-Lewis, rain, boycott and all. H...

So, Team India (BTW who has coined this team india crap??) got a new captain, though only temporarily. A lot of debate has been going on in the past about Rahul Dravid replacing Sourav Ganguly as India's Cricket Captain. Who is better?? I think, a comparison is not at all fair at this point. But I still think that Dravid might not prove to be as good a captain as Ganguly. Ganguly has done the hard yards. He has practically built this team from nothing (which is slowly withering away). He is definitely a better man- manager in my opinion. He chides and makes up (remember his fisticuffs with Srinath). And he has won battles both on personal form and team front. Dravid, if he takes over, will have a slightly easier task. First of all, he has a clutch of talented/proven players already available to him. Secondly, he does not have to bring in a culture change in the team. He has already done that with Ganguly. So, his task is promarily to get that burning desire back. Or, may be more i...

And Team India has got it seriously wrong. Whats wrong with these guys? Although, Afridi is a far better batsman than he is given credit for, Indians should have had a plan against him. I don't think they had/have any considering that in every other match he gets away with a blistering knock against them. And today, he absolutely pummulled the Indians. Time for the team to get its act together.