Harbhajan : Now or never

A shame and a disgrace for the best Test team in the world. A team that blanks Australia 2-0 is content with 2 draws with a # 8 team in the world.  A team that wins Tests more often than it draws or loses is not able to win a single Test against hapless opposition which was blanked 0-4 by a minnow team.  Someone from the opposite camp is good enough every time to thwart the champions with a stubborn 100.

Be it Mac, Baz or Bewda Ryder, they are men of character and might not be blessed on talent, but high on temparament and attitude.

India is a  concerned unit right now. The bowling attack has not been able to take 20 Kiwis wickets in any of the 2 test matches so far. Pitches anyone? Not quite.  Look at the bowling attack -- Zaks, Santh, Harbhajan and IPL.

Except Zaks, noone is toothy enough to take wickets on consistent basis.

Harbhajan is happy making runs with the bat whereas he should be concerned on his dwindling bowling stocks. Few years back when he was young and better bowler than he is today, he consistently took 5-fors and 10-fors. Look at his numbers, 24 5-fors. Most of them coming in his early years of Test cricket. And at a time when he should have been doing a Kumble to the team, he is not even himself that he was in early 2000s.

Harbhajan the bowler needs to step up. Ojha is good for bowling marathon spells but not good enough to run through an opposition in a single sensational spell of spin bowling which we have witnessed in home Tests in last 2 decades. When Kumble was around, the visiting teams had tormenting times starting 3rd session of 3rd day. And now they are happy to bat out for a draw. And when there is an occasionally inspired spell of bowling from one of the visiting bowlers, India finds itself in a dock. Heavens gracious we have batsmen capable enough to bail us out of the hole, but tis the bowlers who put us back in the hole with their headless and mindless bowling.

Time is ripe to look elsewhere for the spinning options, if Harbhajan does not mend up his ways and takes charge as leading Indian bowler now that Zaks is out to a groin strain.

Chak de phatte Ulu de patthe Harbhajan!!

Following on Lankans!!

I am mighty pleased over the plight of Sangakara and his bravado men. They are following up. Whom? West Indies. A team nobody gave hoots to. They are making mighty talking giants Sri Lankans following on behind them.

And those big hundred makers, those run machines on the low slow dry lifeless pitches of Sri Lanka -- Sangakara, Mahila, Samaraweera and P Jaya were content with 50s. What a disgrace man. Cant believe they didnt make 100s on a so called hapless Windies attack.  Oh jeez, the character stocks of Lanka have gone to negative. And did you notice, ever since Chris Gayle made superb 333, the assertive, media frenzy, word lover, bugbear fan, austerity champ Kumara Sangakara has not spoken a word. He has gone to a hiding, the media headlines that screamed big  about his rants are now silent on his whereabouts.

Instead he is sending over Mendis to talk to media who is not being politically correct and he expressed fears that Gayle might go on and make a 400.  Nah, i m not seeing Sanga's comments anywhere.

Poor he. He had said before the start of the series that the spinners would be they key. But then who are the spinners for them? Mendis and Randiv. Mendis got a 6-for but well he leaked out 170 runs for those 6 wikats.

They are going to find winning test matches even more difficult now that the Murali king of chucking has retired. And they dont have Malinga too. Instead they have a Chanaka and Dhammika.  And yes Mahila, Kumara, Ajantha, Rangana too.

So if tomorrow on day 5, weather permitting, WI is able to bowl out Sri Lanka and chase down a small target, the Lankans would be a hurt lot and that would please me a lot cos they have tortured the cricket fans over the years with their negative brand of Test cricket ever since that ugly 952 Test.

India edge ahead on day 3

Harbhajan Singh is on a roll. Batting wise.

3rd consecutive 50.

69, 115 and now 85 not out. Good enough than Sangakara's scorelines.

Even better is his approach to shield his slapmate Sreesanth, who is restrained so far and has not seen Andre Nel in Arnel, Martin, Southee or Vettori yet.

Tomorrow few more (30-40) runs would put Kiwis to pressure and then IPL Ojha and Harbhajan himself can expect a quick wickets to ensure India does not chase bigger 4th innings total.

The middle order has not been able to impose itself on the inexperienced Kiwi attack -- Tendulkar, Dhoni and Raina have not been able to score as much as they want to...

VVS Laxman scored 74 in his first home test in 14 years of Test cricket. He has been on song off late and would continue to carry this golden run in 2011 too when India play away series in West Indies, England and Australia preceeded by West Indies at home.

Another interesting Test match looms with a realistic possibility of a result.

Cricketers are childish to Shahid Afridi

In eyes of Shahid Afridi, except himself, every one is childish.

MoYo
YoKha
Julfi
Yaseer Hameed
Amir
Butt
Butt
Asif Malik

All.

Virender Sehwag

Sehwag is bloody damn good. He is a different player from those boring openers around the world like Paravaraniratne or Taufeek Umar or Hafeez or Hashim Amla or Ali Cook.

He just does not give a freaking chance against him and when you get a chance, you dance high in the air counting how valuable his wicket is.

A 173, 1, 96 in a 3 Test series is freaking awesome. Playing as per conditions. Not a mindless slog as his opponents cast him to be.

Look at Micky Mouse Arthur, he is still getting nightmares from those 319 runs in Srikanth's Chennai that he has written in his autobiography.   He bloody ended career of bearded Saqi Mushtaq as his guru, the GOD did for Abdul Qadir back in 1989.

Sehwag is a unconventional batsman for the modern cricket which is full of players who like to poke out verbal diarohea in the public. Captains talk big things, the bowlers predict big things, an out of form Surd bowler takes himself to be an allrounder,a bowler good enough to bowl in nets at grade C club cricket thinks himself to be a test level bowler.

Sehwag is uncluttered in his mind. He adapts himself to the conditions, stays in a shell for time being and once he feels he has spent time good enough in the middle he comes back to his elements and then mercilessly slaughters the bowlers.

The opposition is so scared of his 100 that they feel they would go to mental asylum if he scores a 100. Evidence of this was evident in Lankan series when Randi bowled a no ball to him delibarately on behest of Dilli babu. Perhaps he forgot he plays for Delhi DareDevils and Sehwag is the king there.

Modern day cricket offers no good sight than Sachin and Sehwag in full elements. Those shots out of nowhere just give you a kick in the butt and you want more of Sehwag, Sehwag.

Just think how idiot Dilip Vengsarkar was who kicked him out and brought in Dinesh Karthik. Asshole.  Look where Bossadeshwar is and where Viru is.  DK is rotting in domestic cricket making single digit figures constitently and Viru, the king is making 100s consistently.

I second Ian Chappell when he says Viru is the most entertaining and rocking batsmen of modern era. And compare that with the likes of Sanga Nanga, Mahila Blabba, Amla Damla, YoYo Bobo. You would see where Viru is.

Champion batsman and a superstar.  Whaddyaplayer. Chuck de phatte Viru de bacche...

His 96 was one classic inning that has brought India back into the game in cyberabad after Zaheer and Bhajji rolled over Kiwis in the morning session.

Sri Lankan Ravans

Sri Lanka have been shoed off by Bangladesh for a Test series due to following reasons:

1. BD cricket is on a new high as I am after Smirnoff, after a 4-0 drubbing of NZ.
2. BD has refused to be part of all cricketing records against their names.
3. BD is tired of shit from Sangakara and the soft spoken Bong Babus do not want to hear the Sinhala tirades of Sangakara on how shit they are and how world class Lankan Ravans are.

So the Lankans are due to play just 5 ODIs before world cup in some locations like Hannumunakonte and some other unpronounciable locations (worse than Tiruvennavalli or Tiruvananthpuram orTircharipally) against disinterested West Indies team.

Sri Lankans play against disinterested teams and they beat them 2-0 or 3-0 and then their pig faced skipper pokes out a verbal diarrohea on how bloody good Lankans are. 

Cricinfo's Lankan page screams headline on what Mahila, the lady Jayawardhena says on how Malinga is valuable for their world cup campaign. Hell 101 wikats in 30 tests make him their 3rd highest wikat taker.

They dont have Murali and  they would struggle to bowl out Windies without their own help. Since Chuck retired, they have failed to take 20 wikats in a Test and would forever do.

And if Murali follows Younis and Yousuf, he could soon make a comeback in the tests for them.

Sanga baba is due for a press conference on how good his team would be when he would beat WI 3-0 and 5-0 and then celebrate as if they have beaten a # 1 team in the world . But hey that team are us and the Lankans can never beat us in a full series. Bwahahahahaa.

McIntosh steals thunder with a wonder on Day 1 in Cyberabad

India is struggling to take Kiwi wickets on regular basis and their inexperienced batsmen are making merry of the attack which bamboozled Australia 2 times in row. The Indians are posting a sorry figure for now and their great spinners mr Harbhajan Singh and IPL Ojha playing on his home ground so early in his career are totally ineffective thus far in the series.

Ojha has played a lot of cricket on the new stadiu in Uppal and he should know the nature of pitch, yet he starts with a sorry figure that makes us believe he is a disinterested fellow in Tests.

Harbhajan has taken his MoM award a bit too seriously for he has now stopped focussing on bowling. A good step at this point of time would be to give him a rude shock which could be well an axe for the nextd 4 Tests and instead take a rookie Ashvin. The wickets are not ocming and chances are they might not come again, but then if Ashvin gets more wickets, it would be a bonus for India.

Sreesanth is erractic and 2nd time in 3rd Tests he dismissed a batsman of a no-ball. Attitude and temparament anyone?  Beauty spells in hours and mostly erractic line. Perhaps he is coming in Tests again for free. He has not played first class cricket off late, has got injured, bowled at NCA and nets. And came back. He is putting Ishant Sharma out of the team.

Today would be a key day to decide if India wins this series 1-0 or 2-0.

India's nemesis Bewda Jesse Ryder is still on crease and old tormentor Dennie Bettori is yet to come.

And if Bhajji continues to bowl the line he is bowling right now, our spin stocks are as good as West Indies or Australia's.

Contract Haulers from BCCI

BCCI has declared the list of players that would be awarded the contracts for this year.

And the biggest surprise is that Yuvraj Singh has been relegated to Grade B and Raina, his nemesis has been promoted to Grade A.  Besides there is a drop of 17 players from 41 to 24 who have been awarded the contracts.  Grade D has been removed totally.

Likes of Munaf, RP and Dinesh Karthik have been dropped.

Coming back to the biggest shock, Yuvraj Singh.

I am of the view that this demotion is totally uncalled for and does not reflect well on BCCI's part for Yuvraj to be dropped. Agreed he had a tough indifferent 2010 owing to bad form, fitness issues, attitude issues and stuff like that.

He lost his place in the Tests and does not seem likely to get it in near future, but he is still a key player for India in next year's world cup 99 days away and the T20Is.

And Raina for a couple of blistering knocks in T20s , ODIs and Tests has not done that good enough to be in the elite company of players like Tendulkar, Dravid, Laxman, Sehwag and Gambhir.

He still needs more maturity and more time to develop as a complete batsman ignoring strong temptation for that ugly hoik over square leg that often results in his dismissal.

For once, Yuvi needs a chance to redeem himself.

Zulqarnain 's Kabootar act

Pakistan cricket continues to be in bizzare state. Just that when the focus came on the strong performances in the just concluded ODI series which ended 2-3 for them, they were again in news for wrong reasons. Zulfi Haider fled the team to go to UK on pretext of some threats to him. Those threats are perceived to be death threats for his role in 4th game which he won for Pakistan amidst high voltage drama.

What went behind his sudden departure is not known and perhaps wont be known, but some statements that he has made indicate dangerous nexus between the Pakistan cricket and the spurious elements who have unethical interest in those cricketers.  Haider had guts to walk out of his career which just began and which was on hold due to one Kakkumal.

He has goen for now, but he might return sooner or later. You never know with this cricketers,  they might come back and play.

So they should not retire, they should just go off and come back when they want to. Just like Younis, Yousuf, Afridi, Miandad, Latif, Imran Khan did.

And one fallout of this sudden departure is that one more Akamal has found his way into the team. And its Adnan Akamal, perhaps middle one of the 3 brothers (or even more). All 3 keep. Ukkumal kept in 5th ODI.

When Kakku would be back, Akkumal would be gone.

Tough to keep count of Akamals playing, but one thing is for sure. No one provided as entertainment as Kamran Akamal does.

Motera Musings

India were out of the hole again and the revival was sparked by familiar face in VVS Laxman and new batting allrounder Harbhajan Singh who got a MoM award for batting. Surprisingly he made a 100 and a  50 in a same game to become 8th batsman in the history to accompalish this feat.

The Kiwis were no pushovers and to me following were the high points of this test match:

• Superb fast bowling spell by Chris Martin on 4th evening to give a strong chance out of nowhere to Kiwis to win the test match.
• Match turning partnership by Ryder and Williamson on day 3 to bring Kiwis in touch distance within India's first innings score.
• Spectacular collapse of India in 2nd innings to be at 5/15 with just 43 runs lead.
• The man called VVS Laxman with his awesome 2nd innings record. Enough said.

The low points:

• The Motera pitch : lifeless, dull and flat. Perhaps that prevented MS to declare when India were 200 up in the fourth innings lead and safely out of danger.
• India's impotent bowling attack. Barring Zaheer Khan and to an extent Ojha, the others were insipid. 
• Continuing bowling failure of Harbhajan Singh would soon come to a point where coach and captain would need to decide if he continues to be # 1 spinner in Tests.
• Gautam Gambhir's insipid 2010 run continues.
• Sehwag's 2nd innings record continues to be patchy.
• Sreesanth should now be relegated to dancing on reality shows. He is just no use to India's lineup. Ishant Sharma seems to be better bowler than this guy.

India would be disappointed that they could not beat Kiwis and continue their winning streak. On the other hand, the Kiwis would be more than happy to get the draw with strong performances from Ryder, WIlliamson, Baz and Martin. I just hope no more tests are scheduled in Ahmedabad in near future if it continues to roll out docile, Srilankan type pitches.