the shorter the merrier...

.......India loses the LOI series against the Oz.....but is this the end of the bellwether we figured in Mahi???....
maybe, maybe not...who knows.....ar rather who cares till the young brigade is performing in the shorter version brilliantly...gapingly surpassing the Ausies[favorites] yesterday....[or call it ~ cum night]...


The blues won comprehensively yesterday in the T20 match at Mumbai....featuring awesome batting performance from Gambhir...followed by a complete abolition of the tyranny of Ausies...

The match started with high hopes for the supporters in yellow & shades of green as the Australians were the expected winners of the tie. Even the Ausie team displayed some ecstatic cricket in the ODIs preceding. Yet the Mumbai stadium engulfed some fraction of the world second most populous nation, figurative comment, and the stadium was having a mass majority of supporters in favour of the men in blues. Even SRK and Sachin were in the mass cheering for India.

As expected for the semifinalists....all went wrong from the start...Indians bowled a tight line, not giving enough room, compelling the Ausies to commit mistakes. Bowlers in blue held the kangaroos to just 166 in 20 overs. The target was achievable from the standards that India had set in the T20 World Cup. Much suppotively the Indian supporters cheered right through, suppresing the "already bakfooted" Ausies; taunting & teasing Symonds. The start for India [upto the 4th over] was alright, a bit sluggish in fact, with Sehwag back to the blues. The next 10 overs witnessed some beautiful and well executed shots from Gambhir, mainly, with a fine support from Utthapa. The score at the 15 over mark had India with three blows, Yuvi and Dhoni at the crease. The game f uncertainities was still focused on the basics, and could go both ways, not undermining the Ausie potential on [n even off] the field. But the match didn't take a breath-taking scenario, like the semifinal. Yuvi rounded things up in the 17th over...ending at 6runs off 12 balls. And then the man of the moment arrived with a bang. Dhoni smacked the first ball of the 19th over to a six finishing the procedings, India winning by 7 wickets. Following were some vibrant, confident, comments from the skipper....
"We were superb today. We wanted to prove that we are the world champions and we did just that."

Words of confidence and support from the leader, cherishing the future hopes of the young guns. The Indians proved that they were the world Champs in T20 version of the sport, even if they lost the ODI series. With the critics resting in their couches, the Indian team looks better and in shape without the triumphant trio. Maybe it's time for the three to bid a goodbye to Cricket and rest the responsibility on the shoulders of Dhoni and others, who are proving the might in the shorter version.

So the new captain in Dhoni has proved to be more competent than Dravid, winning a World Cup[what if in the shorter version]. Now the question arises that how long can we expect the same run from the unexperienced lot? Is Dhoni similarly competent in the longer versions, much in practice?..........
Many such questions are yet answered....and let's wait for time to answer the queries.
Till then.......

Chakk De! India!!......

Indian Prospects

In continuation with the last topic posted in with T20 on the glance, the prospects of Indians in the sport is under scrutiny...

Classifying the performance of the Young Indian Brigade in the T20 final with a serendipity for Jogi in the ultimate over, doom'sday for Pak, overall performance was yet not satisfactory. With sposmadic outbursts from Mahi & an outstanding performance by Yuvi in the series the whole team was still suffering. With the bowlers facing hammering, quite a characteristic of the version, bowling from Indian point-of-view was still better than their batting !!

With the veterans sitting out of the crew, it was really up to the ametuer shoulders to handle the pressure of a World Cup !! And they did quite elegently.

So we can't say that would India do similarly, ousting the opposition, in the future too!!!
The inevitable fact that India has collapsed in the past was rather contradicted with the Championship snatch........But the unignorant problem still lies that

"Is India still good enough to snatch such triumphs, or are they just a lucky herd discovering the right grassland??"

Well being an Indian the soul reaction is always "Chak de India!!" But are they worth the trust in the other versions..is the question..??

TWENTY20 - A Revolution Sport??

a paradise for the batsmen; a disaster for bowlers........

yes this is what T20s are turning to be in real scenario. only dragging people to watch the matches is now the basic theme of cricket played in this form.

i watched the almost all the matches played in the maiden World-Cup [including all those played by India]. all the games were spellbinding, thrilling and throttling till the last delivery....but still the legacy of the "gentleman's game" was missing !! the semifinal in which Indians thrashed the LOI defending champs Aussies; it was rather a game of luck for India.

basically the game is a disaster to the temperament development cricket was meant for as a sport. the tests quintessentially stood aloof all showing what it took actually to stand in the horrendous sun and holding the nerve rather than playing strokes. even the ODIs; or more commonly now known as the LOIs; a later and yet brief version of the 5-dayers is a treat to the flair of batsmen & bowlers. the bowlers, like Muralitharan & McGrath display the artistes in them on the wicket with the leather.....

what this T20 transformation has rather contributed to our penchant towards the sport is a getting dumbstruck at the pace of the proceedings and developing a much more ardent interest in batting; or actually in the present scenario "hammering". the sport has given batsmen a bigger edge; & hence the game is faster and bigger in terms of numbers and records. no record is here secure for batsmen and no team can rely on a particular score as defendable [as Bangladesh defeated Australia, to instigate the misery the world champs were yet to follow].

looking at the economic aspects of the game it yields that basically this is more of a "business" that a "sport". unarguably the betting market is flourished & on song with the development of the latest version of cricky !! there was an exchange of about billions/day in the market. even the shopkeepers in the cities threw chocolates at balls they had put a bet on. adding more; the channel telecasting the whole "chase"; ESPN; earned about few hundred billions in just 14 days, much more than Ten Sports, telecaster of the LOI World Cup [about a month long], could for the longer version.

ultimately the sport refinement towards the shorter version would result in the changes [according to me]:

1) the temperament development of the upcoming cricketers would result into an impulsive, sporadic and rather smashing. they would develop a tendency to react to pressure and building in the same way; "hitting all over the park". the bowlers would not stick to the "line-length" philosophy and would strengthen on the negative line aspect of things.
2) the craze in the public for the LOIs and much orthodox "tests" would replenish quite steadily or parabolically with time steadying on a "say-no to tests" & even LOIs.
3) the economic prospects divert in the direction of a much-more intensified competition between the sponsors as they would tend to increase the rights'-income.
4) the "satta bazaar" would witness a "Golden Era" in the coming years with the advancement of the game in the frantic direction.

[contd..]