The tragedy

After watching Tamim's heroics yesterday, I thought that Bangladesh might just save this one.
Then he got out, and then there was a sudden collapse.
Never mind, I thought to myself, the lower order has never let Bangladesh down.
They have a number eight, who averages 42 in a test match.
That's a brilliant statistic by itself.
But then he failed and Bangladesh have given England a target of 160.
Strauss seems to have gotten the balls of a Tamim and he's gone on a rampage.
It's not as brainlessly brilliant like Tamim's innings, but it's effective.
And yet again, Bangladesh would have lost a game that they had dominated for many sessions and beautifully fucked up in others.
That, my friends, is a tragedy

From the failed ballad to a rock concert

When India played Australia in the T20 Cup, they looked like they were going to die because of the fast bowling.
I don't blame the side. You have Dirk Nannes, Shaun Tait and Mitchell Johnson bowling at 150 k at your head, despite a helmet most modern-day cricketers would be scared.
But then came Rohit Sharma and batted like it was net practice.
He made 79 awesome runs, which Uncle J-Rod calls the Ballad of Rohit Sharma.
The ballad continued the other day against Zimbabwe.
No offence to the Zimbabweans, but if Rohit's ballad against Australia was Bridge Over Troubled Water, then the ballad against Zimbabwe was as bad as Unbreak My Heart.
India should not have lost that match. It was cuntish, overconfident  behavior that cost us the game.
However, today, Sharma changed the ballad into a sizzling rock star performance.
I call the performance Shoot To Thrill  

A must read

I'm currently reading A Corner Of A Foreign Field by Ramachandra Guha. This is also the first time I'm incorporating an image into this blog and it's not a photo blog, which makes this post all the more significant, although the layout might look crap by the time I'm done with this.

But that's not the point.

While I'm not done with the book entirely, I'm not in a place to do an overall review of it, which is why I'm just raising a few issues regarding the way the game was played then and how it is now.

If you read the book, barring technology and the use of protective gear, the game hasn't changed. 

In fact, it has gone back to it's original form, with a few tweaks here and there. 

For example, the type of umpiring then. If a decision was given against an Englishman, he had the right to appeal against it. However, it wasn't the same for the local players, but despite that they wouldn't fare so badly. There was an instance of a match an English batsman, refusing to walk claiming that the wicketkeeper had dislodged the bails when he was actually bowled. Harris was declared out, but the media particularly the Times of India, which was owned by the English at that time criticized the local umpires and claimed that only the English could umpire the matches. 

Eventually in the quadrangular, there were neutral umpires for each game i.e. a Muslim would officiate a game between the English and the Hindus and the English and Parsis; Hindus would officiate games between the English and the Muslims and the English and Paris and so on. The ICC eventually changed the rule of one local umpires in a test match early this century, which is quite bizarre, considering that the Raj was okay with it in the early 20th century.

The book, however, mainly speaks on the Palwankars, probably the first great cricketing family led by Palwankar Baloo, India's first great cricketer. People of course speak of KS Ranjitsinhji as India's first great cricketer, but Ranji himself played for England and had always felt that the Indian style of playing the game was not the right way, in terms of technique. This is probably why Guha narrowed down on Baloo while writing the book.
The book on the whole is more caste and history that went around the game. There are no scorecards or statistics, except for Baloo's and probably CK Nayudu's. It's an evolution of the game to the religion it has become in India. Guha doesn't disappoint again, which is why I recommend the book to both cricket and non-cricket lovers

Good on Bangladesh

I like this English side.
Although they started poorly and are playing against bottom three lowest ranked test teams, they haven't taken their opposition for granted.
Unlike the Indian side, whose players deserve to be walloped.
They scored 505 on a fairly shitty wicket at Lords.
But Bangladesh fought back. And they've done a good job of fighting back.
I know it's day 3 of a test match and a lot can happen over a session.
I am also aware that the Bangladeshi side is known for batting collapses after showing that they are capable of playing with the best sides in the world.
But they need to convert these brilliant bursts of cricket to something more relevant, if they are to have results in their favour.
Right now, they are three wickets down, but I hope they reach a score where they don't follow-on.
England, of course, are living off their T20 high and have done the transition from T20 to test cricket quite well.
And yes, in Bangladesh's defense, they had a good home series against England, although they lost. They fought and could have won one of the test matches.
India, on the other hand, need to grow some balls and need to stop being aggressive.

India outclassed

So India lost to Zimbabwe.
As an Indian, I should be pissed and disappointed, but instead I am laughing.
This is the best thing that could happen to Indian cricket.
We know that our bench strength is full of shit, but losing to Zimbabwe is like a slap on the face.
Like Ayaz Memon tweeted, it's because of overconfidence.
I hope Gary Kirsten breaks their balls.
Freaking wankers

Why the Pakistan All-Time XI will fail

I read the Cricinfo piece on the Pakistan All-Time XI.

On paper, the side is fantastic.

But, in theory, the team will lose.

Here are my reasons why

Hanif Mohammad, Fazal Mohammad, Zaheer Abbas and Imran Khan will proudly don the Pakistan cap and play like their life depended on it.

But four players aren’t enough.

Rashid Latif will be blogging on RashidLatif.net on how his team players conspired to lose the match and will name Wasim Akram in the fixing scandal.

Javed Miandad will be speaking to Dawood Ibrahim to ensure that his name is cleared of all fixing charges that have been filed by Wasim.

Waqar Younis will get into a public altercation with Wasim when Wasim is acting captain, saying that he was captain after Wasim. So as a result, Waqar will bowl badly to show that he was a better captain than Wasim.

Qadir will try and bowl googlies, but get clobbered.

Inzamam and Saeed Anwar will be MIA and be timed out for praying too much.

So yeah, the team will be screwed.

Dirty games

Before I begin this, J-Rod's piece on Pakistani players being mentally retarded is brilliant.
But after today's news, I tend to agree with what Alam said about the 'boys being mentally retarded'.
Since the match fixing scandal broke out in 2000, the cynic says that matches are fixed even today.
We don't know about player involvements because they've been smart since the scandal.
But then Pakistan plays awesomely bad cricket against Australia.
In the second test, they play brilliantly for the first four days and suddenly on the fifth day, Australia has won the damn thing.
You know that something isn't right and then suddenly Afridi comes out and says that he's heard of players fixing the matches, but doesn't have any proof that they did.
He even talks of some players checking women out during a game and then dropping catches.
While the world plays it safe, these guys go and fuck it up and get involved in another controversy.
It wasn't bad enough that nearly half the team is facing a ban for playing shit.
Now they'll be banned for life if they're proved guilty.
And yes, that takes an all-new level of retarded behavior to do something like that.
Suddenly getting genital warts and forgetting that you were married over the phone seem intelligent.
And let's face it: How the fuck can you lose this test match?
It makes India's chase of 120 and getting out for 81 look like intelligent cricket.

The mother of ironies

There are ironies in the world.
And then there is Sreesanth speaking of seamers and focus.
In terms of talent, Sreesanth is right up there. I have never seen a guy let the ball land on the seam so consistently.
But then, with the talent is the additional baggage of attitude.
Prayers, folded hands, tears, break dances, slaps and other moronic acts are the things you associate with Sreesanth.
They overshadow his bowling performances in South Africa and Sri Lanka.
And here he is discussing focus and the importance of being disciplined.
"Focus is surely important, but again everyone lives their own personal life as well. As long as he knows the thin line between foolishness and bravery, that is very important," Sreesanth said. "If you have a mentor or someone is looking up to you, with so much of money and entertainment involved, if there is one coach or family member, who actually keeps an eye on the player and if the player is ready to listen to them, you are alright. If you are talented and hardworking, nothing should bother you," is what he has been quoted to be saying.
Now this the mother of all ironies.

The older man syndrome in Indian cricket

I have a theory.
I could be perfectly wrong, but nonetheless it's a theory and theories are meant to be proved otherwise.
Why did Sachin Tendulkar fail as the captain of India?
I wouldn't call him a bad leader. He did quite well in the recently concluded IPL - both as a leader and as a batsman. When he led the Indian side, he led from the front. He scored 1,000 test runs in a calendar year during his first stint, despite critics saying that he was out of form.
He bowled a last over against Australia to secure India a place in the finals of the Titan Cup, thereby saving Robin Singh's career.
I don't blame his captaincy when India lost 3-0 against Australia. Even Wasim Akram, who captained Pakistan quite brilliantly in the series before, fell short.
We keep saying that India and Pakistan played crap. India probably did, but at that time, the Australians were invincible.
So why criticize Tendulkar's captaincy?
The same can be said of Dravid's captaincy.
He started off well, but then Greg Chappell came.
Now, I'm sure that Chappell is a great coach, but he would work for a team like Australia.
For India, it's a big no-no.
My thing about Tendulkar and Dravid's captaincy is that they are ahead of their times, when it comes to Indian cricket.
So was Anil Kumble.
All three players are thorough professionals, but what worked for Kumble that didn't work for Tendulkar and Dravid is that Kumble was the oldest member in the team.
The subcontinent has a tradition of 'respecting their elders.' Kumble was no exception, which is why making him captain late in his career is probably the smartest thing that the BCCI has ever done. Sri Lanka had that with Ranatunga and Pakistan had that with Imran Khan. India had it with Kumble
Had he been captain earlier, he would have never played for India again, had the team done badly.
It's what has happened to Rahul Dravid. And Dravid has always been a bigger role model than Kumble, although I believe that both are in the same slot when it comes to being professional.
During phase I as captain, Sachin was the youngest member in the team and during Phase II, India was a shit team, with players woefully out of form.
When Dravid was captain, he couldn't transfer his professional attitude to the rest of the players. Dravid that way is very Australian in his approach to the game. There is a lot of hard work put in and the results show.
I'm not discrediting MSD's captaincy here, don't get me wrong. Nor am I criticizing Ganguly's type of leadership. Dhoni is street smart, while Ganguly was so self-absorbed that the team doing badly meant that he was doing badly.
It's also the same reason why their team does well.
I'm not going to blame the IPL for India's poor performance. I'm going to blame it on overall lack of discipline
But again, that's the problem with us as a nation as a whole. We're okay with being mediocre. We have a very talented side, but they are inconsistent and not very hard working. Dravid and Kumble were probably less talented than most of the guys in our team, but their hard work and perseverance paid off and they are respected the world over. Vinod Kambli, people say was more talented than Tendulkar, but Tendulkar's hard work paid off. The talent was there, yes. But so was hard work.
It's the same reason why he's been in the team for 20 years and players come and go.
So, like I said in my previous blog post, if India needs to achieve the same level of proficiency and consistency like an Australia, South Africa or New Zealand (I mention NZ because despite them having a shitty side, they are always competitive), the BCCI and the players need to seriously rethink their sole purpose of being involved in the game.

BCCI and PCB need to analyze

I was going to write about Mark Boucher today.
But I think the Pakistan team tape story is one of the funniest I've heard in a very long time.
Intikhab Alam calls them 'mentally retarded' and a board member calls Shoaib Malik 'a termite'
I say that it's funny because when I think that Team India and the BCCI act moronic and you think that nobody can fuck up anymore, the PCB comes and says, "Hey, you cunts. Beat this!"
I don't blame the players entirely. Most of them are a bunch of talented, but direction-less kids taken off the street and given a chance to represent their nation.
They become famous overnight and think that they can do anything.
Like Anil Kumble mentioned in his article in Hindustan Times the other day while referring to the BCCI's role in guiding youngsters, I feel that the PCB should do something similar.
That is, if they have a bunch of educated people in that unit.
Otherwise like my brother put it, Shoaib "Genital Warts" Akhtar has a new friend -- Shoaib "Termite" Malik. they both used to play for the Pakistan "mentally retarded" team.
And in the process, Boucher, despite his wonderful wicketkeeping has been forgotten in my thoughts as well.

Clean and competitive cricket is back, but we can't see it

So I just read that Bermuda will host the Americas Championship
I like Beyond the Test World as a blog. It shifts the focus off all the players and gives cricket some popularity.
When I read about non-test playing nations play, my initial feeling is that it will be stiff competition because the teams are all in the same league.
Sometimes of course, they do something miraculous and end up beating a test playing nation. The best examples of that are  the Netherlands against England in the World T20 last year or Ireland against Pakistan in the 2007 World Cup and of course, Kenya against the West Indies in the 1996 World Cup.
But yeah, if given an opportunity, I'd watch this series because it would be clean. Let's face it Bermuda, the United States, Canada, Cayman Islands, Argentina and the Bahamas. You can't play dirty cricket with that combination.
There will be no media coverage and now intense fan-following.
It will be clean cricket in its purest and most competitive form

NDTV and the match fixing connection

While doing a search on Mohammad Azharuddin today, I discovered that apart from NDTV other news channels have also been interviewing him.
NDTV still asks him for his expert opinions on the game.
In the defense of the other channels, they only interviewed him about his political aspirations

Only last week on the Big Fight, they discuss India's poor performance at the T20 World Cup. Expert opinions are from Azhar and Mandira Bedi, along with two other cricket experts.

I just got home to see Azhar and Mandira, as the show went off air.

And yes, Mandira looks hot with her new haircut and to her credit, she can have a conversation with people about the game, which is awesome to see considering how she was during the 2003 World Cup.

But then coming back to the channel, NDTV has a tendency to hire guys who have been involved in the match fixing scandal. Ajay Jadeja and Nikhil Chopra were on their panel of cricketing experts for a very long time.
Am I the only one who has noticed this?
At one point when news and sport's channels wanted brainless entertainment, they hired Navjot Singh Sidhu.
But then again, Sidhu's jokes beyond a point get pissing off and he's hired on special occasions like the opening ceremony of the IPL where he dances while UB40 sings "I can't help falling in love with you".
The only thing left for NDTV to do is call Wasim Akram and Javed Miandad on their panel.
While they have great records to their name and I've loved watching them play, I have a lot of doubts regarding their credibility.
When more than one player accuses Wasim, you know that something is wrong.
In Javed's case, his son is married to Dawood Ibrahim's daughter. Need I say more?

Clark and Watson win it for awesome England

So England are the World T20 champions.

I think they deserve it and I'm really happy that they won it.

But they owe the victory to Michael Clark for batting the way he did.

They owe Michael Clark for running out Dave Warner at the beginning of the innings. 

Clark was batting like an idiot and was woefully out of form. TestMatchSofa announced that he should have been renamed to Inzamam-Ul-Clarke. In Inzamam's defense, he can hit the ball and is an awesome batsman despite the fact that he's obese and was cult leader of Pakistan's religious sect in cricket. This sect for a time, insisted that only fanatics could play for the team.

Again it was left to a Hussey to save Australia.

This time, younger brother David took up the responsibility.

He was ably aided by Cameron White (again) and big brother Michael (Oh no! Not him again)  

I thought that the way Nannes and Tait bowled at the beginning, Australia might just win it.

Craig Keiswetter had other ideas and tried to smash everything he saw.

While he looked like a jackass in certain parts of the innings, he hit out and was effective. 

He looked like a jackass when he got out.

Pietersen continued his form.

And it was awesome that Collingwood finished it off. 

Oh yeah, along with Michael Clark, Shane Watson deserves some mention for bowling absolute shit.

But here's a question: if this is the first coalition since the World War, how long will it take England to win its next title?
And my condolences are with Uncle Jarrod. England probably read www.cricketwithballs.com before the match began.
Of course, more than the English, I see the Pakistanis, who have settled in the United Kingdom celebrating tonight's victory.
The English fans will probably be thinking of the next club game. Fucking soccer 

The King offers himself to Team India

Sir Viv has offered to train our players about the art of playing fast bowling.
It's a very generous offer by a guy, who would wallop most bowlers across the world without wearing a helmet.
But like I mentioned earlier, batsmen across the world struggle while playing quality fast bowling.
Our batsmen, barring Raina and Rohit (in that one inning) were woefully out of form in the World Cup.
They played well in the IPL because IPL is shit.
Uncle J-Rod agrees with me here. I asked him on Twitter what he thought of Mohammad Azharuddin's 'expert knowledge' on saying that they played well in the IPL, but not for the team.
(cwbfeed @jcalamur Then I would disregard all comments. Ofcourse their IPL form was better, the cricket is way shitter there.)
If Sir Viv his hired, and however cool it will be to see him in India, I don't know how he'll deal with our boys. 
Personally, our team needs someone like Saurav Ganguly or Ravi Shastri to be special consultant. 
I dislike Ganguly, but he is so full of himself, that he will bring out the best in this Indian side to show that he is a great motivator.
The same can be said about Shastri.
For the sake of Indian cricket, I honestly don't mind that

Previews and predictions

So it's a T20 Ashes tomorrow.
Both teams despite being juggernauts in the tournament, have had their obstacles.
In a group match, England struggled against Ireland.
And in the semis, it was only thanks to Hussey that Australia reached the finals.
England's had a dream run up to now and Australia were slightly jolted on Friday. So knowing them, they'll raise their game in this match.
It doesn't help England's cause that it's a final, but in their defense, they have been playing some fantastic cricket off late. And as Uncle JRod said, KP is donning the role of the elder statesman. For England's sake, I hope that he doesn't become the retarded batsman that he usually is.
The bowlers are bowling well and Swann is their trump card tomorrow.
For Australia, it's about Shane Watson. He's always been a big match player and I feel that tomorrow will be no different. Hussey can't repeat his heroics. That freak of nature happens once in a lifetime. It's like the Hrishikesh Kanitkar four in the Independence Cup at Dhaka in 1998, or (although I hate to mention it) Javed Miandad hitting Chetan Sharma for a last ball six at Sharjah in 1985 (Chetan should be shot for that one. Who the hell told him to bowl Miandad a full toss)
At the end of it, I want England to win this one (that in itself is a first for me), but I feel that the Aussies will take another title home.  After all, they wanted to prove to the world that they have cracked this form of the game at last
For the sake of all of us, I just hope that it isn't a one-sided final. That will be really pissing off.

Mr. Cricket is the man

Ten minutes ago, when Saeed Ajmal took Steve Smith's wicket, I thought that Australia was out of the T20 world cup.
Hell, Pakistan batted like a dream, took out both Australian openers early, had a small fright from Cameron White, but didn't look like they would lose this match.
Michael Hussey had different ideas.
He was batting at a steady pace and before the last over had scored 38 in 20 balls when the 20th over was about to be bowled.
In T20, 38 in 20 is good. Not great, but good.
What the world didn't know was that he would score 22 runs in the next four balls he faced, and won the match for Australia in the process.
When you see a guy bat like that, you just wonder what on earth the Australian selectors were doing by picking him so late in his career.
In my praise for Hussey, I do feel for Pakistan and Ajmal in particular. They tried and almost won.
They probably would have had it not been for Mr. Cricket.
Australia didn't beat Pakistan. Micheal Hussey did

Shane Bond calls is a day

It's a pity that in his nine years as a cricketer, Shane Bond spent half his time recuperating from injury.
Add another two years and he was playing the rebel ICL league, which resulted in his getting banned from the game by the ICC during that period.
Finally, after all the great bowling spells, times of physiotherapy, which was followed by another great bowling spell, Bond has called it quits.
The decision was inevitable. He's 35 and the body would take longer to heal from injuries than it did in the early part of his career.
It is also a pity. I loved watching him bowl. He was fast, could swing the ball and was never called for chucking.
Also, he brought out his best against Australia, which resulted in some brilliant matches between the two sides.
He also loved walloping us during cricket matches and took full advantage of the fact that Saurav Ganguly couldn't play short stuff.
With him gone, unfortunately there is more burden on Daniel Vettori.
Ian Butler and Chris Martin are hard working guys, but they can't penetrate a bowling attack.
But this is not about the rest of the side. This is about Bond, who at the end of the day, was probably the world's greatest fast bowler after England's Frank Tyson to have not taken 100 test wickets

The curious case of Pakistani cricket

So, the Pakistani team fucked us over.
After playing terrible cricket in the initial stage of the tournament, they are now in the semifinals against Australia.
It was something India didn't expect at all.
Team India probably thought that Pakistan, like them, took Aman Ki Asha seriously.
But Shahid and his band of merry men aren't stupid, although they pretend to be. Hell, they won everything last year. This year, despite people writing them off, they kicked South Africa out of the tournament. Before that, they were out as well.
Suddenly, they're in the semis.
While the cricketing world is predicting an Ashes final, I wouldn't rule Pakistan out at all.
You can't rule Pakistan out; in fact, you can never rule Pakistan out. Even if the PCB handpicks 11 random guys with raw talent from the street and gives them a Pakistan cap, they can never be ruled out.
In fact, when there are 11 new random names, they would be a deadlier unit.
So, Australia, get your game in place tomorrow. Your pace attack might suddenly not look so effective and your batting might collapse thanks to some random Pakistani bowling.
You have been warned

Indians and fast bowling

I'll agree that India as a team played like shit at the T20 World Cup.
Dhoni's remarks stating that the IPL parties were responsible for the poor performance will raise questions about his sincerity as a player and a captain, and the team's discipline as a whole. The media being the way it is will use this as a tool to try and finish him off, unless he proves them wrong in the next series we play
If that wasn't bad enough, Yuvraj and Nehra have been involved in an altercation at some pub in the West Indies. They will obviously deny the charges made against them.
Ridiculous, I say.
However, this piece isn't about the partying scenario and the fact that Team India lacks discipline and consistency to make winning a habit. This is a piece about India and the players' inability to play fast and short pitched bowling. And here, I'm going to do a test match analysis, because it is in that format where a bowler can take advantage of the fact that he can bowl fast and short and get away with aiming the ball at the batsman's head rather than the stumps.
For the last 50 years, the cricketing world has always criticized Indian batsmen and their inability to play fast bowling. Fred Trueman during his career best of 8/31 in his post match interview said that the Indian batsmen were scared. And yes, at that time there were. Here, you have a guy bowling at over 90 mph and your head and the only thing you think of is your life, as the concept of helmets and protective gear hadn't come out then.
But since then, things have changed.
Today, batsmen around the world, despite the protective gear available to them, suffer against genuinely quick and quality fast bowling. If I'm not convincing enough, let's look at statistics
Shoaib Akhtar, regarded as the world's fastest bowler averages 34.50 against India. He averages 24 against South Africa and 5 against New Zealand. Now it will be unfair to New Zealand because Akhtar has played only two test matches against them. But against South Africa, he has played five test matches and 10 against India.
But then, Shoaib would be considered inconsistent by cricketing pundits.
So let's take an example of Curtly Ambrose. Ambrose averages 20.99 in tests, which is a phenomenal record in itself. But he averages an unenviable 38.26 against India.
By showing these numbers, I'm not saying that Indian players are fantastic players of fast bowling. Alan Donald, in his career, averaged 17.31 against the Indians. Malcolm Marshall was consistent against all the sides he bowled against and Shane Bond has done phenomenally well against the subcontinent, except Sri Lanka.
Now, why does everyone criticize India and its inability to play quick bowling? Aakash Chopra has been tweeting about how we need to produce fast bowling wickets in India. While I don't disagree with him, Sri Lanka need to do the same thing. For the last 10 years, they have produced wickets to give Muralitharan his wickets. No offence to Murali, though. The man has taken wickets all over the world. The wickets in Pakistan are practically dead.
I think there are a couple of reasons why India is always criticized about their inability
1) India has never produced a quality fast bowler. We've had several fast medium guys. Srinath was genuinely quick towards the end of his career, but that's about it. Ishant was labelled as the next big thing, but he's been bowling like a cunt of late
2) Most Indian batsmen, who have done well against quick bowlers have been smug about it. Funnily though, four of India's greatest players against fast bowling - Gavaskar, Vishwanath, Tendulkar and Dravid have never bragged about their ability. The others, however, look so smug and arrogant that it probably pisses a bowler off. Malcolm Marshall in his autobiography stated the reasons why he disliked Dilip Vensarkar and how he would enjoy bowling fast to him because of his pissing-off attitude.
So, if Indian players need to stop getting targeted, then they need to produce good wickets in India and stop acting like a bunch of pompous idiots. While this will not happen overnight, hopefully in time things will change. Otherwise, teams the world over will try and do their best against India

Azharuddin speaks of Team India fiasco

So, after he received a life ban, this is the first time Mohammad Azharuddin has spoken to a cricket website.
"Obviously if you stay up the whole night, it would affect you. Players should be responsible enough. The game is more important than the parties. Excuses like these cannot be given after you lose. For a player, cricket should come first and everything else is secondary."
Mohammad Azharuddin is appalled by Dhoni citing the hectic IPL schedules, on and off the field, as an excuse for the side's performance.
It's funny. This is from the same guy, who was banned for life for fixing matches that involved his country.
It doesn't matter whether he's guilty or not. It does matter that he was banned and disgraced from the game.
Then he decided to enter politics and stood for elections using a Congress ticket.
Suddenly, without realizing it, he won and became a member of the Lok Sabha. 
Ideally, he should have become union sports minister and legalized betting in all games. At least, we'd know that the IPL and professional wrestling would mean the same thing. 
Now, the media wants his expert opinion on the game and how things are in it. 
Considering his oratory skills, I'm sure that he would be as clear as the Great Khali. At least in Khali's case, we know 100 per cent that he fixes matches. It's his job to do so.
Personally, I blame the media as well for interviewing Azhar. They have no right in doing so.

Team India: Post match analysis

India's loss yesterday was inevitable.
You can't blame them. They won two matches in the tournament.
One was a close call against South Africa, thanks to Suresh Raina's century.
One was a team effort. Full of skill from all the players, in the game against Afghanistan.
Two wins out of five games. That is still 40 per cent victory in the T20 world cup.
If they were writing an examination, they would have still passed.
But let's do an analysis of the players.
Raina deserves praise. Barring the game against the Australians, he has carried his IPL form to the national circuit and has performed regularly.
Rohit Sharma had one magnificent innings. If he plays more like he did when he made that 79 against a good pace attack, then India have something to cheer about for its middle order in the future.
Yuvraj is a cunt. Always has been and will never change.
Dhoni just won the IPL. He needs to lose something now. This was the best thing he could lose. And yeah, he had two bowlers bowling like a pair of twats and a batsman who is a twat.
But these are all excuses.
A more astute analysis was given to me by my brother in an email he sent today: India can't play fast bowling. it apparently can't play any bowling or even bowl for that matter. Perhaps we should stick to our unofficial national sport: pocket billiards.

What a bunch of wankers.

South Africa: the eternal chokers

Uncle J-Rod got it right again.South Africa proved that they can't perform in a big tournament. Today's loss to Pakistan has resulted in them getting out of the T20 cup.
Pakistan has a chance of surviving.
Does that mean, India has a chance as well?
Will the Indian side manage to stun Sri Lanka tomorrow?
Aakash Chopra tweeted that Sri Lanka's reliability on Mahi and Sanga could cost them the match.
At least, Sri Lanka have two people to count on.
Who on earth does India have, right now?
Dhoni's ODing as a captain. He makes Harbhajan open the bowling on a fast bowler's wicket and bowls first on a track where batting first is the smart thing to do.
Yuvraj is batting like a cunt.
Zaheer and Nehra seem out of sorts.
Vijay thinks he's playing a test match.
Dhoni is batting, but getting out at the wrong time.
So, Raina and Sharma, who have been amongst the runs, have a lot to do.
If this doesn't work, India can always join the South Africans and go on a vacation before embarking on their Zimbabwe tour

Australia have cracked the T20 format

In the first T20 World Cup, Australia looked out of sorts.
They never adapted to the shortest form of the game, the same way India and Pakistan had.
Last year, they decided to have a couple of spinners, along with Brett Lee, Nathan Bracken and Mitchell Johnson. It was a good ploy, but unfortunately for them not good enough. They were getting the hang of the format, but not consistent enough.
This year, they have adopted a four-man pace attack and it has worked.
They probably teased everyone in the warm-up game by losing to Zimbabwe. It has always been a plot that they have followed.
In 1974, when Dennis Lillee was making his comeback in the test match that shot Jeff Thompson to superstardom, Lillee was bowling military medium pace at the practice grounds. Similar tricks have been employed by the Australians in future series. The warm-up game was just another example.
India wasn't the only one to be brutalized by the four fast men. Sri Lanka got buggered last night.
In a way it's good for India. According to one of the tweets I read, Australia had to beat Sri Lanka to let India have a chance of qualifying.
It would also do India a world of good if the BCCI payed the next team India is scheduled to play to forfeit and let India qualify.
Since it is Sri Lanka, we have to find a way of tackling Malinga. Maybe Zaheer could take Malinga out for a drink and tell his Mumbai Indians bowling partner to bowl like him for this one game.
Similarly, Yuvraj can finally put himself to use and take Mahela and Sanga for an all-night party before the game. Yuvraj isn't going to make runs anyway, but this way, neither will Mahi and Sanga.
Hopefully, however, Australia's pace attack destroys everyone else to prove that India is not the only side in the world that is genuinely fucked up against fast bowling.

Is the IPL to blame?

India lost because they were crap.
In the first year of the T20 cup, India and Pakistan were unstoppable because they were the only two teams that understood the T20 format.
Yuvraj smashed Broad for 36 in an over; Sreesanth was actually bowling maiden overs and RP was the next big thing.
Similarly for Pakistan, Umar Gul was their bowling sensation and carried forward that form to the following World Cup, which Pakistan won. Also, Misbah-Ul-Haq invented the scoop shot that gave him a lot of runs and India the first World Cup.
Then came the IPL. In IPL I and II, since Pakistani players were selected, they got better international exposure and capitalized on it to take the next World Cup.
Meanwhile, England, New Zealand, Sri Lanka and the West Indies were slowly getting the hang of playing the shortest form of the game.
Australia, however, were getting raped, which is why they have come back with a vengeance this year.
This year, IPL 3 saw no Pakistani players. There were more Caucasians than there were in the previous two tournaments. Hell, even Jacques Kallis was selected to represent South Africa for the T20 this year because of his IPL form.
India had just finished off two seasons - one with South Africa and earlier to Bangladesh - before IPL began.
The players felt that money was more important that resting their bodies.
The effect was disaster.
On the other hand, Pakistan hasn't played too much cricket are probably taking the same plane as India is.
So, is the IPL to blame totally? I'd ask Lalit, but he's got his own issues to deal with at the moment

Aman Ki Asha takes a whole new level

So India played shittier cricket that the West Indies today.
Gayle finally stuck form and raped the bowling, barring Harbhajan. The others bowled like a bunch of garbage.
As I predicted, they had Roach in the side and I forgot that Taylor bowled fast.
Roach took another two wicket haul in his 4 overs, something he has done only twice before.
We could have won because of the number of wides that were bowled by their side. So if we are to reconcile anything from the match, it was that they bowled shit. But then again, we batted shittier, while Gayle singlehandedly won the match for them.
Now, India and Pakistan can go home together in the same plane and Shoaib Malik and Sania Mirza can pole dance for them as part of the Aman Ki Asha Peace process

India vs West Indies: A preview

So India play the West Indies tonight.
Personally, I hate watching matches in the Caribbean because I have to stay awake all night.
I've watched the all-nighters, when India or Australia have toured. When other teams tour, I usually watch until I can't keep my eyes open.
But yeah, back to the topic: it is a do-or-die situation for both teams.
West Indies will rely on an all-pace attack, after watching what Australia did to India the other night.
They'll probably take Kemar Roach, although his record in T20 is shit. The West Indies as a unit, personally is shit today. It's unfortunate, but it's the truth. Yet, despite being shit, they show signs of brilliance like the did when they beat England the other day (with a bit of help from Duckworth and Lewis). But yeah, their brilliance is inconsistent and hopefully tonight, for the sake of the Indian fan and the BCCI, whose IPL franchise paid some of their players millions of dollars to play for the IPL teams, they will play like crap.
India have some problems. Barring the brilliance of Rohit Sharma, who batted like he was on LSD the other night, the others are struggling. Yuvraj Singh shouldn't be in the side; the bowlers, except for Harbhajan are out of sorts and the fielding is as good as a child representing his apartment for a cricket match.
So tonight's contest winner will technically be the one who plays less shit. There won't be any brilliance; there won't be any one-man army (unless of course Pollard decides to sodomize us with his cricket bat); there will just be two teams making fools of themselves on the field.

Paul Collingwood: The unsung hero

As an Indian, people would expect me to speak of Sachin, Sehwag or Dravid in an opening blog piece.
However, I'm starting off with a piece on Paul Collingwood.
You'd wonder why I'm doing something like this, considering that Paul Collingwood's popularity in India is non-existent. You tell an Indian fan that you like him and they say, 'Why?'
Well, the answer is simple: When I saw him take a catch to dismiss Matthew Hayden in a one-day international a few years ago, I nearly wet myself.
Then he became captain and like Michael Vaughan, he was laid-back, yet very effective. He had a very Australian-like fighting spirit in him. This spirit, of course, gave England the CB Series a few years ago.
When I see England do well in this year's T20, I have mixed emotions. Mixed because I've never been a supporter of the English cricket side.. But with Collingwood leading the side (No offence to Andrew Strauss), I hope that they do well in this tournament.