INDIA NO 1 IN ENGLAND ????

 THE DEFENCE OF THE WORLD CHAMPIONS CONTINUES : 
                     
                                    The Europhia surrounding the World Champions now seems to be settling down as this team now gets ready to start their defence of their No.1 spot.India toured WI with a relatively younger team,results may be pleasing to win 1-0 overseas,but now the thinking has started to change.India no more worries about saving the match,the thinking now is to dominate and crush the opposition just the way Australia and West Indies used to do.The Series win did nothing to show our dominance, there was an opportunistic chance to win all the 3 tests but thanks to the Bad Light and a fear of Failure from the Indian Management did not allow us to go for the kill. Yes If we had Viru and Gauti with Sachin we would surely gone for it, but as Dhoni pointed out we just couldn't risk the series win and like always he backs his players anytime.Vijay and Kohli failed to impress in the few chances that they got and pity Badrinath he still for me remains one of the most unluckiest player ever. PK and Ishant Sharma grew leaps and bounds to take the responsibilty and always had the West Indies batsmen under control.The plus along with PK , Ishant was the form of Dravid and Laxman , when you dont play test matches for months it takes time to come in and perform under pressure since our beloved BCCI never believes in practice matches.Mukund and Raina grabbed their chances , more so Raina who played 3 crucial knocks to get fifties just when India needed them the most.Mukund threw is good starts since he seem to be confused on his technique on whether to press forward or go back and across which cost him dearly but with time we can expect him to get better.

Will Bhajji the bowler
wake up ??

                               
                                           The biggest disappointment of the tour was Harbhajan Singh, the bowler, in the 1st test he played exceptionally well to get his 70 but it was his bowling that seems to have fallen apart.400 wickets and the greatness that one should get is never with Bhajji since he always looks to have under performed.A Top spinner of the country is expected always to be looking for wickets but it looks like Bhajji is the victim of too much limited format bowling.On a turning pitch when your leading offspinner starts bowling from middle and leg ,you have to realise he is lacking self belief.He can have a look at Swann who currently deserves to better bowler as he always looks for wickets with his attacking lines outside off stump.Bhajji needs to reignite the fire for the greatness that his fans and many people want him to achieve.

Ishant at his best !!

                         

                        The England tour starts in a few weeks time with a tour match against Somerset.India have a full strength squad with them,giving them a chance to acclimatize to the conditions in England.8 players auto select themselves in the first match at Lords and those are Sachin , Gambhir, Dravid, Laxman, Dhoni, Harbhajan, Zaheer and Ishant.The team will surely be strong but such is the query now that India might consider playing 5 bowlers.Since winning in England you have to take 20 wickets and with 4 seamers along Bhajji it makes sense but that reduces the batting and the team already missing Virender Sehwag its a huge risk of playing 5 bowlers.So the contest now comes between Sreeshanth,PK,Munaf Patel for the 3rd seamer spot. PK can swing the ball and England will be just perfect for him but his lack of pace and aggression of Sreeshanth can be handful to India bowling.Munaf Patel sadly wont be the part till anyone from front line bowlers gets injured.Mukund with his good knocks in West Indies looks to be in the team for the 2 tests till Viru gets fit.Raina and Yuvraj again will fight for the No.6,Raina played very well in the Carribean though Dhoni has always backed Yuvraj in team knowing that if he can take his World Cup form into the tests against the team he loves to play he can be very very dangerous at No.6.

One more trophy ?? 

                                       
                It all comes down to handling the situation better now for India has they now have one of the best team touring England , the series win might not be enough now as India has to now look for the winning mindset going into any test match. Will Dhoni had one more test win  trophy to his cabinet or well we cant see India loose,Can we ????

THE UDRS !!!

ICC meet has started in Hong Kong to improve the simple game of Cricket on the MCC  Cricket committes few recommendations.Whenever you here the implementation of UDRS all that one hears is BCCI.They say BCCI rules the ICC and everything else,can some one rule an international organisation just on the basis of money and revenue ??
                               They say BCCI is stopping the implementations of  UDRS. Niranjan Shah (BCCI official ) explained to all about the economic feasibility  of the system, but the mindset towards BCCI is such now that even a deaf man will recognize a BCCI official speech.Why did this whole thing come up ??? What went so wrong that all countries are running after it ???? Before going to that there are few more rules that I think will improve the game in lot better way than the UDRS.
                                Cricket has always been a batsmen's game.You can have a certain batsmen come down the pitch and smack the bowler out of the ground but at the same time if the bowlers crosses a line , that's a free-hit for the batsmen, fairness ???? A batsmen can wander around his crease and still play shots , but if the bowler's foot cuts the back lines its again a no-ball ????? Experts say after all the batsmen is looking for runs and is innovative enough to do so, well the bowlers are also humans even they should be given the same freedom.Switch hit ,its already been discussed about how it really favours the batsmen,Everytime we want the bowlers to come up with some thing new within the laws , why cant we ask the same to batsmen??? Umpires Rules says the batsmen cant be given out if the ball touches any equipment used by the fielders (like an Helmet), but they will give runs to team if the ball hits the batsmen helmet and goes for 4 Leg Byes, Why is it a crime being a bowler ?????
                         UDRS ,as told is to reduce the horror umpiring decisions, we always forget that that can be done by catching out players.Players who know they are out and should walk.When you want every possible chance as a batsmen,you want technology,don't you need to be honest and brave enough to walk when you knick it.You want Umpires to be helped .then why not giving them the power to consult the 3rd Umpire for it whenever they want ??? When a batsmen gets out if he is wrongly given out , why is the 3rd Umpire quiet ??? He can see the fault and help the on-field umpires by telling them what actually happened.Won't this improve the over all Umpiring , but  nope we want technology, why all this years cricket lived with technology or Umpires ???? Yes today too we can survive.

                              What BCCI told that the cant afford $60,000 per day in a match for UDRS,why is that so wrongly taken ???? If you are in the University Exam section you know students copy and cheat so will u set up a 50,000 network set up in all the states to catch those few cheats ??? No u wont , that's not the want.You need to realize that the decisions can be made,those horrors can be avoided with the collaboration of the available 3 umpires.You can think of implementing UDRS when you have full stands filled with people since that will help you recover the money.UDRS is costly when we see 1000 people watching a dead rubber.ICC gave an option and BCCI upheld it, If ICC wants this dearly they can just force it as Boycott Sir rightly said to outvote BCCI. But first better look at the idiotic rules and then lets turn to technology.We have already complexed this game lot more please Lets keep this simple silly.

The Defence of the champs !!

 Some one said true that its always easy to go to top but the tough part is to maintain that position.The West Indians did it for a considerable amount of time followed by the dominance of Aussies.Now its time for INDIA to rule.And the tour of WI provides them to kick start a very busy but tough season with tours of English and Australia later this year.The WC win seems ages ago with the exuberance of IPL4 covering the entire nation.IPL has done its bit for the selectors as it presents us with the opportunity to test out the youth n give them the experience at the top level.


IPL 4 league matches are almost done with and there have been some great individual performance by the Indian players.With just two days to go for the team to be selected for the tour of West Indies,lets analyze the chance of players who can be aspiring to go on board .


With Sachin and Sehwag almost sure to be sitting out due to rest n surgery respectively , there presents an opportunity for new openers.Vijay was the back up opener when ever there was an issue about it , now his performance have not being commanding the position.This presents Kohli n Gambhir to open the innings.They have a strong middle order in the Yuvraj,Dhoni,Raina.


We can see Yusuf Pathan n Rayadu who along with Rohit Sharma have a chance to fight for that one slot.Jadeja mite have chance to be on board but that can then have toss up between Uthapa n Jadeja.The choice is obvious now.The bowling line up auto selects itself with Zaheer,Bhajji,Nehra and Ishant Sharma with his strong IPL performance will go ahead in race with Sreeshanth.Ashwin with his consistent show is almost sure to grab the second spinner slot which makes the squad complete of a balance team.Now lets see what the selectors go for !! 


Squad : MS Dhoni(wk)(c),Yuvraj(vc),Gambhir,S Raina,V Kohli,R Sharma,A Rayadu, H Singh, Z Khan, R Ashwin,A Nehra,I Sharma,Y Pathan , R Uthapa, R Jadeja.