Late Cut

Bit outside the off stump, probably fifth stump; that was the first ball of the over. Good pace, lovely out swinger and also a bit late movement. The ball is only 7 overs old. The game has just begun; no wickets down yet. That is a bit of a surprise since the opponents are slightly mis-matched. The bowling side has representative players of high skill; the opening batsmen are not highly ranked but not bad; after all they are playing first grade district cricket. In grade cricket anywhere in Australia, that is no mean achievement. The line then changes slightly towards the off stump next ball. One after that and it keeps coming towards the off stump with same late outswinger and off the deck movement. I can see what the bowler is up to now. The opener has been stubborn, not very skilful but good enough to leave good balls and not good enough to touch the cockers!! Three overs that the bowler has bowled from my end, I am certain would have produced a wicket, if the batsmen were...

Five tests and Indians proved to be duds, even after winning a famous test at Lords after a long time; and that too more for the way in which they won rather than the result itself! Perhaps for the first time England were bounced out by Indians! They have been spun out many times but bounced out?? I never though I would live to see that..Strange thing though was that some bouncers were actually quite friendly!! Only a few were in the West Indian category of eighties. But Poms reciprocated the chivalry of Indian bowlers by being even better hosts, and hit them straight down the throats of very visibly placed deep midwicket, square leg fielders. Honestly it was as much an English loss as it was an Indian win. This is not to detract from one of the finest and worthy centuries in the history of Indian cricket; a superlative century in the first innings by Ajinkya Rehane on a spicy wicket and against a skilfully mean set of seam bowlers. Or a singularly unidirectional but lion-hearted...

Indian cricket team is once again living up to its tag of being unpredictable. The difference is till now in the tournament, it has shown the kind of consistently dominating performance that can only be termed as oxymoronic for Jekyl and Hyde nature that Indian fans are so used to. It is indeed a pleasant surprise. I thought they would be tested by the Sri Lankans, but probably the toss going in favour of Indian captain and then the support he got from his new ball bowlers in forst 15 overs, really put a nooze around the Lankan throats. Dhoni is too smart a captain to let that loose; to me the brilliance of his captainship was a decision to take the pads off and bowl a few overs when his main pace bowlers were coming close to exhausting their quota and clearly, one of the best batsman of spin bowling ever, Mahela Jayavardane was waiting for spinners to come on. Dhoni got the nod from Aleem Dar with a hooping in-swinger, only to be denied by the DRS. But that and Dhoni's spell infac...

Border-Gavaskar trophy was the pinnacle of cricket rivalries of the first decade of this century. Ignited by one of the best series ever to have been played, 2000-01 series in India, where Indians came from behind and only second time in the history of test cricket, ended up winners after being made to follow on, set the tone for the explosive rivalry. The cricket between the two has always been electric, rivalry fierce and has often involved gamesmanship bordering on the breach of spirit of cricket, but all being taken as the spice that has made this rivalry a real Masala recipe; a typically Indian. To the credit of Aussies, whose visits to the sub-continent was once in a decade affair till 80s, changed their perception and made it a point to win this "Last frontier", especially since their world beating team had won every where else. After incredible arm-wrestle, eventually Aussies broke through for the first ever series win in India after 35 years of drought at Nag...

Is DRS a Decision Review System or Dead Revived System? Looked like it was laid to rest after India's tour to the Old Blighty, when ICC declared it no longer mandatory . However, no sooner did the Indian team arrive down under, the issue has been raised thanks mainly to the Eagle Eye technology owner or supporter, Channel Nine, who seem to be convinced that their word on everything in world cricket has to be final. Sky TV commentary team in England did the same and gleefully, trumpeted poetic justice, every time a decision went against Indians...till VVS Laxman was reprieved by the so-called infallible "Hot spot" technology (use of Infrared camera to detect contact between bat and ball). Michael Vaughn's infamous tweet about Laxman's cheating by applying Vaseline on the edges of the bat to "hide" the hot spot, proved at least one thing, irrevocably; EVERY ONE is still suspicious about the capability of ANY technology to be 100% correct. Something that...

Brutal Veeru Sublime Veeru Viv like Veeru But most importantly, Focussed Veeru!! Though this innings of Virender Sehwag came against a reasonable rather than testing bowling and a feather-bed of a wicket, the way in which he approached it, indicates that if this player puts his mind to it, he can break all possible records in the annals of this game. To me, this puts Veeru right besides my most favourite batsman of all time, Viv Richards. There is lot more to Veeru than mere statistics, but they do tell something. Look at the following charts and it will show how Veeru is the most non-discriminating batsmen ever. He does not discriminate against any type of bowling, conditions, match situations and most importantly, the state of his own innings. He treats all same...one-dimensionally. If a ball is bowled, it is meant to be hit! And he rarely hits a shot in anger....he doesn't need to. He started off a little circumspectly, as his first 50 runs came off 41 balls or a ...

Reading an interesting article by News Limited's Senior Cricket Correspondent, Malcolm Conn in the Sydney Daily Telegraph of Sat, 6-Aug-11, just confirmed a few things I already know. Since this article is unavailable on-line, it is given below verbatim, in full, including two pictures. _________________________________________________________________________  Why India doesn't want to know about the technology that Australia can bring to Umpiring decisions: Malcolm Conn These photos prove why India has been using third rate technology as an excuse to stop video umpires ruling on the leg before wicket decisions. The photos (left) with the spars red dots highlights the cheap and inaccurate system the International Cricket Council used during the recent World cup, which raised India's ire. The tightly packed white dots in the photo (right) shows the space age technology Channel Nine began using last season and will use again for the New Zealand and India series this s...