With the Ozzies batting first, this stat would tell you how it started, with the new big daddy of Opening the Batting taking over the islands with elan, too short to even have a lasting impression:

PA Jaques c Ramdin b Taylor 31 (35b 4×4 1×6) SR: 88.57
SR : 88.57! Sir, that’s too low if you are aiming for a Rajasthan Royal berth!

Surprise! Surprise! West Indies on top. Having any team 94/4 at lunch on Day 1 at Lunch would be called being on top. But this one I am not too sure about. No doubt Taylor and Mumbai Indian Bravo bowled well, but this is Australia. The king of counter attack, Roy (took the throne from Gilly) Symonds is here and looks like is here to stay. Simon ‘Krabbie Katich is there too. With Brad of-course-i-am-gilly-material Haddin and Binga overworked Lee still to bat, 300 shouldn’t be that high a task.

Lets see:

Current Score : 208/6 (Roy 50*) : Keep Refreshing

Post from: EveryJoe

West Indies vs Australia : 3rd Test : Session 1

Runs : 94
Balls : 41
Fours : 10
Sixes : 6

Poor old Andrew Symonds went for 30 in an over. This was certainly SOME innings. I beg your pardon if I am not articulate enough. Its just that….well….I am excited. The IPL has just begun.

Laters

Post from: EveryJoe

Viru You Little Beauty!

It’s been decided to put him up through this ordeal to teach him a lesson in cricketing justice.

Good luck, Symo!

Post from: EveryJoe

Symonds To Pay The Price for His Misdeeds

So the Australian Open finished off with the results I had predicted in this post. Masha, aka, Maria Sharapova sailed through to the trophy. As I said, nobody in the tournament weiled the kind of power she did, and on the men’s side, Djoker, aka, Novak Djokovic, got the better of suprise finalist Tsonga. We had been pretty much hooked to the tournament, so much so that we missed out on a lot of cricket. With the Commenwealth Bank Series on, we’re back to bats and balls.

Anyway, lots of things happened during the Border-Gavaskar Series, and some of it wasn’t pleasant. And it lead me to compare a few aspects of our favorite game to tennis. There are quite a few things ICC, the various local cricket authorities, and the players can learn from racquets and balls.

* Off-season: We’re a big fan of this one. There was next to no tennis in November and December. This time of the year is off-season for the game. After the US Open, the number of tournaments declines sharply and by the time it’s November, the tennis world is alreading on vocation. The tennis season, after this temporary halt, unofficially kicks off in January with the tournaments building up to the Australian Open. The players and viewers get back to the game with revived enthusiasm. Cricket is played all the year round with no break in between. There are obvious downsides to this, but they deserve a post of their own.

*Mutual Respect: Respect for opponents is something that has been missing in the game recently. Everyone saw what happened between Harbhajan Singh and Andrew Symonds, how Ricky Ponting and other players on the Australian side took to swords. That was the on-field story, but the trend of psychological war of words off the field is worth a mention, too. There is nothing seriously wrong with trying to bring down the morale of the opponent, but look at the tennis players. At pre-match conferences, they’re not telling us why their opponents suck or why they have an edge over them, but why that opponent will be difficult to win over. There’s a sense of respect for the opponents, both on and off the court.

* Women are powerful: Tennis’s popularity today is largely due to the women’s tennis. What if women’s cricket was given equal importance as the men’s cricket? First off, it would encourage women to take it up as a career, and second, it would help the game get female readership. You can’t match the glamour of miniskirts and spaghetti tops with trousers and half-sleeved tee-shirts, but women’s cricket is worth giving a try. The most popular and rich sports have all progressive women’s circuits as well– golf and football being two examples.

* Integrative training: Cricket is both physically and mentally exhausting. Shaun Tait proves that. Besides the usual training, there should be some yoga, pilates, etc. Ingtegrative training is big in tennis. Maria Sharapova spends two hours after every match with her trainer who does acupressure and allied stuff.

Obviously, there are lots of things tennis can learn from cricket, but that’s outside the scope of this talk.

Fan Question: What other sports do you think cricket can learn from?

Post from: EveryJoe

What Cricket Can Learn From Tennis?

After India’s T20 championship victory, Andrew Symonds said something along the lines of T20 being a format where “the lesser sides can beat you easily”. Of course, Australia lost to Zimbabwe and then India, the two lesser sides he was referring to.

India has since kept Australia on toes in T20, and they seem to be innately made for this version.

Further, SA just lost to Windies in a T20 tie, and it wasn’t a close match by any means.

Could there be any truth to what Roy said?

Post from: EveryJoe

T20 Format: Lesser Sides’ Feast?

Oh, and take the poll.

Post from: EveryJoe

Who’s your fave plump player?

Things were looking good for Michael Clarke. First, Lara Bingle and now, T20 captaincy, but there seem to be plenty of sour grapes around.

Adam Gilchrist isn’t happy apparently and lost no time in admonishing Clarke.

I’m reluctant to assume that he (Clarke) has automatically got the job and I don’t think he assumes that either.

When Gilly speaks, we listen. He might be right after all. When Kumble can do it, there’s no reason Hussey can’t do it, but really, since Ponting is going to be around for some more years, Hussey or Gilly taking on as captain is quite unlikely.

All in all, appointing Clarke as T20 captain is not a bad move at all. If nothing else, we’d at least know if he’s fit for the real job at all.

But it was interesting how Symonds reacted to this development.

I didn’t realise the plan the selectors had for the Twenty20 side so I didn’t put my hand up for the captaincy.

Roy has been pretty bold in expressing his viewpoints in the recent past, and this comes as no surprise actually. He’s trying to be sweet on Pup, but I can see he has green eyes.

What are your views on Clarke?

Post from: EveryJoe

Gilly’s snark at Captain Clarke

I don’t think anything was over the top, so I think it’s going to add a bit of spice to the summer.

and

Everyone’s going to be looking for Sreesanth to do his stuff and it shows with a bit of passion. I think it’s going to be good for the summer.

I thought ditto at first. It *is* fun. And verbal skirmishes are OK, but just have a look at how he flared up on getting Symonds out, and how he looked Clarke in the eye, and the *really* wild appeal:

Whew. And did you notice Bucknor’s mediating? Singh was lucky there.

I heard Sreesanth was leafing through selp-helf books; that relieved me a bit and I thought maybe the reading would drive some sense into him. But, na da. Neurobiologically speaking, he’s formed deep synapses for aggression. The more he gets into it, the stronger the connections are getting.

Are the Ozzies putting him on? I don’t think so. Sreesanth seems to be one to engender the sparks all the time. And you don’t expect to be hurled expletives back at you when running into guys like Roy and Hayden? And all this pseudo-sledging is going to boomerang, no doubt. Ponting isn’t Bucknor, after all.

Especially, what he did at the last match was extremely disappointing. You are a 12th man and dishing dirt out at the opponents– what does that show about your attitude and motives?

Harbhajan caught on too. You know, everyone wants to try their hands at a new trend. I heard about his dropping bombshells on the field, but I hadn’t imagined the guy was capable of such gutsy stuff. Pseudo-gutsy, IMVHO. Raising bats at others and all.

All those who had been churning out blog posts corroborating an Indian team solely comprising of youngsters, do you now see the exploits of the dahling (pun intended) ducklings. That, when the seniors are around.

His behavior, in my opinion, has crossed the boundary of acceptability. He’s gone overboard; he either doesn’t know how to exert control over his impulses or he’s just not trying to. Or maybe there’s something else, but we know private blah-blah rarely meddles with a guy’s game. Oh, wait. But this isn’t about the game, is it? Yeah right, private blah-blah.

As some have said before, sledging is second nature to Ozzies, and that’s how they play their game. It’s neither good, nor bad. It’s just how they do it. And they don’t do it because they have anything personally against their opponents; this is their way of getting an edge over them. Their sledging is more psychological than abusive. I am not sure, but it involves, apart from other things, using “negative suggestions” like “You are going to get out now” against batters on field. And of course, we know about the psychological wars they wade against the other competing team via the media. So if that’s something you can train yourself in, good. Else, shut up, and just play the game.

Cricket certainly doesn’t need maniacs. India can find many of Sreesanth’s talent.

Some of you might disagree with what has been said. You have the right to do so. But if you think Sreesanth’s a hero, you’ve got to have a strong argument for that. Do chime in. I am all ears.

Oh, and take the poll.

Post from: EveryJoe

Sreesanth: The Way Out?

Hero Turned Loser # 1 Andrew Symonds aka Roy:

The guy with the brown (or is it golden, or golden+brown, you better judge) streaks is one of the most active players on the field despite his size. He’s ran out more batsmen than I have seen any other player do. And I share Shakespeare’s philosophy:

Let me have men about me that are fat;
Sleek-headed men and such as sleep o’ nights:
Yond Cassius has a lean and hungry look;
He thinks too much: such men are dangerous.

I like plump folks; most of them have good humor in them.

But what’s with saying T20 is crap “since you can lose to the lesser sides” and slamming India’s post-victory celebrations as “over the top”. I didn’t rant about that, because I guess it’s okay to exercise your freedom of speech, but I don’t like players locking horns with each other on the field.

Hero Turned Loser # 2 Shanthakumaran Sreesanth

When I saw him dancing in SA, I was like, “Here is an Indian cricketer who isn’t shy, who isn’t scared of expressing himself.” And he took that last catch in the T20 final. He became a hero. And although he won’t make it to my hunk list, it was cool about him that he was a dance champ and was comtemplating a career in Bollywood.

But there he was bickering with none other than Roy. A little bit of weirdness is acceptable, but when one goes overboard, titles like neurotic, maniac start springing to mind. I think I am going to settle in for “maverick” for the while. That’s not that insulting. So if he thinks that if he’s playing well, he has the liberty to do just about anything and that the world is his cricket ground…I would better warn him.

Actually, I will tell ya what, he’s one of those x-generation Indians (me, Aishwarya Rai, Sania Mirza included) who flaunt American accent and are desperate to tell the world what stuff Indians are made of. But chill, Sree, chill. You need to channel all your adrenaline to more constructive pursuits.

Oh, and you know what his first name literally means? Man of Peace!

Hero Turned Loser # 3 Harbhajan Singh

At the risk of sounding judgmental, I am going to say he’s been overrated. He’s talented, yes, but his lack of consistency has always put me off. Big time. But I had still liked him for this stints at bhangra.

I have heard he uses obnoxious abuses on the field. Now this isn’t news, I know. You put a bunch of guys on a field and what else do you expect (this was an ongoing problem over the sports fields at school)? Sledging comes naturally to them. BUT. This is ODI cricket! Can we expect some etiquette, Sir?

Full stop. Rant over. Your turn.

Post from: EveryJoe

Heroes (read: losers) of the Week