India: 500 Not Out

India play their 500th Test match at Kanpur against the Kiwis. Could have been just another game but cricket (and its fans) love statistics. So becomes one of the most significant games in India's Test history. To celebrate this milestone, its time to pick up an XI of India's most memorable moments in the Test arena.

Disclaimer - The memories are the ones which happened on my watch. So all are post 1989 or as we cricket tragics mark the event, after Sachin Tendulkar's debut.

1. That Partnership at Eden Gardens, 2001

The greatest turnaround in the history of the game at one of its greatest centers against an all-conquering Australian side who were treating the series as the "Final Frontier". They were well on their way to achieve their goal till they were stopped in their tracks by VVS Laxman and Rahul Dravid. The 4th day's play was not just match or series turning, it permanently instilled a belief in all Indian fans that miracles do happen.

2. The Chase in Chennai, 2008

By itself it would be remembered as one of our greatest victories. India chased down 387 with Sachin Tendulkar hitting the winning runs after Sehwag had given a turbo-powered start to the chase. But then it wasn't just any other game, being played in the aftermath of the horrific Mumbai attacks. Sometimes sport can provide just that bit of healing touch to a whole nation.

3. Adelaide, 2003

Rahul Dravid hitting the winning runs on the 5th day. An image firmly etched in the memories of the Indian fan. Australia had scored big, but they ran into a pair of familiar foes. The Dravid-VVS combo ensured that both teams are on equal footing after the first innings. And then the much maligned Ajit Agarkar produced his best spell of Test match bowling to knock out the Australians. And he was there at the other end with Dravid to see it through to the end.

4. Edgbaston, 2002

On a green pitch, India chose to bat first and the English team had the absolute privilege of being the only team to witness centuries from Dravid, Tendulkar and Ganguly in the same innings. And they followed it by slumping to an innings defeat against the spin duo of Kumble & Harbhajan on a green top.

5. The Monkeygate Test, Sydney, 2008

A match India lost on the field but where on-field incidents spilled over threatening diplomatic relations. Players were called over for investigations by international judges into racial abuse. There were umpiring controversies galore and accusations of cheating. Questions were raised on the very spirit of the game. The Australians seemed rattled as Anil Kumble declared that "there was only one team playing in the spirit of the game", reminding them of Bodyline time. It was ugly. And after all that the Indians bounced back to win the next one at Perth. Karma. Probably.

6. Sreesanth's six off Andre Nel, Johannesberg, 2006

S. Sreesanth, one of the biggest enigmas of Indian cricket. A freakish talent which went to waste. Amongst his achievements, the one stand-out would be to shut up Andre Nel. And he did it in his own maverick style. Hits a six, runs off to the other end and then starts... dancing!!! Leaving Nel bemused and everyone else rolling in laughter. And he also picked up 8 wickets in the game to win India's first ever Test victory in South Africa.

7. Declared at 194, Multan, 2004

The match had it all. India's first Test victory in Pakistan. Sehwag establishing his legendary status by hitting India's first ever Test triple. And Dravid declaring with Sachin batting at 194. Something which the stat-hungry Indian fan could not get his head around. But all's well that ends well.

8. Kapil Dev's Blitzkrieg off Eddie Hemmings, Lords, 1990
You need 24 runs to avoid the follow-on. And you have a genuine number 11 for company at the other end. So what do you do? If you are Kapil Dev, you take matters into your own hand and just hammer 4 consecutive sixes. And Hirwani at the other end promptly got out the very next ball. Couldn't prevent a defeat but it was heroic. Personally, me missed out following most of Kapil Dev's glorious career and only remember the dragged out ending in pursuit of Hadlee's Test record.

9. Kumble's Perfect 10, Kotla, 1999
On a pitch which had been dug up a few weeks before, Anil Kumble produced one of those freakish spells of bowling, taking out all 10 Pakistani wickets in the 2nd innings and squaring up the series. And wiping off some of the bad memories of the previous game at Chennai.

10. The Chennai heart-break, 1999
One of the heart-breaking results for an Indian fan. Sachin Tendulkar nearly pulled off a 4th innings chase all by himself. But the tail could not finish up the job. India were left 12 short off what would have been a sensational victory against arch-rivals Pakistan.

11. Bludgeoned in Bridgetown, 1997
For an Indian fan, the 90s were really tough to watch, especially when India was playing abroad. We just couldn't get an overseas test victory (not even in Zimbabwe). So when India got a target of 120 against West Indies, it seemed the elusive overseas victory would be finally achieved. But the pace trio of Ambrose, Bishop and Rose had other plans as India were blown away for 81. That overseas victory would have to wait a few more years.

And the 12th Man. The Test that wasn't, Centurion, 2001
Two full-strength national sides taking on each other in a five day clash played under Test match conditions but not being called a Test match. The aftermath of the Mike Denness affair had led to India lodging a protest. ICC did not withdraw the referee. So India and South Africa got a different referee. ICC removed Test status from the game (but it was still a first class game). This could have been Dravid's captaincy debut. And for poor Connor Willaims, this was his only match for India and could have been his debut. He never payed another international. And the Kanpur Test would have been India's 501st.

And the ones which did not make to the list - Irfan Pathan's first over hat-trick against Pakistan, Sehwag's 293 against Sri Lanka, Zaheer Khan's jellybean incident, Kumble bowling with a broken jaw, Dravid's Sabina Park exploits, Harbhajan's 2001 series. And many, many more.

Hopefully many more will come in over the coming years.

The Eden Gardens winning moment

World Cup 2015: Short Notes - 24th Feb

In today's episode, Chris Gayle, Chris Gayle's stat attack, and more Chris Gayle.

• But first things first, England duly won the Battle of Britain or the Cricketing equivalent of the Calcutta Cup in a pretty un-English manner. Batted first, put on a big opening stand, failed to capitalize on it, yet reached a big score, then easily chipped away at the Scottish batting and won handsomely. Should have a calming effect on the jitters going on in the English camp. Bangladesh-England is going to be the game to watch out for.
• India have created a template for winning matches - bat first, preserve wickets, create a big platform and then launch/implode at death ending in a score of 300 odd. Then keep chipping away, the rising required run rate creating its own pressures and you have registered a huge win in the process.
• Now to the Chris Gayle show. He could have been given out first ball and even a review won't have saved him. But he wasn't and even the review couldn't get him out. One of the key issues with DRS - this umpire's call business.
• And then Chris Gayle consolidated to reach his fifty, then consolidated some more to reach his hundred, then went berserk to reach 150 and finally exploded to his double century.
• Stat Attack - 
• Highest individual score in World Cups
• Highest individual by a non-Indian batsman in ODIs
• Biggest ODI partnership going past Dravid's two second wicket efforts with Ganguly & Sachin in the year 1999.
• Samuels & Gayle partnership was worth 100% of the West Indies runs
• Equal most sixes in an innings record
• February 24 - a day for ODI double centuries. Off the 5 till date, 2 have been scored on this very day of the year.
• Zimbabwe showed heart in their chase but it was way beyond them. Quite similar to the happenings against South Africa.
• West Indies lost to Kenya in 1996 and then went on to beat Australia and South Africa. This time around the loss against Ireland seems to have spurred them on.
• Shocking Stat - Devon Smith has played 100+ games as a batsman with an average of 18+. 
• The DRS issues again jumped into the limelight. Did not really affect today's outcome but might become critical in the end.
• We also had our first appearance of Duckworth-Lewis. An algorithm which absolutely no one understands but still used.
• Prediction Time - Ireland to beat UAE.

The IPL Expendables XI

The Expendables - a lovely movie with a starcast comprising of veteran action stars. They may have grown old but the spirits are still young. And these veterans packed enough punch to create a movie good enough to go on to become a series on its own right.

Was watching Expendables (again) the other day and found it similar to the Indian Premier League in some respects. The IPL can be considered to be a haven for recently and should-be retired stars who are past their prime but still playing on - some successfully, some not-so-successfully. So thought of making an Expendables XI for this year's IPL. And have followed the IPL policy of limiting the number of foreign players to four.

1. Sachin Tendulkar - How old is he? He has been going on and on since 1989 when half of the players in the IPL were not even born. And one of them (Sachin Baby) is even named after him.
2. Ricky Ponting - Recently retired from all international cricket. And then goes on to be the top scorer of the Australian domestic first class season. Though finding it difficult to sustain in the slam bang IPL mode
3. Rahul Dravid (C) - captain of the expendables. Leads Rajasthan Royals, a side which has a battalion of veterans (Hogg, Hodge, Tambe) and a squadron of babies (Sachin Baby, Sanju Samson)
4. S Badrinath - not retired yet but chances of playing further international cricket is now very limited. Will take over from the likes of Wasim Jaffer & Amol Mazumdar as the next Ranji legend.
5. Saurav Ganguly - all right, he is not in any of the squads as on date, but like Chuck Norris in Expendables 2 he might return out of nowhere and be leading one of the side. With Dada you never know.
6. Adam Gilchrist (wk) - The wicket-keeping slot simply can not go anywhere else.
7. Laxmi Ratan Shukla - He made his debut for India in 1999 and hasn't played since. And neither has he been close to national selection since. IPL considers him to be an uncapped player (?). But Shukla continues to toil on in Ranji trophy and IPL.
8. Ajit Agarkar - Sir Aggie hasn't played for India for more than 5 years. One of the enigmas of cricket. His Test career highlights are (a) scored a century at Lords and (b) a six-wicket haul which lead to India winning in Adelaide. And he has been one of the best one-day bowlers for India of all time yet one of the most unsung in that regard. Still toiling on in domestic cricket.
9. Brad Hogg - He was happily retired from all forms of cricket. Then the Big Bash happened and at the age of 42 Hogg was making his T20 international debut for Australia.
10. Muttiah Muralitharan - Another legend who is still clinging on. His Test records are unlikely to be broken.
11. Pravin Tambe - The most off-field inclusion in the Expendables XI. At the age of 42, Tambe gets selected for the first time to the Mumbai team. And then gets picked up by the Rajasthan Royals. Yet to make an appearance though.

This was my Expendables XI for IPL. One thing I can safely bet, they won't be pushovers in the competition.

P.S. Wondering how many of these warriors survive into IPL7.

Arbit Statistics - 18

The Arbit Statistics return after a long hiatus. India's huge victory in the 2nd Test at Hyderabad have led to a list of some quirky statistics which deserve to be, umm... listed.

1. Australia have become the 1st team in Test history to have lost the match by an innings after declaring the 1st innings. A singularly unique achievement. 
2. The 2 Australian innings combined scored 368 runs which was 2 short of the Vijay-Pujara stand. To put further perspective to the value of the partnership, the rest 9 Indian wickets added 133 runs.
3. With this win (his 22nd as captain), MS Dhoni now climbs to the top of the leaderboard for the most Test wins by an Indian captain moving ahead of Saurav Ganguly.

Now, awaiting some more odd stats, as the series progresses.

IPL5 - Post2

Not following the IPL much this time around. Sign of cricketing overdose. But still switch on to SET Max every night because it is the best thing on air. Random observations on the IPL so far.

• Too many last over finishes making things seem a bit fishy.
• Add the messed up points table where almost every team except the Chargers is near to the top of the table. Things become fishier
• Indian performances going backwards compared to the foreign contingent. Not good signs for the future. Where is this year's Paul Valthaty or Manish Pandey? Shahbaz Nadeem is the only domestic player who has made some name for himself.
• Saurav Ganguly still HAS the passion. And thats why he keeps coming back. And thats why I admire him.
• IPL 5 certainly seems to be the last time we will be we seeing Gilchrist and Murali. 
• Dravid & Rahane - what an elegant combo. Period.
• Wondering if the drama & hoopla behind IPL will last longer with the sponsors reducing (most of the ads are for Sony SIX, MIX, MAX & PIX and Indian Idol), owners in trouble (Mallya's airlines), and stars fading away.

Ranji Trophy 11-12: Jharkhand Update

The first 2 rounds of the 2011-12 season of the  Ranji Trophy are over. There have been big scores (including a triple century) some close draws, some boring draws, rare outright wins, a few weather interventions. There were 2 highly interesting games. Maharashtra beating Hyderabad by an innings in a low scoring crazy shootout to rival the one in Newlands. And the absolutely rivetting draw between Tamil Nadu & Haryana where all 4 results were possible till the end.

It seems to me that the domestic season is attracting quite a bit of attention this time around. I can think of a couple of reasons for this increased awareness. The first is the presence of big names in the tournament. The performance of recent India rejects & hopefuls like Harbhajan Singh, Suresh Raina, Rohit Sharma, Ravindra Jadeja, the Pathan brothers and others are being keenly watched. Long retired Saurav Ganguly is stil motivated enough to play for Bengal. Also thanks to the IPL, the domestic players are not all anonymous entities. Players like Rajat Bhatia, Mithun Manhas are no longer unfamiliar names. There is better coverage of the games. Cricinfo keeps updating scores on a regular basis. The twitter handle @Ranjiscores is also doing a great job of providing regular updates on the games happening all over the country.

Now a performance review of my team Jharkhand playing in the Plate League Group B. So far has played 2 games against Hyderabad and Jammu & Kashmir, both away. 

In the first game against Hyderabad, Jharkhand conceded a big first innings lead after bowling first, which more or less sealed the game result. Game ended in a draw with Hyderabad getting 3 points and Jharkhand 1. The first day was affected by weather. The standout performers for the team were Ishank Jaggi (81 in the first innings) and Amir Hashmi (68) with the bat while SS Rao picked 6 and Shahbaz Nadeem picked 3 wickets. 

The 2nd game against Jammu & Kashmir in Srinagar was badly hit by the weather with no play at all on the 2nd and 3rd days. As neither team could complete the 1st innings also, both were given 2 points each. Samar Quadri & Shahbaz Nadeem picked 2 wickets apiece while Manish Vardhan got a quickfire half century.

Nothing much can be read from these results though the team is lying bottom of the table with 3 points fom 2 games. Ishank Jaggi & Shabaz Nadeem seem in decent form while captain Saurabh Tiwary's indifferent run across all formats continues. Team certainly seems to be missing the pace of Varun Aaron in the bowling department, while chances of Dhoni playing a Ranji game in the near future appear very remote. 

Coming up next in the league stage are

17-20 Nov: Maharashtra

29 Nov - 2 Dec : Assam

6-9 Dec: Goa

Pataudi Trophy - Test 2 - Day 1 Thoughts

Trent Bridge Play Summary - India win toss, bowl first, after a tight first session have England in deep trouble at 124/8 at tea; Broad & Swann smash their way out of trouble, Anderson takes out Mukund first ball. And test match in balance at end of Day1. Now my views on the day's play.

• Sreesanth - He is something else, gets abused by the crowd, runs into trouble with the opposition, maddens his own captain, irritates the viewers, basically drives everyone nuts. And then when you are almost on the verge of counting him out comes back and takes wickets. And then goes away again. Could be a great bowler - bowls at a decent pace, can move the ball, now only if he keeps his craziness in check. But then he wouldn't be Sreesanth.
• Swann's dismissal - It came out of the blue when Dhoni was running out of ideas to break the 9th wicket partnership. A dismissal caused by the pitch with Praveen Kumar's medium pace rearing up from nowhere, taking Swann's glove and lobbing up to Abhinav Mukund at 3rd slip. The shocked expression on Mukund's face as he caught the ball said it all. Swann's left hand was injured and he did not take the field. But the pitch could be really troublesome for batting.
• Saurav Ganguly's commentary - I simply loved Dada's commentary. Speaking in a soft voice, witty, sharing anecdotes and so far cliche free. Simply loved the way he wondered about how long Ponting was going to play with Greg Chappel around during the end of the day analysis.

Now Day 2 beckons. India survived Day 1 without too much damage (and saved the follow on as well :P). Lets just sit back and wait and watch.

World Cup Thoughts - Feb 26th

Finally a good game between Ireland & Bangladesh, taking the count for good games to 2 out of 9 played so far (Netherlands-England being the other one). And both my predictions made yesterday came true. Here are the thoughts for today.

• The groups are looking more and more lopsided. The stronger Associates have landed in a group which was already far more competitive than the other. West Indies, Bangladesh, England & Ireland are fighting for 2 QF slots with the Dutch also a tough team.
• New Zealand - Zimbabwe match is going to be the decider for the 4th quarter-final spot in Group A, and I have a feeling that Zimbabwe might sneak in.
• This is going to be a spin dominated world cup. Except Australia everyone is playing more and more spinners.
• I was watching the post-match show after the South Africa - West Indies game. There was a discussion on the issue of taking the fielder's word for low catches. Saurav Ganguly then recalled an incident from a test played in 2008 when he took the fielder's  word for a low catch and walked. However the ball had touched the ground and India went on to lose the Test. He did not name the fielder or even the opposition but it was obvious which match he was referring to. The Sydney Test (monkeygate scandal) of 2008 still hurts every single Indian player involved in that game. Maybe thats the reason India haven't lost to Australia in a single Test match since then (Played - 8, Won - 5, Draw - 3).
• Fantasy Team performed well with both trumps Watson & Tamim putting on a good show. Tamim's Man of the Match award was a bit surprising given Shafiul Islam's late spell, but I am not complaining.
• Today's prediction - Pakistan are playing, can't predict the unpredictable but they should win.

The World Cup Memories - 2003

The 8th edition of the World Cup was held in South Africa in 2003. This time around I was living in a hostel for my engineering course. Saw almost all the matches in the hostel common room, which was filled to capacity throughout the duration of the cup. Have to say watching in a room stuffed with almost 100 people was pretty near to the stadium experience. Most of the matches started in the afternoon. Quite a few second half classes were missed. Bunking classes had to be done with extreme care to ensure that the attendance did not fall short in any of the papers. This was also the cup where the pre-match shows went on for hours and hours and Mandira Bedi became a cricket presenter (?)

The Indian team was now being referred to as the Men in Blue. They had come off a disastrous tour off New Zealand where 100 runs per innings seemed to be the par score for the entire team. The after effects of this series continued with the first 2 games. But after the bad start the Men in Blue picked up and went from strength to strength to reach the finals, where they lost to the Australia. This has been the most successful Indian campaign in the World Cups that I have watched. The team also provided quite a few moments to remember for their fans. The victory against Pakistan which included the upper cut sixes by Tendulkar of Sohaib Akhtar; Tendulkar's pulled six off Caddick, Ashish Nehra swinging out 6 English wickets and then puking on the ground, Ganguly's minnow bashing with 3 centuries against Kenya & Namibia, Zaheer Khan's misplaced sledging in the finals. But above all this would be the memory of the Indian team huddle (which has since been copied by every other team).

The Australians continued their dominance in the World Cup winning all their matches to win the cup inspite of losing Warne in a drugs scandal. South Africa choked again. In 1992 it was the rain rule, 1996 it was Lara, 1999 there was a tied match. In 2003 all the factors jumped in together. Lara smashed another 100 against the Proteas, Duckworth Lewis jumped in to help New Zealand beat them while the game against Sri Lanka was tied because of rains & wrong reading of the Duckworth Lewis chart. The sight of a dejected looking Shaun Pollock after the Sri Lankan game summed up another great South African choke.

With the tournament expanded to 14 teams the established ones indulged in lots of minnows bashing. However sometimes the so called minnows dished back the same medicine. Top of the list would be Kenya reaching the seni-finals. And there was John Davison of Canada hammering the West Indies but the rest of the team could not sustain the momentum provided by him.
For all the on field action there was none which could compare with the black armband protest by Andy Flower and Henry Olonga. Their actions to protest against the "death of democracy" in Zimbabwe effectively ended their playing careers but was definitely amongst the bravest messages ever sent out by a cricketer through his actions. 

In all, this was one memorable world cup. The good performance by the Indian team combined with the viewing atmosphere in the hostel was an experience which I do not think will come again.

Next Stop - West Indies 2007

The World Cup Memories - 1999

The 7th edition of the World Cup moved to its old home in England. The format was interesting and confusing at the same time (with the concept of Super 6s being introduced). In terms of timings this was the most Indian viewer friendly tournament with the tournament being held during the summer holidays and all matches starting in the late afternoon. I was in Std 12 then , with IIT-JEE coaching classes taking up quite a bit of time then. But still managed to catch up with most of the happenings in the tournament.

This was a cup with quite a few memories. The initial league stage threw up quite a few surprises and no team seemed to be a clear favorite after its completion. India started badly by losing to South Africa and then getting stunned by Zimbabwe. The tournament's rules ensured that Henry Olonga's final over to India would come back to haunt them again. India regrouped with some great individual performances (the Dravid-Ganguly partnership against Sri Lanka, Tendulkar's 100 against Kenya) and then reached the Super 6s. The Indian campaign then got derailed in the Super 6 stage. India though maintained its 100% winning record against Pakistan, a match played in the backdrop of the Kargil war. I guess the patriotic fervor had never been higher in India than on that day when India beat Pakistan. Two countries at war playing a game of cricket. It was a time when cricket was irrelevant yet people took it for much more than just another game. 

Australia like India had a stuttering start to their campaign but unlike India they just went on to win every game and onwards to the Cup. The two games against South Africa provided the most abiding memories of that tournament. Steve Waugh's "You have just dropped the world cup" line to Herschelle Gibbs and the tied semi-final (In my opinion the best ODI ever played). The sight of the Aussies jumping around after Donald was run out and Klusener who could have been the hero just no where in the picture is the enduring memeory of this tournament. The tie ensured that regardless of any number of close matches they won, South Africa would always be remembered as the great chokers of the game. Zimbabwe gave the most heartening performance of the tournament with what was certainly their strongest lineup of all time. The tournament also set the trend for boring final matches and the Australian unbeaten march.

Next Stop - South Africa, 2003

IPL Discard???

I was reading Saurav Ganguly's views on the team selection for the World Cup in Times of India. What irked me was the way the journalist uses the term "the IPL Discard" to refer to Ganguly. Is this the way we treat our former heroes by taking cheap shots at them? I haven't been a big Ganguly fan any time but still felt hurt on reading this. Calling India's most successful captain ever with such a term is disrespectful to say the least. I don't know how editors permit these articles to appear?