"I 've had to stop smiling"

'I've had to stop smiling'

A refreshing and candid read from Younis Khan. I rate him and MS as the 2 of the best speaking captains. Very honest, very candid and refreshing.

Thats a sea change frm the character rants and projection of how good we are and process oriented from Lankan chaps. Fit in Sanga or Mahela, they would just sound shit.

Contrast this in the above interview where Osman Saimuddin asks Younis about the extreme nature of Pakistan -- sublime to ridiculous. And the chap candidly admits that this is in the inherent nature of the country.

Ditto for MS when he quotes about the fan and media pressure.

One more place where YK goes candid is the reason why he was not willing to accept captaincy post 07 world cup loss. Another place he is awesome is when he suggests how much he had to pump every player for the Australia series which in the end burnt him out and he lost the focus.

I mean in this era of self marketing who would admit the mistakes openly. That takes a big heart to do that. MS, Younis have it. Thats why they are the best of speakers and make it a refreshing read.

I dont bother about the lose twangs like Gayle or Ponting here. Strauss is not even considered. Vettori is too good a man to rip him apart on this area. He is a work man who is trying hard to carry his team on his own shoulders just like Sachin did in 90s.

Who captains Bangladesh, I dont know. Is it Asharhalf or Shakib or is it 650 million dollar baby who was KKR'ed ? I have said the best, I have said who I dont care and I say the worst speakers are Sangakara and Mahila Jaya.....

Pakistan beat West Indies in a mess up

It was a good scoreline. Pakistan won by 5 wkts. They messed up. 134 was not a huge score. Not at all. Yet the big guns made a mess. In the end the kid Akamal and the Boomer chewing gum saw it in the end that their team gets through the upset.

Misbah, Yusuf, Malik failed and thats just going to raise more brows in their country. Beating West Indies could have been a walk in the park for the Greens, but they are Pakistan. Lest they mess, they wont be the team they are. Mavericks...Their next game is against the Indians. And its not a Friday. Its a Saturday. 2003 / 3/ 1 was also a Saturday. It was Centurion then, its centurion now.

Tendulkar, Dravid, Nehra, Harbhajan were then in blue. Younis, Yusuf, Afridi were in green.

Got to see an agression in Pakistan team, the agression they showed under Wasim Akram, not under Imran Khan. Under Imran Khan, the players were more like soldiers who have taken to whites to fight the "war" against India.

Under Inzy, the Pak team mellowed and that basically gave the likes of Asif and Akhtar a chance to go wild, my view. Dare somebody do that under Akram or Imran, the player would have ended his career. Today serial offenders like Yusuf, Asif, Akhtar continue to play and get away.

Chuck out a few losers from Pakistan team and they should be a good team back to the glory of 90s. And yes PCB too.

Don't write off blues

Writing off India in ct is a huge stupidity based on their 2006 record in this country. They are the best odi team since 08. Yes bowling is freak n now no yuvraj n sehwag means more pressure on tendulkar dravid n ms. This guys have 58 hundreds n close to 31000 odi runs.

Throw in gg n Raina batting looks fairly Gud even if no Vs n ys play. There hv been talk of emotions hurt n revenge from Pakistan over weekend clash. Indians hv been quiet n I guess they wud answer those calls on field

This is in reply to the post from Dilip where he reckons India would be kicked out in the first round itself.

Sent from my iPhone

Correcting Afridi

Afridi....

So far, luck has been with India. Hopefully, it would all change this time around

Me : Not quite. 2003 wasnt luck. 1999 wasnt luck. 1996 wasnt luck. 1992 wasnt luck.

Afridi :

If they claim themselves to be the best, I would say we are also best. Every team knows its strength. We have a very balanced side. Still, I don't take any side lightly

Nope, India doesnt boast to be the best. They have shortcomings. Bowling is the main worry. They dont have fit Gambhir which makes Dancing baby a default entrant to the team. No Zaheer too.

Few days back Younis Khan had said "ab humara haq hai jeetne ka".

Alright, play it on the field. Better team on the field wins. Past records, political tensions and emotional stuff doesnt matter.

How well you play for 100 overs would matter on 26. And its not a Friday. Last time when India beat Pakistan in a world cup was a Friday. And in 1980s every Sharjah encounter between the two teams was a Friday affair for unknown reasons.

SL win the first game in lottery

........as in D/L method. Plenty of character shown. Bhar bhar ke. I guess character was distributed for free in the flight from Colombo to South Africa. Dilshan continued his form in ODIs, Jayasuriya continued to count one more failure and ticking Mahila to write him off and say that pressure is on the senior pro to perform and show his character.

BAW WAW Mendis took 3 wkts or 4 to prove that Saffers cannot play spin. Is Mendis back ? Ask Pakistanis or Indians. Answer aiwai mil jayega.

Unfortunately for Saffers, time wasnt theirs as AB and Dale Steyn said. Mahila, supposedly an abundance character man sparkled once in a million times and his time was today. So the next games now he would be back to his scoring pattern.

Sanga Singh who is now the "aaankho ka dulara" for every sub continental cricket writer (exclude Indians) was among runs too. I havent digged his post match interview. I saw the scoreline in the office on my iPhone and first word i said was "Damn" when SA scored read 4/121 in 21 overs.

A lot of euphoria has been generated around the statements made by Sanga Singh and people call them as mind games. Whatever they are, they are most boring and repititive. He should learn some new stuff before saying the same stuff which in a short is " We are trying to win every game , have a process and have a long term goals". Give us a breather man. We aint robots to listen to the same shit every time you open your mouth.

Learn something from Dhoni who would be ruthlessly honest in stunning the team, media and fans by quoting that bowling was bad, batting was good, XX player was fine or bad. Ah man. India boosting. Yup.

Saffers, as Q says are hopeless in multi team tournaments. I believe this is one game SA played with SL after 2003 tie game which kicked them out of the tournament and ended Pollock's captaincy.

If thats true 6 years and no game in SA. Alright thats true. SL havent toured SA since 2002. Amazing. Have toured Bangladesh 3 times and Zimbabwe 2 times. No wonder they have inflated averages.

South Africa wont be affected that much as they next play England and New Zealand. SA and SL should be good to go to the semis, though I would hope England and NZ show a bit more character in taking out the character out of the SL team.

Bowling worries India

India's bowling is a worry.

And their best bowler in the warm up game is not going to play the most important game of the CT. Not because he is a lowly bowler on talent, but because his captain doesnt put that trust in him.

This is South Africa and there is place for just one spinner. And that spinenr is going to be Harbhajan Singh who is fresh from a 5-for.

RP Singh had a fabulous T20 world cup in 2007. How far he goes this time is not very sure as he is not seeming to be in good form. He was clobbered for 66 runs in 8 overs by Neil Broom.

Ishant Sharma has been on and off. Praveen Kumar well I am not sure if he would be playing. Ashish Nehra seems to be the best bet to rely on right now.

Zaheer Khan seems to be missed big time in this tournament. A country where he has been tremendously successful except the match on 3/23/03 against Australia, the biggest match of his career.

Possible bowling line up looks like : Nehra, Ishant, Harbhajan and RP.

Batting more or less looks settled. Tendulkar, Gambhir to open with Dravid at 3, Yuvraj at 4, MS at 5, Raina at 6. 7th spot seems to be in a bit of doubt. I would rather give the benefit of doubt to Yusuf Pathan in the first game and then may be try Nayar in the game against dummy Bangladesh.....

If the bowlers do their job half decent, the Indians would be good to live up to their reputation as the best ODI team in last 2 years. They have now won 6 trophies on trot. No other team can boast of the same record.

Warm up game pointers

Dancing baby cant play in a warm up game tooo.....He opened with Dravid and hit a IPL style 20 and got out thinking he was playing a T20 and his job done.

He has played his quota of the game on the tour. He is not getting any game once the main tourney starts and in the match of the tournament -- vs Pakistan there would be no Praveen Kumar, RP Singh and no Dancing baby...

Bowling looks now a worry too :D

Go long Yusuf (Indian)

Yousuf Pathan is the next man whose place in the final XI should be in danger. Ages since he performed. And T20 specialists must perform if they got to go longer in longer form of the games.

Go long Yusuf.

Pre-condition for new cricket era in Pakistan

"
For me, we're at the beginning of a new era for Pakistan cricket. It will be a nomadic, often difficult time, but it is a period that will require wise leadership, long-term strategies, and a large supply of patience."

Not untill Ijaz Butt is ousted..........

CT practice updates

SL's character men failed to show it against Pakistan to lose it by 108 runs. Mahela flopped, Sanga flopped.

Yusuf flopped.

Mendis flopped.

Akmal bros clicked, so did Misbah and Naveed Al Hasan. Who s he ? Is he Rana ? ICL man ?

Other hand NZ lost. West Indies lost.

Perhaps BD would have been better......

Australia would win in another practice game vs England C in England to begin their defence of the title and finally lose it to India in the semi final.