Test Championship may cause disharmony

Have you enjoyed dethrone ceremony of Australia’s legacy?

Have you enjoyed dethrone ceremony of India’s Number 1 position?

Have you enjoyed England being number 1 test side at the moment?

Are you eagerly waiting for certain team who will dethrone England in few months? Aka South Africa?

Are you eagerly waiting for Australia 2.0?

Are you eagerly waiting for India Fightback to top 2.0?

Are you waiting for a massive upset coming by Pakistan, West Indies and surprise surprise Zimbabwe, who may dislodge bails of Top Test Team?

Are you optimistic about Sri Lanka the Test team post-murali?

If the answers for above questions are yes.

Then, where does Test Championship fit in?

ICC is planning to replace ca$h cow tournament ICC champions trophy (ODI series) with ICC Test Championship.

Are they doing this because they want to ‘save’ test cricket? No.

ICC Test championship is nothing more than making more Ca$h. I can say, It is basically another ICC World Cup or another T20 Domestic Tournament (IPL, FT20, Big Bash, etc.)

There is no difference between them. Here, ICC (mainly) and respective boards, who take part will make money, whereas, in T20 Toruny, hosting board and player’s board make money.

There is no early intention reveled by ICC that what are they planning to achieve here. I bet they will be happy if only ICC Test Championship go on and no bilateral team touring series in future. If that happens, say goodbye to traditional bilateral test series.

I am not sure if I would like that, because on one hand I can’t wait for revenge test series against England when India host them, on other hand, I am still sulking about Zak’s terrible fitness, and amount of tests India will play on top of IPL and Zillion ODIs.

Schedule is quite hefty for Indian players. As much as I like player to be fresh for IPL or ODI world cup that much I want my players to be fresh for Test Tournaments. So, I am not sure what is the ICC and other boards’ plan is.

What I can assume from FTP, that ICC’s plan is to just add another Test championship on top of hefty schedule, just like how they added T20 World Cup. (thanks to India, who won the first WC, against epic contender Pakistan)

(It’s ridiculous that IPL has gotten this much of scrutiny and people have started to think IPL = T20 cricket, and ignored FT20, ICC T20 World Cup, T20 Tourny in Pakistan, T20 Tourny in SA etc etc.)

So, Why would Test Championship may cause disharmony? I mean first thing first, if tournament is won by number 4 ranked test team, it just totally disturbs the team that is at the top of ICC ranking. Now, many people argue that ICC Ranking doesn’t make sense. Well, I don’t want to go in detail, but it is applied on all teams.

Another thing may happen that it will start to devalue or belittle or cause buffering in Bilateral Test Series.

Just like how media and many fans massively value Ashes (Australia vs England), people will start to value Test Championship so much that they will stop carrying about bilateral test series. What do you think will happen to tournament between not so strong test sides?

Now, fan like me will watch any kind of cricket, whatever is on!  What about the fan wanted more of test tournament between particular nations? Now, tournament will go on, as per FTP, but what if players start preferring Test Championship more and don’t play or rest for normal bilateral tourny? What will we do then?

Let’s say they have no choice but to play then what about freshness of players for bilateral test tourny compare to Test Championship?

I expect disharmony is just waiting to happen. Either players will not be fresh or will break down for particular tournament due to load of tests. Also, bantering and preference of particular Test Tournament will always be there.

Imagine the scenario E.g. England who are at the top of ranking, losing to India, but media/fans will say, well, we are still at the top, no?

or another scenario, SA is at the top of ranking, but Australia beats them fair and square in one test ergo winning the semi-final but losing to India in the final, which team is the best test team then?!

It will be interesting to see how ICC, Media and Fans will give importance to test championship before or after the winner of the first test championship.

For me, test championship is nothing but to make more money but not to save test cricket, just like ICC T20 World Cup.

My Bowlers Don’t Get Credit and I don’t like it

Yeh, that’s right … This is Angry Post … so if you are batsman or masturbater-kind over glorious cover drives … FO. 

All Of you … Every single Indian of You … cricket lover of you are guilty of this sin … those who said India produces Great batsmen only. 

FUCK YOU.

“Ooohh wow Great WI bowlers … legends. Oooh Great Pakistani Duo. Ooooh Oooh Murali. OOoo Australian Bowlers …. Ooooh Dale Styen. Oooohh English bowlers in English Condition”. 

 

Shut Up. 

Who the fuck … who the fucking fuck has been taking 20 wickets from 2000-2011. My Dady? No! Your Daddy? No. Then, Shut up your mouth … you have cavity. 

India has played 42 test series 23 WON 10 Draw series = 33 = not lost. 33 out of 42 test series NOT LOST. 

Did your batsman come down from hell and took 20 freaken wickets???? NO.

My Bowlers Did. Yes .. Those Skinny Bastards. Those Skinny Bastards also .. had to bat and bared taunting from commentators the way they bat … the shady techniques they have … laughed at while they took a rapid signals to get off the strike after bowling under ugly sun. (I hope Sun doesn’t read this)

How many times your ‘batsmen’ … your 3 Gods + Your Dasher … Bowl and helped taking 20 wickets? Once … thrice .. I will give you 5 tests. Then … who took those wickets? My Daddy? Your Daddy? NO .. You? NO … My Skinny Bastards. 

Let say you have full respect for Kumble. I agree. But what after him? Did we crash like Aus did Post-Warne? Did we ..? No right! 

Were there only Mammoth BATTERS responsible for those wins? 

You rated them recently … Gave them least score … gave Australia FULL mark. Then, Worshiped Dale Styen. Masturbate over English bowlers in English Condition .. but WTF happened in WC. 

Oh WOW the WORST rated bowling team WON the world CUP. Didn’t they? 

You You You … Pseudo supporter of Indian bowlers. You haven’t done great in giving credit to my bowlers too. One say Zak is God, rest are meh! Really?, Zak had done great against Aus and Bangla in last 3-4 years. What about other series? What have you done?

You said ‘Oh Oh Ishant is inconsistent, IPL has ruined him, Oh oh Bhajji should have been dropped, He is SO bad that he is dragging our team down, oh oh Plaha sucks, Oh Oh Sree .. ‘he is Lunatic’ ‘Overrated bowler’ He is more of an actor than performer, Ojha oh we don’t respect left arm spinner, they ‘AREN’T’ actually real spinner, Munaf!? ‘He has become spinner’  … 

Are you getting it what I am trying to say?

Put one hand on your heart, look at the pitches my bowlers bowled at …  look at the scorecard for last 5 years. I say, look at the score card for even whole decade. And tell me, are you doing enough justice to my bowlers. 

Are my bowlers (plant) lost among three giant batsmen (trees)? Has proper sun-light reached them? Shouldn’t they be praised more in Media, because they are the one who took 20 wickets, no?  for 32 NO LOSS test series? 

What is more easy … playing 200+ dot balls and be MOM or bowling 1oo deliveries running hard … jumping hard .. and still occasionally been asked to play ‘Night Watchman’ to shield your batsman? Just tell me now, what is easier? 

My Bowlers are Work Horses. They are like factories, who never say no, till their system failure due to overload. They are Stallions. Your Batsman are Just Bull Dogs. 

And I like my Stallions as much as I like my Bull Dogs. And you should too. 

– By Angry Knowledge_Eater’s Bowler’ Mind.

 

 

Cricket, Me, and Tardness

It was fun growing up in 90’s. Watching Cricket in 90’s was even better.

But playing cricket, but not just watching, was the best.

For me, there was no such a thing as DravidTards, SachinTards, AustralianTeamTards, KumbleTards, WarneTards etc. etc. I liked all of them. I liked the whole team. I was fan of Nayan Mongia, Ajay Jadeja, even Vijay Bharadwaj, Kambli, Prasad, Srinath, you name it .. everyone. I wasn’t even old enough to evaluate or understand, who was skillful in the team and who was wrongly picked. Nothing sort of thing. I just wanted team to win.

I never had lust of having their autographs or never bought their wall-portraits and fantasied like many teenagers do. I didn’t even ask that I want Sachin’s picture notebook or Rahul’s. Or neither I cared to find out what state is that player from!

Whenever my team won, I got happy. Whenever they didn’t, I felt sad.

It was THAT simple.

As we touched 2000, I grew up. (very cool right 🙂 ) I got wiser. Started to understand even further about the game. 2003 WC came. India played many ODI’s. I didn’t get to see whole 2001 epic Kolkata win against Australia. We had temporary BW TV, as we were shifting to new house. I didn’t even get to watch much of test cricket as my school time was 9-5. I come home, if there is any day-night ODIs, I watch them, IF I had done my homework. There was no such a thing as internet. Forget the highlight, not even score card. Was I even keen enough to check every single scorecard in newspaper, as I am right now? No. Only when India won. I would barely even look at it, if India would have lost.

Then, What was I keen to do at that time, related to cricket? Play cricket. Play real cricket. I used to get at least an hour everyday to play gully cricket. Not only cricket, I played all kinds of games. Marbles, hide and seek, Kabbadi, and there are zillion other games which doesn’t have English name. And of course, if you have read my earlier post, I did Judo as well, in depth.

So, what do I want to say? What is my point in all this?

My point is that I never actually had specification or THAT teen-age sportsman love or that eagerness or that bias feelings like I would be happier if certain individuals have scored runs I would be happier that certain others in the team scored. I mean I felt same happiness. Even right now, I would be happier if certain individuals score run without a doubt, but I always had that kind of feeling that let it had to be Indian batsmen or bowlers.  Let it be from the team I supported from childhood. I never had or even today, I never had ill feelings if one player from the team should score more than others.

There was no that crazy ‘Tardness’ developed in my brain, it has lot to do with my age, very limited media exposure, I had no access or interest in Ranji. Nothing.

It was simple. Team won. Tendulkar scored runs, Kumble took wickets, Jadeja played cameo, Azhar caught splendid catch.

It got even simpler around late 90’s and mid 2000’s. Dravid scored, Ganguli scored, Sachin Scored. They all scored. Tons of runs. Mammoth partnerships. Team won. Yay.

And then enter: Access to internet

Statsguru, Forums, Blogs, Videos, More stats, Ranji trophy numbers, which player come from what state, who are Sachins Dravids Gangulys Kumbles competitors in terms of wickets runs … etc. etc.

It just got messy. You start to wonder, ‘Can player actually do that?’ ‘Is this player better than others?’ ‘Is he really the special one in the team?’

Then you tend to follow game very closely, you tend to compete players within team. You tend to question importance of the players within one single team more than you compare your team player than others.

The Tardness was born.

Has tardness ever entered my soul? Has tardness ever polluted my mind? Has tardness ever made me to hate players within a team?

It wasn’t easy. In rise of Internets, access to scorecards, stats, reading articles, reading zillion hate comments, it wasn’t easy. It just wasn’t easy to pick side. It wasn’t easy to adore just one … just one player from team so badly that you can strip any other player with vicious arguments, backing up with specific knocks or specific bowling attacks or specific situations.

The answer is no.

How can it be? I played cricket more than I watched. I never had access to internet, when my consciousness was strengthening. I didn’t even care about what player is from what state. I just supported team. I still support team.

That’s why I have never let Tardness enter my brain. Yes, I might like watching certain players more than others, but Tardness is different. It’s like teen-age love. It’s an obsession for player, that I have never developed in my brain. I never grew up that way. I was very sane by the time, I had access to internet.

I mimicked Dravid’s batting style personally, loved watching Sachin, thrilled when Ganguly stepped out of the crease to hit 6, said ‘YES’ loudly when Kumble’s googly came at > 90 km/hr crashed into stump, widen my hand in air (afridi-style) when Prasad knocked of Amir Sohail’s off stump etc. etc. The list goes on.

I might have Tardness for team. I am not sure if I have ever insulted or question players within team. I might have defended my players. All my team players, all the time. Hack! I even adored Robin Singh.

But right now, with technology, statsguru, videos, score cards, IPL, Ranji, all things available, growing up without having tardness is almost impossible.

If you were born in 70’s and 80’s, and were aged >6-7 entering 90’s, I am sure it was just easier to avoid tardness, unless you had access or immense interest in Ranji and team selection.

And I am glad that I was never involved or never perceived my team or team players that way. It was just easier supporting whole team, though my team was losing quite often. 😛

Mini-Final Mega-Final Final-Final

So, here we are … trying super hard to act like ‘we-don’t-care-about-upcoming-mother-of-all-matches’ and trying super hard to concentrate on our daily activities.

But, It’s not working right!

I know I know. This is what Cricket does to you.

I also know almost everyone (other than few Indians) want India to NOT win this World Cup. Many reasons. Quite understandable.

I know, our team has become punching bag after Australians, so I understand that.

So, look how many finals India has to win to be called champions.

1) Mini-Final vs Australia

Why Mini-Final! Because Tim Nielsen said so. Not, exactly. India had to beat biggest and most consistent WC thumping team on the Human Planet.

They defy Australians. Mighty Australians. Think about it for a sec.

Still Number 1 ODI side in ranking.

Was coming with 6-1 win to England.

With line-up of Lee, Johnson, and Tait (Average speed over 140 km each).

Ricky Ponting.

Shane Watson.

Hussey Brothers, Recent decent form of Micheal Clarke, weird aggressive stroke play of Haddin, Could blast at any time Cameron ‘Bear’ White.

And lastly, They just had a Hat-trick in WCs, ALSO, were defending champion.

These were enough reasons, they could have STILL win this world cup.

It looks easy to talk about it now, that ‘hey, they were beaten by Pakistan, and also were beaten by India in Warm Match’. But, remember India was batting 2nd. And 260 wasn’t bad target to push for win.

They tried their best, argued, sledged, fought, bled blood.

But, phew!! India won. It wasn’t easy.

2) Mega-Final vs Pakistan

Mega Final is next up. Mother of All matches. The Jugular of Asian Cricket. Gold Mine of Cricket. Sons and Daughters of Cricket.

The India vs Pakistan. In Semi-final.

First Time ever in ODI World Cup history.

Pakistan has the most complete bowling side. In form bowling side. They beat Srilanka and Australia in their Group stages. Almost beat NZ (Kamran Akmal). So, it’s fair to say, they are literally unbeaten side.

India has home pressure. Never lost WC match, but never won game in Mohali against Pakistan.

It will be another, the toughest match, India will ever play in their WC history. Even tougher than 1983 final.

And at the End, if India somehow manages to win that one then,

Phew

3) Final-Final vs Srilanka or New Zealand

And that might possibly be the toughest match mentally.

Because, it’s final. Final-Final. You win -> You will be called champions. The Champions of the World.

Doesn’t matter who comes in Final.

That team will bring it!

So, if India manage to win this world cup, they should be called winner of 3 Finals.

1) Mini-Final, which they have won against Australia

2) Mega-Final, which they have to win against Pakistan

3) Final-Final, against Srilanka or New Zealand.

Phew!

Now, how is that going to happen?

India is ready for QF. Playing Raina not bad thing.

Yes, You heard it right.

India is ready for QF.

Sehwag Sachin Gautam Kohli Yuvraj all had decent bat in 6 matches.

Zak, Bhaji, Munaf had good days except in few crunch moments they went for 10+.

And now Add RAshwin in the mix.

+Add surprise bowling package Yuvi is providing.

Yuvi is flighting bowl perfectly from beginning. He rarely bowls shortish delivery like he usually does. And like Yusuf does in his 65% or more deliveries.

That Puts Yuvi among Strike or Main bowler.

So, Sachin Viru, Kohli, Gauti, Yuvi, Zak, Bhaji, Munaf, RAshwin 9 players good outing with bat and bowl.

10th -> MSD, didn’t get to bat much but he had good days with captaincy and one blunder or may be it wasn’t blunder but wasn’t positive. However, he had great times behind stump. I don’t think he dropped any catches or missed any stumping. 8 dismissals, and I bet among 5 catches many came of slow bowlers.

So, now it’s coming down to 11th.

Yusuf had Okish days with bowl. Good with field, not so good with bat.

It’s not his fault entirely. He is innocent ManBeast after all.

So, what should be our line-up against Australia.

I personally prefer Raina ahead of Yusuf against Australia especially.

Why! Main reason is the Raina against Australia.

For some reason, I think Australians rate Raina very high. Their mentality might be weak bowling against him. Short ball thing is fluke. What are the chances of Short balls working well in Ahd.! It’s not about short balls. It’s the worry of playing long innings. Raina has played long innings more in international matches than Yusuf. If we are 3-4 wickets down early on, which is more likely against Australia, we need someone to stay on crease to play out 50 overs. That’s where I see Raina being ahead than Yusuf.

Yusuf is an X-factor. It is unlikely that he will play anchor role. Raina has been dynamic. He can change his roles. Him being in CSK, might have gone against him, and might have been culprit of sledges among cricket-circle. But I rate his batting in ODI way ahead. He comes in top 3 as a fielder, as well. Expect him to force many run-outs and stop many runs in cover region (as you saw him fielding for Viru – Sachin hehehe)

Another thing why I want him in, the way he bowls. Bhajji right arm off. RAshwin right arm off. Yusuf right arm off. Raina right arm off. Although, I think due to weirdness of Raina’s bowling style, and un-predictive bowling line-length. Raina might surprise batsman or force batsman to go after him. Yusuf is stump to stump very predictive so far. Though good economy might make MSD to go ahead with Yusuf.

And last thing is, Raina is left hander. It does make a difference. There are not many left handed, young players who play cover drives and over midwicket in cow corner as good as Raina. It will force Punter to make mistakes in setting field in crunch situation.

So, I don’t mind if Raina plays on Thursday instead of Yusuf.

So, this will be my playing XI on Thursday. In that batting order.

Sehwag Sachin Kohli/Gauti Yuvraj MSD Raina RAswin Bhajji Zak Munaf

Good Luck.

And yeah please beat Australia, so they finally stop winning World Cups.

“We don’t Choke .. “We don’t do sledging .. “We don’t play short ball well ..

South Africa: We don’t choke

Australia: We don’t do sledging

India: We don’t play short balls well

Srilanka: We don’t mostly win test matches at home

England: We don’t care about Tourny other than Ashes

Pakistan: We don’t think Afridi is 32 years old

Bangladesh: We don’t think we are minnows

Ireland: We don’t wish to play for England

West Indies: We don’t think we can win like Past West Indian legends

Zimbabwe: We don’t care who govern our Country

Kenya: We don’t think Tikolo’s glasses are cool

Netherlands: We don’t think we are rich of cricketers

New Zealand: We don’t think it’s all about Dictator Daniel Vettory

Canada: We don’t think there is anything wrong with our squad selection

Who wants to win World Cup for whom?

India wants to win World Cup for Sachin Tendulkar

Srilanka wants to win World Cup for Murali

South Africa wants to win World Cup for Kallis

NewZealand wants to win World Cup for Vettori

Kenya wants to win Wold Cup for Tikolo

Australia wants to win World Cup for Ponting

WestIndies wants to win World Cup for Brian Lara

Ireland wants to win World Cup for Eoin Morgan

Netherlands wants to win World Cup for Ryan Ten Doeschate

England wants to win World Cup for Stuart Broad

Bangladesh wants to win World Cup for Saurav Ganguli

Zimbabwe wants to win World Cup for Andy Flower

Pakistan wants to win World Cup for Ijaz Butt

Canada wants to win World Cup for Celine Dion and Micheal Fox and Sidney Crosby

Picture Tribute to Australian Dingo

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Incredible Animal.

Small Tribute to Google Searches for Australian Dingo.