Cricket Live

A lot of credit must be given to the manner in which the pitches of Bangalore and Mohali have been prepared. They have helped the batsmen and bowlers as can be seen from the scores in the games, and yet, have provided ample opportunities for the games to be result-oriented ones.

In Mohali, the track started off by keeping lower than expected but settled down to be a good one which saw both sides scoring 400 plus scores. Later, in the second innings, again the Aussies looked like scoring a lot of runs before Ishant Sharma and Zaheer Khan got the ball to reverse and the spinners came into their own to get rid of the Aussies.

In the second Test at Bangalore, it is the fourth day’s play and the pendulum looks to be swinging each way. Australia scored a mammoth 478 after it looked like Indians could get them out for less than 400. Then India struggled to get to 38/2 before Tendulkar and Vijay got them to a good position. The last five wickets fell for nine runs for the Aussies to get back into the game.

We need more of such tracks.

The second Test match between India and Australia will begin from October 9 and it could not get more exciting. For one, India leads the series 1-0 and will look to protect their lead – something that MS Dhoni has also done before.

However, that may not be the best to go about the business for the Indians especially given that the Aussies will come hard at the opposition and try to square the series.

Australia will a problem though. It is a concern whether they can play Doug Bollinger in the side given his injury and if he wouldn’t play, then the side will be left with the two frontline bowlers in Mitchell Johnson and Ben Hilfenhaus, but none of the others can really be called wicket-taking bowlers.

One also senses that it may make more sense for the Aussies to play Steven Smith. The reason is quite simple. Indians are good players of spin and so far, Hauritz has been taken apart. The only way that the Aussies can take wickets is by using surprise as an element; the worst case scenario is that Smith will bowl as badly as Hauritz!

Chennai take on Bangalore in the first semi-finals of the Champions League T20 and this will be good news for those broadcasters who had lost a lot of money in the first edition of the tournament.

After all, the Champions League T20, which had started last year had struggled to attract the audiences in the first year. The main reason for the same was the lack of performances by the Indian teams. This time around, Chennai and Bangalore face each other in the semi-finals, which means that one team will go through to the final.

Between Chennai and Bangalore, it is not going to be easy to decide which is a better team. The simple reason for that is that the two sides have played each other six times in the IPL so far and would each other well.

However, given that the match will be played at the Kingsmead, the track will be fast and Super Kings have only one pace bowler, it will mean that the Bangalore should be favourites to win it.

If it was bad captaincy in Mumbai’s first game, then it was a case of atrocious fielding in the second match that meant that the South Australian side escaped from jail to win the game.

With this result, the Mumbai Indians would be wondering whether they thought that they had taken the opposition too lightly after getting to 180. That is what was the impression one got from the body language.

And yes, there were four catches dropped, one run-out missed, and it was a fielding performance that can best be described as appalling. The opposite batsmen were able to run easy singles and converted singles into two with ease as well.

The feeling that one got looking at the body language of Tendulkar was that he was somewhere else. Unlike how he looked in the IPL, Tendulkar here seemed lost and almost unenergetic for some reason.

While Mumbai’s campaign may almost be over in the tournament, it will augur well for both, Mumbai and Tendulkar, if the baton of captaincy is passed onto someone else for the next IPL. Time to start looking at a new captain probably.

There is a movie called ‘Back to the Future’. The Pakistan cricket is a modified version of the same – that is, they show their backs to the future. By picking up Mohammad Yousuf for their ODIs and more importantly for the T20Is, it does show that the selectors are not thinking straight.

Talk about a man who retired from the game when he was not selected in the ICC World T20 in 2007. He had joined the ICL after retiring from the game. He came out of retirement many time after that, but in the four years since playing his first T20I, he has yet to play a single T20I.

The reason has been quite simple and straightforward. He is an atrocious fielder and a runner between the wickets, two of the basic prerequisites to be a part of this format. His batting is decent, but has shown the inability to accelerate at crucial times.

Is this to say that the talent in Pakistan is so conspicuous by its absence that Yousuf has to be chosen for the T20Is? And the more important question is whether the captain will be allowed to not pick him in the playing eleven if he wanted to?

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One feels that Suraj Randiv’s misdemeanour in the game against India deserved to be punished. Probably a fine of some sort, if not a ban for a game or so. However, the same should not be restricted to being against an Asian team only.

Because, from what one sees these days, the Australians and some of the Englishmen have continued to go scot-free despite being involved in some of the nastiest on-field dramas. Are we trying to say that swearing at the opposition, throwing the ball back at the batsman and shouldering them are ethical?

Come on, you got to be kidding me. Recently, Stuart Broad had thrown the ball back at Zulqarnain Haider and hit him on his hand. It has turned out that Haider hurt his hand due to that throw and will now miss the rest of the series. Broad was fined 50% of his match fee. That’s it!

What about those Aussies, who manage to shoulder and swear at the opposition. Is that under the spirit of the game? If not, even they should be banned or fined. Why have two different laws for the so-called Spirit of Cricket?

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Yuvraj Singh’s own 2010 cannot get worse than this. Or nor can India’s year when one looks at the number of fitness issues. Yuvraj was diagnosed with dengue and has not been a part of India’s game against Sri Lanka and this means that he continues to suffer from injuries.

Earlier, Yuvraj was a part of the first Test match against Colombo but a viral fever pushed him out of the side. By the time he was fit for the third Test match, Suresh Raina’s century had taken his place away.

Then came the ODIs, and after pottering around for five runs, he was dismissed by the Kiwis. Again, the same story repeats as he gets a viral infection and is then diagnosed with dengue.

India’s issues have been no better. They continue to lose their players to such issues on such a consistent basis that it looks highly unlikely that the World Cup will see 15 fit, frontline players participating in it. There are the likes of Tendulkar, Gambhir, Sreesanth, Zaheer, Harbhajan and even Nehra who are making it difficult for the side, and if the cricket board doesn’t do something about it, the side could be in jeopardy.

Wherever the Indian team goes, whatever they do, the injuries are always a part of the side. This time, it is the turn of Ishant Sharma to join the list. According to the latest reports, the Indian selectors have named Munaf Patel as a back-up for Sharma, who has injured his ankle.

So, there is no Zaheer Khan, no S Sreesanth, no Harbhajan Singh, and now Ishant is also out. Gautam Gambhir and Sachin Tendulkar are already missing whereas MS Dhoni’s fingers are slowly breaking down enough to cause issues while behind the stumps.

What is the BCCI doing? Already, they have received a letter from the Indian team management enlightening them about the issues that the side is facing, and the fact that if they play so much cricket, then there could be issues.

However, the key members of the BCCI are busy fighting a case against Lalit Modi. Shashank Manohar, N Srinivasan and the rest of the top officials are all busy in that. How can you expect them to even think of thinking about the good of the Indian cricket as a whole? And therein lies the problem, which is rather difficult to overcome. At least till they are done with the Modi shenanigans.