KKR off to a winning start with a YES Bank Maximum Win

Defending champions KKR won their first game in the run to defend their title. And the one on losing side were Virender Sehwag 's Delhi Daredevils. 

Earlier Srinivasan and Dhoni had instructed Delhi Daredevils management to drop Sehwag from the playing XI and attribute it to the back spasm. Dhoni wants to ensure that Sehwag gets no chance to explode back to form and in process find a way back in the ODI and Test team.

Pun intended for above para.

Back to the game, this time the star of the win was Sunil Narine who took 4 wickets and spun KKR to its first win of the season and 5th win over DD in last 6 games.  From DD, only Mahela and Dave Warner ran into double digits and the rest failed miserably. Of course they were without 2 of their best batsmen of last season -- Sehwag and KP. 

Mahela's jugglery did not inspire "CHARACTER" in the Delhi lads and in the end Gambhir led his team with a 29 ball 42 to a win that also piled agony on the viewers to witness the owner of KKR team once again on the holy Eden Gardens ground.

The sighting of Bollywood "Bhands" is a ugly view on the grounds which should only be left for cricketers to step in.  Unfrotunately IPL is a mix of Bollywood crap and cricket. 

And yes this time it is YES BANK MAXIMUM instead of DLF Maximum. Pepsi Maximum should have sounded better.  Suddenly DLF Maximum sounded better, the word we had bemoaned all this years.

Players who will be missed this year - 1

Players who will be missed in this season of IPL : 

Sourav Ganguly

The T20s never suited his style of play when he was past his prime, although he stood a great chance of succeeding in the shortest format, should IPL have arrived when he was in his pomp in mid 2000s. He had his share of controversies in the IPL auctions, franchisees and after last year's poor show from his franchisee, he called it enough is enough. He will not play this year and that robs his die hard fans (like me) another chance to see their Prince of Calcutta in action. Watching him captain the team and batting is a pleasure to eyes and one can always anything of him is never enough.  Although he shall be missed on field, I am sure he shall make for that absence in the commentary box and for a change he will speak less of those sponsor prefixes before every 4, 6 and a catch.

Michael Clarke

Australian captain, their best batsman and their chance to recover the Ashes until the 4-0 drubbing happened.  He was never a T20 styled player. Guessing that he retired soon from T20Is and was reluctant to participate in IPL. He participated last year, had very little success. And this year he was retained by Pune, but the back injury happened followed by stomach trouble. He was promptly withdrawn by CA to rest and gain full fitness ahead of back to back Ashes this year. 

Kevin Pietersen

A lot has been said about how much he wanted to play the entire season of IPL and he risked his England career for that. He managed to get back in the team through a phased process, but the irony stuck hard. He will miss the entire season of IPL this year and that might be a loss to Delhi Daredevils, but certainly England shall benefit from this layoff.  Not to mention he is much loved player in India and how much crowd loves KP in full form.

Jesse Ryder

The cricketing world was relieved to see the big guy coming out of induced coma this week and to find that he will be fine but after a long battle ahead. He will be sorely missed for his attacking game play, more by Delhi Daredevils than New Zealand for now.

Players to watch out for in IPL - 1

Players to watch out for this IPL Season 6:

Virender Sehwag

Out of favor in all 3 formats, this jamboorie season of IPL will provide a strong platform to repeat 2012 heroics and win back his ODI place for the upcoming Champions Trophy. He is no longer the captain, so he should find the ways back to play the way he has always done for the last 13 years and God Willing will continue to do for next few years.   

Gautam Gambhir

Captain of SRK's defending champion franchisee and out of favor Test opening batsman. His ODI form remains decent, but like Sehwag he will need to find  form very soon ahead of Champions Trophy in England. He almost made a comeback in 4th test against Australia, but jaundice pulled him down. Fit again, he will need to find ways to get runs in his bank  rather than focussing on retaining the IPL silverware.

Virat Kohli

He is RCB captain this year and all eyes will be on the next batting sensation of India to see how he moulds in the captain's  role. Many in India see him as a natural successor to Dhoni in Tests and ODIs, so it will be very interesting to see how he leads the beleaguered Vijay Mallaya's franchisee and on the other hand how many runs does he make and if the captaincy affects his silken and crispy batting...

Shikhar Dhawan 

So called next batting sensation and supposedly a loud mouth, a Jat and of course the fastest century maker on Test debut. All eyes will be on him, if he continues his Test form in IPL and wins back his place in ODIs as well.  A patchy IPL might not earn him a ODI recall, but a half decent to a successful one will be enough to make him the 3rd opener in the squad and will compete against Virender Sehwag (form and fitness permitting)... He plays for the worst team of past 2 seasons -- SunRisers and his run of luck will also define the fortunes of his IPL franchisee. 

Ravinder Jadeja

Unexpected success of Australia Test series and most expensive buy of 2012, I wish he flops too badly and so much that he never finds a way back to the Indian test team. 24 wickets in 4 Tests would not make him an overnight great allrounder, for his batting and bowling are too one-dimensional..He surely enjoys strong backing of the men that matter in Indian cricket, so any rants like this don't matter much in his showing. He should fail sincerely.

Murali Vijay

Born on fool's day he had been looked in the Indian cricket as a fool until the Chennai Test vs Australia. And after that, he never looked behind. Top scorer of Australian test series, he has been successful in IPL for past several seasons. Unfortunately for him and luckily for the fans, his IPL success has not converted to limited overs success internationally. Another strong show in this IPL and he will be a strong contender to the opener's spot in the upcoming Champions Trophy and the Caribbean tri-series to follow next. 

Cheteshwar Pujara

Stereotyped as a test batsman, Pujara has not really set IPL on fire in his stints with RCB. He was injured last year and has missed several games due to form and fitness. He has been a member of India's ODI team vs England, but never got a chance to play. He is a fluent stroke maker and when the need be, he can often switch gears. And delightful to watch, are his classical text book boundaries.  Not long back he accelerated on his way from 150 to 200 vs England and that got him a ODI call.  One long run and successful at that will make him  strong contender in the middle order for the ODIs as well.

Yuvraj Singh

The prince of Indian cricket after DADA, he is back to full fitness after the health issues he battled last year. He missed out 2012 IPL and doesn't have a very good memories of 2011 version as he first encountered the gigantic issue he faced in that IPL.  All of that is now thing of past. He has made a successful comeback in ODIs and T20 for India.  His good run with the bat and ball will play a crucial role in deciding how far Pune Warriors go in this version after 2 very bad seasons.  Snubbed in the captaincy by an annoying Sri Lankan, he shall be committed to prove the team management of Pune Warriors wrong by putting up a very strong show.

Angelo Matthews to lead Pune Warriors

Angelo Mathews

Kumara Sangakara

Mahela Jayawardhena

3 SL cricketers, also the current and ex-captains of SL. 

But the newest thing that puts this 3 cricketers in a single bracket is that they are also IPL captains in 6th season. 

Kumara Sangakara leads the worst IPL team of previous 2  times -- Deccan Chargers and now Hyderabad SunRisers owned by DMK chief Karunanidhi's grandson (or g.nephew). 

Mahela Jaywardhena will lead Delhi Daredevils and latest Angelo Matthews will lead the Pune Warriors team ahead of Yuvraj Singh.

Aghast decision.  Michael Clarke would have been a natural choice to lead the Pune team, but he is out injured and recuperating for the Ashes campaign later this year. In his absence, Yuvraj would have been a natural choice, given he had led the franchisee in 2011. 

But franchisee said Yuvraj is the most important player for them as an allrounder and he could not be burdened with captaincy responsibilities too. Not sure how Yuvraj will take this news, but this is a very bad decision. 

On two counts. 

Number 1, the leadership abilities of Angelo Matthews are not well known or let's say they are too early to find out.  He is just appointed the captain of SL ODI and Test team and he has not started well.  So we don't know how that limited experience will help him lead an IPL team full of uncapped Indian players, few Indian legends, fringe players and of course international players. 

Number 2, with the ongoing tussle over SL players participation in this IPL, Pune might stand on a losing ground when they play their away games vs CSK who have less SL players, none too important.  Pune joins Delhi and Hyderabad franchisees who might need to play without their captains in the Chennai games. 

Not sure how much of the advantage that will provide to CSK against Delhi and Pune, but surely they will be a sure starters against Hyderabad team. For Delhi, MJ is their best bet, given his success in T20 opening role and iffy form of Virender Sehwag off late. 

It certainly would have been a logical choice to move the entire Chennai games out of Chennai to give every franchisee a fair chance and a level playing ground. But that is very less to hope for as Chennai franchisee owner is also the BCCI president and the most powerful man in World Cricket today. 

He already is responsible for lot of ills in Indian cricket, behind a lot of regional selections in the national team and the latest political row is not helping the other franchisees cause as well. 

It is futile to hope that Srinivasan will provide other franchisees a fair ground to compete as a BCCI chief. Even if he would want to as BCCI chief, the other part of IPL team owner would not want the BCCI side of him to give in. 

Although this drama is far from over, as always Chennai Super Kings team start a notch or 2 ahead of other teams in this year's IPL as well.  

Angelo Matthews leading ahead of Yuvraj Singh is another turn-off for the fans of the poster boy of Indian cricket.  I am sure Yuvraj will take it in a very good stride and will consider this as a nothing event given what he has faced in past few years in terms of health issues and the cricketing form. 

Get well soon Jesse Ryder

My thoughts, prayers and best wishes go to Jesse Ryder to get well ASAP. 

Amen.

Pepsi Indian Premier League Season 6 is around the corner.

And the times for 

Pepsi Indian Premier League

are back.  Version 6 this year, probably last time in India for at least 2 years. 

Next year general elections are due this time. So most probably it will be a repeat of 2009 drama.  Except the fact that there is no Lalit Modi this time who can take IPL to South Africa in a quick matter of few days.

This are the times when we will see again the likes of :

Shahrukh Khan

Shilpa Shetty

Preity Zinta 

in the stands dancing and singing.  And a few Telugu stars suppporting new Hyderabad SunRisers(or SunSetters, given their past 2 season performers) could be seen like Nag, Venkatesh, RamCharan, Chiru, Pavan Teja, Rana Daggubati and Siddharth...

Also the times are back when the Lankan cricketers are not welcome this time around owing to the war crime thing which is bone of contention between India and SL governments and also a muscle flexing opportunity for TN parties -- DMKs and AIADMKs.

Already there are talks of poor Akila Dhananjaya (he is a male player with a female name as is Mahila Jayawardhena) and Nuwan Kulasekara being dropped (source : Times of India) from Chennai Super Kinks...That as a last resort for India Cements to save its Chennai games and of course continue flex unholy muscles through BCCI president..

Also the times are back when a Vice President of a company owning a IPL franchisee will lead its team. Non cricketing captain ? 

Think again. Back to Lucky again, the 0-4, 0-4 loser and 4-0 winner, 2 times IPL champion, 1 time CLT20 time winner and 2 World Cup winner captain MS Dhoni shall lead the CSK again, which will definitely reach yet another final this time.

Also when the sponsor prefixes or suffixes shall be appended in front of every catch, 4 or 6.  We will come to know who are competitors to the iPhone and cheap plastic (Samsung Galaxy S3, S4 etc) in India -- Lava, MicroMax, Karbon etc.....

Also the times are back when ECB shall rant about how bad IPL is for health of Test Cricket and how holy English County Cricket is. 

Michael Clarke shall shun IPL for Ashes (which no matter what he plays or not in IPL shall be kept in England. 

Ricky Ponting shall lead Harbhajan Singh, Sachin Tendulkar and Sachin Tendulkar Next (Rohit Sharma) in Mumbai.

Sir Shri Ravindra Jadeja shall ride high on his new found Test success and it is possible he might negotiate with another franchisee for a slight higher paycheck (he might think he deserves a 3 million USD contract) and in the process might get banned yet again.

Probably we will see Rahul Dravid and Sachin Tendulkar last time playing together (for opposite teams) and in any form of cricket game.

We will see yet again that our dear old game of cricket is hijacked once more for month and half on the name of "Cricketainment". Who knows this year we might see new faces with the bodies of Rahul Sharma and Wayne Parnell. (I so much hope that M Vijay and R Jadeja are caught doping and banned forever).

Ladies and Gentlemen, the Indian Premier League is back.

SL are reborn despite a mediocre Test record

A series win against much improved BD and the SL authors are back to declaring emphatic statements "SL are reborn". "Young SL does nation proud" and similar rantings.  If not for some reckless batting by the Deshi kids in the 2nd test, BD would have gone and scared SL in 2nd test as well after setting lot of national records in the first test. 

A lot of new faces were injected in the team, a new leadership team was established and a lot of old faces were missing. The impact was visible on the performance. 

While I won't go in the details of who played well and who was bad, let me highlight the inflated figures of SL cricket in Tests. 

It has been 31 years SL is playing Test cricket.  By the end of this series they have played 222 games, won 66 and lost 80. On the onset the record looks impressive. If you take the older teams and compare this results with them SL's record would look superior. 

But in the old days there were no cheap results, there were no cheap victories and of course no cheap runs and wickets.  There were no Bangladesh and Zimbabwe then. 

Here are some hard hitting facts of SL's test record :

• 23 of those 66 wins have come against Bangladesh and Zimbabwe.

• They have not won a single test in India and Australia in 17 and 13 tests respectively.

• Their record against Australia (dominant  team in modern era) is pathetic with 1 win and 17 losses.

• They have won 1 test each in West Indies and South Africa. 2 each in England and New Zealand. In all of this countries, they have lost more than they have won.

• They rarely tour West Indies who are no longer strong as in 1980s. In last 16 years, they have played just 6 tests in Carribean islands, won 1 and lost 3. 

• The best overseas country for victories for them is Bangladesh where they have won 4 tests (vs BD) and lost 1 (to Pak). Next comes Zimbabwe where they have won 3 and lost none. In Pakistan they lost 8 but won 6. 

• They have won more against WI than they have lost. 5 of their 6 wins have come at home and when WI were even more weakened due to player strikes and similar issues (2005)

• All 6 wins against India have come in SL on low, slow pitches when Murali used to play. After Murali retired (last test they won against India), they lost 1 and drew 1 against India in SL. Without Murali they are yet to tour India.

• They have lost more than wins against England, Kiwis and SA. Most of the wins against this countries have come in bad pitches of SL, away conditions the team has struggled including their greats Sanga and Mahela Jayawardhene.

Surprisingly Sanath Jayasuriya and Mahela Jayawardhene have been their most successful Test captains with identical number of wins, losses and draws (38 tests, 18 wins, 12 losses). Again the numbers are inflated due to the fact that they play more at home than abroad. And they play BD and Zim frequently than any other team.

While all other teams have played max 10 or less tests against BD, SL has played 14 tests against them.  India and Australia are the teams that have played least against BD ( 7 and 4 tests respectively).

And with all of this mediocre record above and postponed home series, the Lankans are targetting to be one of the top 3 teams in Test cricket. Yeah well they can certainly be. Dreaming does not cost anything and why only top 3, they can certainly rule the Test cricket for next 50 years in their dreams.

Another selectorial gem from Sandip Patil and company

Another gem from Indian selectors : 

Shikhar Dhawan ruled out of the Delhi test, Gautam Gambhir picked. Fine till now. Then left out as he is diagnosed with jaundice. Unfortunate.

But there comes the blunder.

In comes Raina. For Dhawan, in comes Raina. 

A middle order batsman for an opener ? Seriously ? Will he play the final test ? If so at what place ? Will he open alongside Vijay, another CSK player ?

Oh wait, Raina is another CSK player. CSK players come in handy as replacements (no offense against Raina, he is a good player and I back him). 

So if Raina won't open then will he play ? And if he won't play then why have him in the team ? Will he bat at 7 and push Jadeja to 8 replacing Ojha ? Not quite. 

In 2nd innings when Dhawan did not bat, Pujara opened the innings with Vijay. Just like Dravid did when one of the openers used to get injured.  Some habits of Indian cricket don't change. Bad habits of course. 

So in all probability, it is going to be either Rahane who comes in the team and opens with Vijay or if they continue with Pujara - Vijay pair then Rahane shall play in the middle order. And if Raina trumps him in the middle order, then it shall be very unfortunate for Rahane after having being walked over again.....

Sandip Patil is proving to be another Kris Srikanth. Very sad to see the victorious team members of 1983 World cup proving to be disastrous selectors. Vengsarkar first, Srikanth next and now Sandip Patil.

India's 3-0 victory good on paper, not so good in foreign tours context

So India won in Mohali even MS tried hard not to in the final hour of the game. Thanks to the lusty boundaries by Sir Sri Sri Jaddu maharaj, the shackles were broken and the captain got inspired and he hit the winning runs off Starc's over. 

It was a heavy weather made of a modest target and no credit snatched from Michael Clarke who continued to believe they can win, he kept the pressure on. And by Dhoni's own admission, India felt the pressure. And that pressure saw Tendulkar and Kohli loose their wickets. 

India are now 3-0 up, 3rd time they have won 3 tests in row.  They have a good chance to win the 4th one in Delhi, Sehwag and Gambhir's hometown...

Jadeja is now established test player, a spinner though. Calling him an all-rounder would be an insult to the great all-rounders who have graced the game. But he does not solve the overall selection conundrum.  What happens when India travels abroad is a headache question. 

Also the picture on openers is not very clear. Who would be the openers in South Africa ? Logical inputs point to Shikhar Dhawan and the beard master Murali Vijay. That their temperament is questionable on foreign conditions, is another issue altogether. 

Ashvin, Ojha / Harbhajan and Jadeja might win India the 4th test as well, but this combination would not work in South Africa. They will need more of a seaming alrounder, more in terms of Henriques of Australia or Broad of England (allrounders on paper) batting at 7 position, if this combination is what India will look to play in South Africa. 

But we will worry about that later. 

For now its munching time on Aussies. One more win and the revenge will be complete. Even though this 3 victories don't sound as sweet as they often did in the past when legends swamped both teams. Kumble, Dravid, Ganguly, Laxman in India. Warne, McGrath, Gilchrist, Hayden, Langer and of course Ponting in Australia. Not to forget Steve Waugh and Mark Waugh. 

But a win is a win. And this win will go a long way in establishing Dhoni's captaincy for another year at least. And so when India tour next in alien conditions, questions will be raised how much India has learnt from those 0-8 scoreline ? And not many fans will remember the possible 4-0 result at home, but most of them shall remember 0-4 in England and 0-4 in Australia.

For record now Australia have lost 7 consecutive test matches in India and if you include draws then they have lost 8 of their last 10 test matches in India. The last win coming under Gilchrist in that infamous Nagpur test match.

Uncle Srini gives an extension to Fletcher uncle

0-4 in England

0-4 in Australia

If that was an away scoreline, then here is a look at home record:

2-0 vs Kiwis

2-0 vs WI

Fine, home victories but against lower opposition. 

1-2 vs England in India. 

Whoops.  A series loss at home after 8 years.  Shameful record.

Few more records:

Failure to make it to the finals of Asia cup and CB series in Australia.

0-3 loss in England ODIs.

1-2 loss to Pakistan in India.

That was the ODI part.

Failure to reach the World T20 semis. But that happened twice under Gary Kirsten.

Above is the record of Duncan Fletcher in the 2 years of Indian coach and the old man has  got an extension of one year owing to the continuity (as per Uncle Srini).  Not worthy of a day's extension as a coach after above pathetic record. 

He did not develop the game of a single young player abroad or improve the defects of senior players in his tenure. Fine there is a logic that the likes of Sachin, Dravid and Laxman (in Australia and England) do not require any batting advice, but then again somebody needed to go and tell them what was wrong with them. 

Another example is of Gautam Gambhir and Virender Sehwag. Under this guy, their game just went on a downward slide and the guy kept quiet. No inputs, no improvement.  No sight of improvement of form for this duo.

No out of the box strategy to startle the opposition. During England loss in India and in England, the guy did not have an answer to the spin and seam tactics of England. No way to stop Alistair Cook or KP or Ian Bell or Monty Panesar when they were on a roll in India.

So the only reason he must have had behind this extension is some good ties with Dhoni who is said to have recommended for extension to his step father N Srinivasan. And Srini who can't ignore Dhoni provided an extension to the disastrous coach of India after Greg Chappell.

So now it remains to be seen how deep India plummets in the coming year in all 3 formats of game.  Not to stress hard that the planning to retain the World Cup title in Australia shall need to begin sometime this year and again it will be interesting to find out what strategy and plan Fletcher has.