World Cup 2015: Short Notes - 27th Feb

Its the World Cup. And there ought to be some madness. But even the madness has its own patterns.

• There seems to be a grand conspiracy by all parties to put egg on the ICC's face. The Associates are putting on a tough fight on the field. The Full time nations are hammering each other in one one-sided game after the other. Meanwhile ICC is still looking at taking the World out of the World Cup by restricting the entries to ten.
• Ireland nearly choked and then managed to sneak through against UAE in a close encounter. Afghanistan were down for the count but showed some amazing resilience to win an even closer encounter.
• After the India defeat, AB de Villiers wanted to go to his room and feel sad. Then he decided to take out his sadness on the West Indies. And what followed was countless records getting broken one after the other.
• Jason Holder - 1st 5 overs - 9 runs, next 5 overs - 95 runs. So he comes back and scores a 50 in a losing affair.
• The luck of the Irish - Ed Joyce and the dancing bail. (Video)
• In other news - Pakistan are behaving exactly like Pakistan - losing heavily, rumours of rift against the fielding coach and the chief selector has been sent back for being found in a casino.
• Australia haven't had a game in two weeks now. Almost forgotten that they are still playing.
• The Indian fans are already walking about like World Champions. Well the real World Cup begins only after the group stages.
• Prediction time - Pakistan-Ireland and England-Bangladesh to be the deciding games for this World Cup.
• Side Note - As if a World Cup game is not enough incentive, Australia and New Zealand will also be playing for the Chappell-Hadlee Trophy.

P.S. In case you want to feel like doing something about the World Cup size for the next tournament and haven't done it yet, feel free to sign this petition here. [Current Count - 13960]

Arbit Stats 39

January 18, 2015, South Africa vs West Indies, at Johannesburg

The top three of Rilee Russow, Hashim Amla & Abraham Benjamin de Villiers scored centuries in the South African innings, making it the first ever instance of 3 individual centuries in a single ODI innings.

Meanwhile AB de Villiers helped himself to the records for the fastest ODI 50, fastest ODI 100 and equal most sixes in an innings. Not  a bad way to bat 44 deliveries.

P.S. Johannesburg is proving to be a record making/breaking ground. Today comes after the 434 ODI and the 231 T20. Wonder whats next in store at the Wanderers.

P.P.S. Wonder what the likes of Michael Holding and Ian Bishop would have been thinking while commentating on their team's bowling attack.

IPL7: Notes#3

The League part of the Indian Premier League is over. Congratulations to Kings XI Punjab for winning the League. Oh wait.... the IPL is still not over. The top 4 have to now go through a seemingly complicated (albeit more fair) elimination process to decide the champions of IPL7. 

Some thoughts on the India phase of the league (For UAE phase, click here)

• Chennai Super Kings are the consistency personified. 7th consecutive knock-out phase entry doesn't surprise anyone.
• Defending champions Mumbai Indians recovered marvelously from pathetic start to just about enter the knock-outs by the skin of the teeth with net run rate calculations being as much in focus as the actual match result. (Detailed post tomorrow or maybe not)
• Rajasthan Royals have always been a fan favorite team, in spite of the spot-fixing scandal. They have been unorthodox in their selections also but this time over-experimentation caused an early unexpected end to their campaign.
• T20 cricket has emboldened batsmen. The bigger the target, the likelihood of it getting chased down somehow becomes higher. With batsmen under no pressure, even 15 an over does not seem too big an ask. KKR, Kings XI, Mumbai Indians all produced one astonishing chase after the other.
• If CSK as a team are consistency personified, Robin Uthappa was the epitome of a consistent batsman. Nine 40+ innings in a row in a format which is designed to be unpredictable will take some beating.
• Amit Mishra had a horror tournament after a good return to the national side. But it was as a batsman that he provided the "highlight" of the tournament with this extreme run-out against Rajasthan Royals. (Video)This one was straight from the Inzamam school of run-outs. [Aside - 23 run-out collection here]
• Apurva Wankhade was fielding in a stadium carrying his name. Would like to know how many similar stadium-player combinations are there.
• When the batsmen are in a rampaging mood, even the likes of Dale Steyn become lambs to slaughter. Steyn getting hammered twice (by AB de Villiers & Yusuf Pathan) wasn't a pleasant sight to behold. But what was pleasing was the way a smiling Steyn applauded his opponents. The kind of moments which make sports special.
• Indian seamers stated well, but by the end of the league stage Bhuvaneshwar Kumar was the last man standing. Mohit Sharma was the other one to have enhanced his reputation.
• As always, the future of Indian batting seems in good hands with Sanju Samson, Karun Nair, Manan Vohra all playing key parts.

Till next time

World Cup Thoughts - March 3rd

After the grand Irish victory, yesternight, 2 seemingly boring matches were lined up. Here are today's World Cup thoughts.

• South Africa hammered Netherlands by 232 run margin. The batting machine was efficient with Amla & de Villiers getting centuries while no one really clicked for the Dutch.
• The 2nd game between Canada and Pakistan turned out to be much closer than expected. Pakistan certainly in quite a bit of bother till Afridi came up with a 5-wicket haul.
• Canada looked liked an immigrant XI more than anything else.
• They might have been beaten on the field but the Canadians certainly did not fall behind on thee verbal front. It was certainly funny seeing all the talk going on.
• ICC seemed to be using this game to popularise the concept of the UDRS. Daryll Harper made one mistake after another and then kept on getting corrected by the Decision Review System. 
• Tomorrow 2 critical matches from the Quarter-final perspective are lined up. Zimbabwe against new Zealand and Bangladesh against West Indies. My predictions - Zimababwe and Bangladesh to win.

Cricketing Joke of the Day

Q. What do you say when the "Laughing Buddha" becomes serious?

A. Gautam Gambhir [Gautam being the name of Buddha and Gambhir meaning "serious"]

World Cup Thoughts - Feb 25

Writing this while New Zealand & Australia are facing off for the Chappell - Hadlee Trophy (preview here).The 7th wicket pair of Nathan McCullum and Jamie How are trying to stage a recovery as the Kiwis are now at 118/6 in the 28th over. Now for the previous 2 games.

• Kenya are on the wane. Sad to see them reduced to such a state.
• Pakistan are mercurial and now I consider them to be the dark horses for the tournament. But then you never know with Pakistan. Though the team is playing as a unit these days.
• West Indies don't look like having any sort of bowling attack. And if the batting misfires then the game is as good as over.
• Darren Bravo is probably the best batting talent to have emerged from the West Indies for quite a few years.
• AB de Villiers was awesome.
• South Africa played 3 (yes THREE) spinners, one of whom opened the bowling (Still cant think of anything to say about that)
• Imran Tahir lived up to the hype. It was a good performance on debut for the cricketing nomad.
• My Fantasy cricket team had a few nervous moments with the rains but they stopped and ABdV (also my trump player) completed his century and got the Man of the Match.
• And why has ICC scheduled a day match (and a big one at that) on Friday and only one game each on Saturday & Sunday.
• Today's predictions - Australia to win Chappell - Hadlee Trophy, while Bangladesh will beat Ireland (Aside - Ireland & Netherlands certainly are in the wrong group)

As I write the 7th Kiwi wicket has fallen.