Desicritics Author: Angshuman Hazra

The Future of Indian Cricket

Angshuman Hazra — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 07:32:04 EST

I could not believe my ears when I heard Maninder Singh defending Yuvraj Singh in the face of questions raised on his form and fitness in a tele-discussion on dropping Rahul Dravid and Sourav Ganguly from the one day side.

Upon being reminded of Yuvraj Singh’s inability to last long in any of his Australian outings Maninder argued that Yuvraj is mostly getting dismissed through slip catches in the first class matches; however since Yuvraj bats at number four / five in ODIs & T20s there will be no slips when he comes in and he should score! Whether that comment was more insulting to Ponting’s captaincy or Yuvraj’s batting ability is for you to decide.

I have long been supporting the cause of picking only those players in ODIs who are either good batsmen or good bowlers depending on their trade but who necessarily have the accepted ‘plus’-es called good ground fielding and deft running between wickets. The philosophy is more rigidly applicable to T20 teams.

I have always believed that Rahul Dravid and Sourav Ganguly should have retired from ODIs just after the 2007 world cup. Both are very good batsmen. But unlike Sachin Tendulkar the Lords 1996 twins do not have quick feet; they are neither skilled ground fielders nor quick runners between wickets. They are not going to contribute that little extra to the team in normal ODI / T20 conditions where we need slip fielders (Dravid’s specific plus) for only 10-15 overs and part time seam bowlers (Ganguly’s specific plus) only in overcast conditions. This means they are susceptible to finger pointing and selection hazards even if they do not perform in 2 or 3 games. You don’t want to see players of their calibre facing it.

However Australia is a place where the Golden generation boys’ batting assumes greater importance than that of the next generation of batsmen simply because the men hold their performances in these shores while the boys have been unable to do so. It happened during the 2003 tour and it has happened this time too in Test matches. I see no reason for that not happening in ODIs unless the matter is as simple as explained by Maninder.

These two ex-captains should have deserved serious thought from selectors just as the right, experienced horses for the course. There are horses by the dozen for Indian courses but the away courses have not yet been happy for the colts. The benching of the senior pros could be postponed by one series in this context.

Moreover, the specific ‘plus’-es of Dravid and Ganguly (and even Laxman’s catching, for that matter) come into play so much more in Australian conditions.

Let us ignore that all. Now we go to their ‘minus’-es, i.e. lack of the commonly accepted pluses. Since both were dropped after a very short run of failure in ODIs and don’t look likely to be considered for a re-admission we can safely attribute their dismissal to their minus-es which can no more be improved unlike form.

Surely we can then safely assume the chosen few for the ODI side for the tri-series to have those ‘plus’-es.

Let us check up on the facts with the names in the announced squad. We will call them the ‘Future Guys’. Bowlers first.

S Sreesanth
Speciality: bowler
Plus: Virtually None - not much batting, was not impressive in the outfield in the last series he played, is coming back from injury

RP Singh
Speciality: bowler
Plus: Virtually None - not much batting, not the quickest outfielder.

Ishant Sharma
Speciality: bowler
Plus: None - No batting at all, quick legs but lousy outfielder.

Piyush Chawla
Speciality: bowler
Plus: batting has never clicked in international matches, but a good outfielder.

Irfan Pathan:
Speciality: bowler
Plus: Has developed into a very good outfielder, good runner between wickets
Plus 2:. Very capable with the bat

Praveen Kumar is unknown to me. Harbhajan is an adequate selection displaying some plusses for his lower order batting and decent outfielding in ODIs.

The batsmen’s list: Mahendra Singh Dhoni (capt & wk), Sachin Tendulkar, Yuvraj Singh, Virender Sehwag, Dinesh Karthik, Robin Uthappa, Gautam Gambhir, Suresh Raina, Rohit Sharma.

All the batsmen are good outfielders, and most are good runners between wickets. Some are excellent catchers.

So even if the omission of Ganguly & Dravid looks unjustified if we look at the bowlers, it looks less debatable when we see the people they are competing with. If some of these guys can perform like a Ganguly or Dravid in his prime over the upcoming tri-series they would be justifying the selectors’ faith in them as the ‘Future Guys’. They would have then rightfully ousted the two iconic batsmen from the ODI squad simply by being better than them.

What if they do not live up to it? It has already happened once, and the same Ganguly was at the centre of it.

We will all be watching. We have been hearing this ‘blooding youngsters’ theme for sometime now. We have seen how our youngsters can be relentless in 20 over games some months back. And we have also seen in the very next ODI series against Australia how they start looking like amateurs in longer games. We have seen confirmation of it in the ongoing Test series.

We remember that these same ‘Future Guys’ fielded incompetently and batted poorly for first half of the ODI series at home against Australia. That they won two matches out of seven. That the 1st win came from the bats of Sachin & Ganguly, the second from the bats of their bowlers and they wasted the platform to win a third that was laid by – who else – Sachin and Ganguly.

It is not the fault of the ‘Future Guys’ themselves. Many of them are talented, agile and intense (enough for T20s) but have not yet acquired the stamina required for long games. Moreover Sourav and Rahul are greats – and to replace such people you must develop their successors over a period of time. You can’t just select their replacements in the hope that you will be as lucky as the guy that picked the two of them for the same trip 12 years back. The system they came up from did not ensure Sourav and Dravid were excellent by the time they played in the national team – they just turned out that way. Are we living in the hope that such players will just emerge out of nowhere?

We hope the concerned people – the selectors, the board members, all that are party to this young team theory - have studied the reasons of failure of the earlier ‘Team building for the future’ effort ahead of the 2007 world cup. We hope they have ensured that the youngsters included in the sequel to the big flop are adequately groomed. If not then I’m afraid the whole exercise, even when done with best of intentions, can look like one big and dangerous experiment quite resembling a conspiracy against the seniors to replace them with inferior players. Just as it did the last time.

Suresh Raina has already faced one such ‘battle with oldies’ in his first stint with the national team. It may not be good for people like him if they are to be declared losers in this ‘war’ the second time round. The missile, however, has been launched now.

The future of Indian cricket will look healthy if the Future Guys achieve the double bill of performing well right throughout the series. However if they do not then people representing the BCCI selection process should accept their inability to develop (as against ‘select’) replacements for the older generation in public and ask the rich board of India to arrange a detailed training for them from Cricket Australia.

Meanwhile, the effect this selection has on the team morale ahead of the Adelaide cruncher remains to be seen. I would have no doubts on the effect if Dhoni was also the Test captain. However Kumble’s absence from the ODI side should help calm down the dressing room infinitely.

PS: Let’s give the selection guys, at least one of them, some relief. Vengsarkar picked and backed Ishant Sharma all through and must be complimented for the way he identified this boy’s gift of natural bounce and accuracy.

Bowler vs Batsman

Angshuman Hazra — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 06:35:23 EST

Most of us believe that the bowler is more important in Test matches than the batsman. They are there to win you Test matches. Perhaps the great bowling sides of 70's and 80's have also supported this 'bowlers are king' theory. Today we will explore the validity of this assumption.

For all their runs the batsmen won't get you the 20 opposition wickets you need to be a victor. To get the 2 points you need 4 good men to handle the red cherry. The value of bowlers can not be undermined in any way.

But the coin has another side. The batsman can score 600+ in an innings and make sure that the opposition will never win the game. For all their wickets, the bowlers cannot ensure that the draw is the worst result for their team. Fundamental difference is good performances from bowlers shorten the game while competent batting ensures greater length of play.

Let us put it this way: a team requires a good bowling arsenal to turn (i) a potential loss to a win, and (ii) a potential draw to a win.

However the bowlers cannot turn a potential loss to a draw. You need the batsmen there. And the only time a self-respecting team considers a draw a decent result is while playing a better team. That is because against the better team a loss is more likely than a win, and when the former looms large the draw seems more honourable. Batsmen must stand up and be counted against higher ranked opposition.

But then the need to opt for a draw depends on the game situation. The importance of the batsmen's performance, therefore, is a dynamic quality. Are the bowlers allowed to think likewise? Are they exempted from performing in the 3rd innings when at the end of the second innings the team will be happy to earn a draw by batting out the 4th innings? They are not. We need the bowlers to do well regardless. As long as a team keeps winning as the first option the bowlers will have to strive for wickets irrespective of quality of opposition and game situation.

That is where the bowlers are important: they drive quality through the very nature of their role. They bowl to win. Their primary role is to aim for the ultimate result - a win - while the batsmen's primary role is to support bowlers by giving them time and runs to achieve the aim.

In India we worship our batsmen while the bowlers are also rans. Anil kumble, the greatest Test player amongst the current lot and team captain, struggles for endorsement deals. This must change for more young people to want to be bowlers.

We tend to think of big 4th innings chases where the batsmen are apparently 'batting to win'. "Are the batsmen too not winning us games there?" we may wonder. Well, are they? There may be the odd instance when they actually are winning games that could only be won by them (Brian Lara scoring 15o odd against Australia in 1999 comes back to my mind). At all other times in 4th innings chases the batsmen may only be playing catch up, covering up for their deficiencies in the first innings and / or their bowlers' inadequacies in the two opposition innings.

The ongoing Test match in Perth is a case in point. At the end of the 3rd day the Australian batsmen are battling to make up for their bowling and batting drawbacks. The Indian bowlers are bowling to win. And the best thing about it is the draw being taken out of the equation.

Corollary

Where does the fielder (the catcher, to be specific) figure in that hierarchy? Well he supports the bowler directly. He is no less important than the batsman. Their positions in the field must also be wisely chosen, much in the way batting orders are for batsmen. Asking Sourav Ganguly to field at point while hunting for wickets is a far bigger indiscretion than asking Rahul Dravid to open the batting in Australia without an adequate notice period (or even not selecting the more compact Dinesh Karthik ahead of Wasim Jaffer as Sehwag's opening partner for Perth).

You may have taken 600 wickets, Mr. Anil Kumble. You are even allowed to bear a grudge that your phenomenal Laxmanesque feat of taking 100+ Aussie wickets at around 5 wickets per match in an era dominated by them has gone virtually unattended in the media. But you cannot put fielders at wrong positions in a match where you need to hold on to all your chances and forget worrying about all other things.

[This post was written before the start of 4th day's play at Perth]

The Cricket World Cup Ends in Farce and Australia's Victory

Angshuman Hazra — Sat, 28 Apr 2007 22:23:51 EDT

The final game of a tumultuous ICC Cricket World Cup befitted the tournament, with its allegations, losses, and upsets.

Scene 1: A damp morning awaits the World Cup Final. Play starts in the morning after a 2� hour delay. The match is reduced to 38 overs a side even before a ball is bowled.

Scene 2: Chasing Australia's mammoth total of 281, Sanath Jayasuriya fell into the vicious trap of Duckworth Lewis. He eyed the rain clouds and sensed that a rain interuption, possibly the last one, was round the corner. He wanted to keep his team. In trying to manufacture an ugly across-the-line swipe off the last ball of a Michael Clarke over he surrendered his wicket and set Sri Lanka further back on the D/L chart after the loss of three wickets.

Scene 3: The 5th ball of the 25th over is bowled. Fairly dense droplets of rain are pouring for quite a while now. The pitch is getting mucky and the outfield / bowling run up gets more dangerous by the minute. However the batsmen Chamara Silva and skipper Jayawardene do not budge as that could mean the last of their team's hopes to win the cherished title. Umpires Steve Bucknor and Aleem Dar had hesitated on forcing a pause of play under the exceptional circumstances but now they decided enough was enough and called out for the covers.

Scene 4: The play resumes soon with two overs missing from the over quota available to Sri Lanka and the target reduced to 269. For the last few overs a couple of new-to-the-crease batsmen of a brave team making a valiant attempt to chase a steep target against the world's best side in the biggest and most watched cricket match of all has had the small additional worry of looking at the skies after every delivery as well as the 'parallel' scoreboard of M/s D/L for playing to two different game plans at the same time. One game plan is to win the game over the full distance, the other to stay ahead if rain interrupts the match.

All this is actually taking place even though the tournament rules provide for a reserve day for EACH of the matches of the tournament. Unbelievable! I failed to appreciate the cricketing logic behind that rule when I first heard of it during the group league matches and I still cannot reckon just how they could allow a final to be played under those same set of rules. Remaining true to their ever-greedy selves that owe allegiance only to the telemedia & their sponsors, an all important group of entities that naturally want the matches to end on scheduled days, the rulemakers of International Cricket Council have decreed that:

(i) the reserve day is to be used "only if we have a match with any unfinished innings of less than 20 overs" for any of the sides; and that
(ii) the match starts afresh on the next day instead of the simple matter of completing an interrupted but full 50 over match over two separate days.

And who on earth would prefer that sort of painfully obnoxious enforcement of the word "one day" in "One Day Internationals" in exchange of a proper game of cricket? Who would refuse to even spare the Big Final that crap? Of course the self styled 'keepers of the game', the International Cricket Council.

As indicated in the previous mid-match post I had reckoned Sri Lanka to be overwhelmed by the concession of 30 odd extra runs to sublime big hitting skills of the Aussie wicketkeeper, runs that Adam Gilchrist had no business getting against a bowling side as good as the Lankans, runs that turned a potential nail biter into an expectedly one-sided affair barring an improbable 2nd miracle. However the speculation about the final margin - a fair one - is destined to remain just that as Sri Lanka, who unlike Australia had to suffer mid-innings downpours and consequently let a few crucial mid overs go by while they were helplessly torn between the two game plans, have been as badly hit by the ICC's rule makers as by that blinder from Adam Gilchrist.

Shame on you, ICC. Can you not just do us cricket lovers a favour by disappearing from the face of cricket? The game cannot seriously go on any worse by itself than it is doing at present under your central regime.

Update: These excerpts from cricinfo's text commentary sums the sad end to the people's World Cup aptly. Read on:

6.12pm The light's been offered and Sri Lanka have taken it - meaning Australia have won the World Cup again. They certainly deserve it and are huddling in celebration. A bit of a damp squib of an ending, which is of course fitting.

Now what's this? Aleem Dar is having a word with Australia, telling them they can't yet celebrate. Officially this match isn't over. You couldn't make it up. You don't have to.

And the farce continues! Now the stands for the ceremony have been brought on, and are off again, as the umpires shoo them away. My word.

6.17pm It's what is traditionally known as night. It is so dark but the umpires are now saying the match will continue. Heads should roll for this. The man is out putting the 30-yard circles back out. He needs a torch to do so. The batsmen are heading out to the middle accompanied by a guide dog.

6.30pm Congratulations to Australia who were the best team from the first match and maintained their relentlessly high standard throughout. Sri Lanka gave them a game but on the day came up just short.

There's a certain irony that cricket's four-yearly showcase ended in farce ... Australia, Sri Lanka, the Caribbean and millions of spectators deserved more but given what has gone before today, it was almost inevitable. You can spin it all you like, this tournament has not done the game any favours and people at the top, if they had any decency, would be contemplating their futures. But we all know that won't happen.

Cricket Finals Mid-Game Report - The Green Mile of Adam Gilchrist

Angshuman Hazra — Sat, 28 Apr 2007 15:56:46 EDT

We are into the lunch break of the 2007 Cricket World Cup final. Even if the break were to be of 10 hours instead of 10 minutes I would be groping for words to describe it. I have decided that I will rather let this collage of images from various points of the Gilchrist innings. These can narrate what transpired till the 31st over of the Australian innings of The Final better than words ever would.

10.2 (ov): The first powerplay is over. Sri Lanka have restricted the Aussies to a rather low 1st Powerplay score of 47 in a 38-overs-a-side winner takes all encounter. Dilhara Fernando smiles ruefully as he failed a collect a very low c&b chance from Adam Craig Gilchrist, then batting on 31. The next three balls disappear for 4, 4 & 6.

22.2 (ov): Malinga bowls an inswinging near-yorker (outswinging for Gilly) that pitches on leg-n-middle and threatens to split the gap between bat and pad through late movement to hit off stump until Gilly, already predetermined for a big hit, still manages to make a little adjustment to middle the ball for a straight four over the bowler's head. An international batsman on another day or even another international batsman on this day would be mighty pleased just to survive that one. [cricinfo text commentary: "Where did that come from?"]

30.3 (ov): Adam Gilchrist skies a riser from Dilhara and Chamara Silva take the catch at mid on. Gilchrist departs for 149 off 104 balls. It makes the incident from 10.2 the turning point of the match.

If you are about to write off the Sri Lankan bowlers for having conceded 281 in 38 overs think again. A mere 109 runs were scored off the 129 balls faced by other Australian batsmen. That is very good against this batting side in a 38 over match. Add an Andrew Symonds coming in at the slog and scoring just 2 boundaries in nearly eight overs of stay and you'll think that the Australians finally met their match. It all, however, came to nought because Gilly rattled up 149 runs from the 104 deliveries he faced.

Just how special was it? I reckon that return of 149 to be at least 30 runs more than what any Australian batsman in prime form (including Gilchrist himself, perhaps) could have recorded against this bowling. Gilchrist hit no less than 8 sixes and 13 fours and yet so many of the shots came straight in or around the 'V'.

From whatever we know of the man, Adam Gilchrist will be speculating hard during the lunch break on announcing his ODI retirement today in the event of Australia pocketing their third successive World Cup title.

My vote is on a 'yes'. And so it should be.

Quote of the day: Ricky Ponting played out two dot balls and another one when Adam Gilchrist hit his seventh six off the first ball of Sanath's 27th over and took a single off the next ball. Michael Holding observed: "That's a nice ploy by Sri Lankans, to keep Ricky Ponting on strike. You never thought you would ever hear it, did you?"

Cricket World Cup 2007 - The Final Match-up

Angshuman Hazra — Sat, 28 Apr 2007 12:03:36 EDT

Since waking in the morning, I have wanted to carry out a stats study of the three best bowlers and four best batsmen from each of the finalists to guess what to expect from the world Cup final. The match is going to start in a few minutes from now (7 pm IST) and I finally did get the time to do it. The Cricinfo folks have done some job on Australia-Sri Lanka encounters from the past. Their study firmly reiterates that Sri Lankans have a dismal record against Australians, particularly so in the World Cup.

But then so much has changed in the last year or two. We have a Sri Lanka that has played exceedingly well outside Sri Lanka for one year now, one that has the best depth and width in bowling resources. Equally we have an Australian side that has shown over the last 11 matches that their batsmen can go the extra yards and even dwarf their already lofty standards to cover up for any perceived weakness in bowling.

I have a simple plan for comparative measurement of bowling and batting strengths of the two sides. We sample them from their last 15 matches. Since 70% of those have been played in the World Cup, the current form of these players gets adequately reflected in this sample. At the same time the temporary troughs and exceptional circumstances facing a few players (e.g. Mike Hussey never got a decent opportunity to express himself this Cup) get slightly evened out by extending the sample a few games prior to the World Cup.

The prime criterion of judgement for bowlers is, as always, wickets. Runs, for batsmen. However to get a fairer picture of the player performances we would modify the wicket tallies of bowlers with a factor inversely proportional to their economy rates. For the batsmen we will modify the run aggregates with the factor of their batting strike rates. So here are the basic rules:

Bowling: We take the top three bowlers of one side. We divide the wickets taken by each in the last 15 matches with his economy rate (expressed in ratio of six - i.e. an economy rate of five will be 0.833 and so on) for the period and add the resulting modified figures for the three. we do the same for the other side and compare them.

Batting: We take the top three batsmen of one side. I multiply the runs made by each in the last 15 matches with his CAREER strike rate on date (expressed in ratio of hundred - i.e. a strike rate of 80 will be 0.8 and so on) and add the resulting modified figures for the four. We do the same for the other side and compare them.

[Filtered strike rates of players for recent matches are not readily available. We are therefore forced to make do with career strike rates]

We are not taking up a fielding comparison. In Pre-World Cup previews we rated these two as comparable fielding sides and their performances from the world Cup indicate as much.

SL - bowling

Lasith Malinga: 28wkts @ 5.17 ~ 32.5
Chaminda Vaas: 23 wkts @ 3.35 ~ 41.2
M Muralitharan: 31 wkts @ 3.80 ~ 48.9
Total: 122.6

Aus - bowling

Glenn McGrath: 29 wkts @ 4.57 ~ 38.1
Nathan Bracken: 22 wkts @ 4.11 ~ 32.1
Shaun Tait*: 28 wkts @ 5.47 ~ 30.7
Total: 100.9

[*played only 14 matches so far]

Bowling Strength Analysis: The Sri Lankans are holding a slight edge there, 21.5% precisely. The Aussies do have an in-form left arm slow bowler (Brad Hogg) as their 4th bowler but Sri Lanka is equal to it. Their crisis man is Sanath Jayasuriya of the left arm slow-medium-fast variety.

SL - batting

Sanath Jayasuriya: 500 runs @ 90.73 ~ 454
Mahela Jayawardene: 570 runs @ 76.07 ~ 434
Chamara Silva: 501 @ 72.70 ~ 364
Kumara Sangakkara: 419 @ 74.3 ~ 311
Total: 1563

Aus - batting

Matthew Hayden: 927 runs @ 78.6 ~ 729
Ricky Ponting: 850 runs @ 80.24 ~ 682
Andrew Symonds: 340 runs @ 92.23 ~ 314
Adam Gilchrist: 371 runs @ 96.12 ~ 357
Total: 2082

Batting Strength Analysis: Aussies hold a 33.2% edge there. This value is significantly more than the 21.5% deficit in the bowling analysis. Also these figures do not take into account the increased batting strike rates exhibited by Hayden and Ponting in the present tournament in comparison to their overall strike rates, or else the batting would have looked even more of a mismatch.

If the number crunching is beginning to put you off then just dwell on this: Mike Hussey is no more amongst the top four Australian batsmen for being reduced to an unknown quantity in WC'07. However Sangakkara, also going thru a dip of form (and has no excuses of exceptional circumstances like Hussey) since the Super Eights, still qualifies amongst the top four SL players.

Sri Lanka will need one last World Cup ton from the blade of Sanath Jayasuriya to bridge that gap. For all the wizardry of Murali, he has only ten overs to bowl and Australian batsmen are quite unlike Indians and New Zealanders in that they know it.

Acknowledgment:

1) Huzaifa, for correcting me merely two days back that the final happens to be on the 28th of April and NOT 29th

2) The rain in Barbados, for letting me complete the post without missing the match!

Satire: The Big Swim - Where My Heart Still Goes On

Angshuman Hazra — Wed, 25 Apr 2007 00:47:01 EDT

Disclaimer: All characters in the story are fictional. Any similarity with anyone living or dead is purely coincidental.

--------------------

Diary entry - 24.04.2007

It is the 43rd day of our trip. An amazing cool day awaits me on the breezy deck of the cruiser. It is an irresistible combination, always provoking a liberating sensation in the midst of the sea. You feel on top of the world, another world.

Let me introduce myself first.

On second thoughts I do not matter here. Let's say I'm a lot like The Anci ... OK, it is the third millenium so it is proper to say that I am like Jack Dawson of Titanic the movie minus his Rose. I had my Rose too but ...

I walk ahead and stand near the tip where the railings from both sides of deck meet. This place floods me with memories. My Rose used to stand on this railing with both hands stretched out like wings and eyes closed, dreaming of flying like a proud albatross. A childlike joy dripped from her countenance when she emulated Titanic's Rose or the albatross – I'll never know - and I loved her for it. Fifty feet below where I stand, the cruiser is cutting through the cold seawater at a leisurely pace. It is following four guys that are swimming in the ocean for an ever-nearing destination ahead. Those guys are Oz, Kwi, LionL and SpBok, in descending order of their ranking positions in the quadrennial Big Swim.

The guys are participating in a month-and-half long swimming challenge of several rounds spread across seven seas. The Final Destination is now just five days ahead. I am holding the pre-trip prediction sheet where 90 days ago I jotted down four prospective winners from the starting lot. My heart still wants to take one last look at the piece of paper before jettisoning it with other redundant paraphernalia into the milky turbulent trail of the four valiant swimmers that is being continously devoured by our dogged vessel like a never-ending noodle.

The four names were noted down in large fonts and fourth one was later touched up in a loving red hue. A sprinkling of gold from the morning sun today makes that name look nearly as beautiful as the person herself. I had backed Oz, Green, LionL and my Rose, in that order of ranking, to remain in the hunt when the final week began. Green inexplicably got off at the first port and the other, the love of my life, sank into the depths soon thereafter. But Kwi and SpBok, two of the next three on my rating charts, managed to stay on board. (I had rated Kwi and Windz joint 5th and SpBok 7th.)

Immune to logic, I pick up the pen and circle off the two lost names on the sheet to write Kwi and SpBok above them with a strange introspection. I peep across the sheet at the four moving images challenging the wavy sea in the distance. SpBok was the crowd favourite to win the challenge at the outset. I dedicate a silent round of applause to him for doing better than I thought but his swim (so far) has been more of the seasick guy from my predictions than the prospective champ he was made out to be. Not too many people around would argue that SpBok would have been following the Big Swim on his bedroom telly this weekend if even one of Green and Rose could have stayed on for a half-decent duration instead of letting two valiant but inexperienced prize fighters called Bong and Irlos take their places in 11 of the 24 Swims in the Super Round. If ...

The caressing breeze stops abruptly. Logic intervenes along with the smell of rotten fish being thrown out from the deck. My Trance of Lost Romance is broken. Soothsayer designates are not permitted any 'if's. All that reasoning and ranking counts for nothing when two of the four contestants you had backed to be swimming into the last week are out and down by Day 10 of 47. No droplets of mercy for my dead prophecy ever welled up as all the talk of 'two bad days' went around the deck. The format was circulated well ahead of the swim and I laid my bets knowing full well of the rules, the scheduled face-offs and their pitfalls.

There goes my prediction sheet into the ocean. It gets wet rather quickly and sinks. The blue embraces the red Rose and takes her home. I repent not making a boat or swan out of it like childhood days. It could have floated a while longer in the ocean and sung a final song before going down.

Diary entry - 25.04.2007

LionL has eliminated Kwi in the one-on-one challenge last night. The bout between Oz and SpBok is scheduled for tonight. Only one of the two winners gets to complete the swim in the swim-to-finish thereafter. In three days we'll know who gets to stand on the railing with both hands stretched out like my Rose when the ship reaches the Final Destination cheered by admiring onlookers.

The winner will no doubt have earned the applause by dint of stamina, bravado, hard work and good luck. However by then the faithful cruiser ship would have done enough to get a fair share of the applause because strangely the journey has been tougher for the lifeless ship than the living, breathing, struggling and retiring contestants in this edition of The Big Swim.

Mohammad Ashraful - Masterful Cricket Leads To Bangladesh Win Against South Africa

Angshuman Hazra — Sun, 8 Apr 2007 01:51:23 EDT

7th April, 11:30 pm IST: This innings had it all: pacing, authority, skill, art, precision, audacity, conquest of adversity and giant killing. Mohammad Ashraful of Bangladesh has arrived yet again and his sublime 87 in the Bangla-RSA Super Eight match is the most attractive innings of World Cup 2007 so far, or whatever I saw of it.

When Ashraful effortlessly glided Kallis' full delivery on leg stump to the mid wicket boundary to open his account no one would have imagined the adequately decent stroke to qualitatively rank second last in an innings studded with 12 boundaries. A streaky four over the keeper's head to a gloved pull, played typically too early in his innings by the outrageously impulsive talent, was all that his fans and detractors got to hold against him today. It was his second four, and then there were none below the 'breathtaking' mark.

Mohammad Ashraful played three picture perfect lobs over the head of short fine leg against fast bowlers' off stump deliveries, reminding one of Ravi Bopara's similar ice-cool four against Dilhara in that heart stopping final over in the very last World Cup match we saw. If some of Ashraful's boundaryward shots stunned you for their audacity, the others stole your heart with their pristine orthodoxy. Poetry and madness never co-existed better than in this little big knock from the Bangladeshi number five.

His innings was a lesson in middle order batsmanship of the highest order. The bowling monotony of South Africans, their biggest threat to a semi final spot, certainly helped him plan his final assault better but a good deal of homework and mental preparation for this formidable opposition showed in near-flawless execution of the varied choices he made over the innings.

Ashraful's Sophia Gardens heroics in 2005 helped his team turn a corner in the ODI's but over the 20-plus months since that match I had gone back to rating him as the second most wasteful batting talent of today's game, overshadowed only by the inexplicable tragedy of West Indian Ricardo Powell.

I mean, upon fair assessment of underachievement of potential at this moment Ashraful is expected to handsomely outrun Ramnaresh Sarwan, Mohammad Sami, Marlon Samuels and even Azhar Mahmood. But just like that 2005 innings against Australia this Ashraful special rekindles an anticipation of watching this exceptionally gifted batsman bloom into an aggressive yet consistent performer, a player quite like the Sachin Tendulkar of yore.

Oh - that reminds me of something that Barry Richards exclaimed at the commentary box when Ashraful played a bloody beauty of a lofted cover drive to Langevelt in the 49th over. "There was a bit of Sachin about it." Yeah Barry, we know which cric-tattoo was playing back on your mindscape as you said that. If you watched Sachin pile up those straight sixes off Mike Kasprowicz en route his twin tons at Sharjah'98 you will surely be reminded of him whenever a high quality right handed batsman plays a pulsating lofted drive to a medium pacer exhibiting exemplary bat trajectory.

Today Mohammad Ashraful gave his bowlers a platform to put a price tag on South Africa's semi final berth. He will have to keep leading the batting efforts of his team thus by notching up good knocks on these lines for the next decade or so. He looks so good whenever he bats without losing his head that his big scores almost always add to the self belief of his team and inspire them to noticeably greater heights.

When his time arrives Mohammad Ashraful can seriously be amongst the best batsmen on the planet. He has been endowed with great powers but as ole Spidey said, with great power comes great responsibility. Ashraful is the best player to have come out of Bangladesh till date and he needs to assume the lead responsibility in delivering his team from mediocrity to quality and so book a page in Bangladesh's cricketing history. But he can only chase that schoolboy dream AFTER he hauls himself to the lofty level he is blessed to attain, one where he can see any batsman of any international team eye to eye and feel equal with or superior to him.

From his varying batting slots, his effable manner and the delight he derives from his mates' achievements Ashraful looks the quintessential team man ready to fit himself into the larger gameplan. Consistency is the vital missing element in his brand of batsmanship and the ongoing high-class exposure at cricket's Big Event should teach him a few invaluable lessons in holding back his instincts during periods of play when the brain is better allowed to dominate the heart. He can have a chat with India's Sunil Gavaskar, Pakistan's Javed Miandad and Sri Lanka's Aravinda de Silva on how to go about his sacred mission.

Ashraful's transition will be helped significantly if Habibul Bashar, in his capacity as the Bangla captain, can borrow a few pages from Arjuna Ranatunga's amazing big fat book, for the latter had no mean contribution in Aravinda's transition from Mad Max to the Max Man, a key factor in the coming of age of Sri Lankan cricket during the 90's.

Update: Bangladesh beat South Africa by 67 runs. Yet another Ashraful-inspired win against an ODI superpower. That 'giant killing' bit from the first line is looking increasingly out of place with The Tigers.

The India-Sri Lanka Match - Mid-Game Report - Trinidad, 23rd March

Angshuman Hazra — Fri, 23 Mar 2007 15:37:34 EDT

Time: Interval of the India-v-Sri Lanka Pool B match.

When Zaheer bowls a leg-side wide to flag off the match I feel a surge of anger rushing up but I refuse to shout. It is difficult for a date-happy fan like me to forget that Zaheer Khan had yielded 15 runs in his first over on this very day four years back and started the proceedings of an Indian flop show in the final of the last World Cup. I manage to control myself nevertheless and gently utter, "You can do it Zach."

To my boundless joy he hears it, as does his team! Admittedly he does not do it that over; he continues bowling leg side and yielding extras. But then Agarkar does something first up that millions in India will thank him for if India scrape through the ordeal and end up as the winners of this unfolding epic. He starts off as a man possessed and has Sri Lankan openers in all sorts of problems in five of his first six balls. Becalmed, Zaheer gets back his groove and with later support from Munaf they send down eighteen overs of seam bowling that I would like getting replayed back to any team with an all-seam-no-seering -pace attack as the model way to do it on a slightly helpful track.

The first Sri Lankan wicket falls in the seventh over, An all-time classic, it could have been straight out of a Test match. Six overs had gone by and Sri Lanka, after being kept quiet, had taken 9 or 10 off the last one thru Chamara Silva. An iffy Jayasuriya has survived a few close shaves. Now he faces Zaheer and is promptly struck on the pads by Zaheer. Everybody in the ground and around the world thinks Sanath is out except umpire Aleem Dar.

Now, Jayasuriya has already benefitted from an even-harder-to-believe lbw let off from Daryll Harper off Ajit Agarkar's very first ball. This second one threatens to be the last straw for a team not renowned for its resilience in adversity. Today is a little different though. Zaheer blasts one past Sanath's ears the very next ball. Today's Sanath can only swing at it as an afterthought.

Zaheer makes the ball move both ways in the next two deliveries. Somehow in the space of four balls he manages to distract Sanath from his original game plan of seeing out the first spells of Indian opening bowlers. Convinced that he is only waiting for the ball to gobble him up Sanath swings at the next one outside off stump without getting to it and Ajit Agarkar gets to pouch it at 3rd man quite like the Sri Lankan dasher's Eden 1996 dismissal. All's well again.

Agarkar by now has seen some of his gems prove to be too good for the batsmen but then funnily enough he picks up the team's 2nd wicket off an 'Agarkar' - that familiar full ball he bowls every now and then just outside the batsman's pads. Those generally disappear into the boundary to the exasperation of Indian cricket lovers. Today is a little different here again, in that the ball disappeared into the glove of a magnificently diving Dhoni off Mahela's faint tickle.

Agarkar and Zach only pick up two wickets in the excellent spell and Munaf remains wicketless in a relentlessly incisive spell to remind you-and-me of His Unluckiness J Srinath. I can easily recall at least six or seven other deliveries by the medium pace trio which could have got a defending batsman out for no fault of his. The bounce helped them but so did a discernable steadfastness to remain unfazed in the face of ill luck and umpiring horrors.

This period of play is almost as good Srinath's unforgettable opening challenge in Ashish Nehra's match from South Africa 2003 when India were defending a modest total against England. Srinath put up an unplayable spell and set the batsmen's mind up for Ashish's taking. [BTW that 'no seering pace' fails to apply to that match as Ashish was easily clocking 148 kph in it - nursing an ankle injury.]

No one takes six wickets today but things do not get too bad either. Hereafter skipper Dravid takes over and is made to look even smarter because his other three bowlers do not disappoint him. The only one to go wicketless is - once again - Harbhajan but he does not get much help from the seaming surface (contrary to the claims of commentators) and is distinctly unlucky to miss an lbw by way of another umpiring horror.

Ganguly had picked up a wicket in the last India Sri Lanka match back home and the book-ish (or studied, as you look at it) decision to make him bowl pays off rich dividends as he picks up the best Sri Lankan bat in my book, Kumar Sangakkara, in only his 2nd over. Dada bowls four on the trot and the remaining 5th bowling quota is taken over by one dunno-what-he-is bowler called Sachin Tendulkar.

Sachin has been having a ball with the ball since that Pakistan trip last year when his confidence skyrocketed after picking up Inzamam repeatedly on featherbed surfaces. On that occasion he bowled seam up. He did so not because the conditions were assisting seamers but because spinners were generally getting murdered. But then we saw the same guy turn up as the familiar leggie against West Indies two months back to play a critical role with the ball in the low scoring second one dayer on an underprepared Cuttack surface.

Today, Sachin Tendulkar puts on his preaching specs and offers a free masterclass on both varieties of conventional swing. And he does that with a 30-over old ball. He swings the cherry both ways at will like Zaheer and keeps the batsmen guessing right till his eight over by which time it is too deep into the slog overs for the batsmen to play Sachin with respect. [Besides, ICC's Anti Corruption Unit are reportedly keeping vigil on the match; who wants to face questions for the crime of not hitting Sachin for boundaries in the 45th over....]

Rahul Dravid rotates his bowlers frequently for good results. Interestingly he is seen readily making field changes to suit the bowlers' liking. The last three overs of the innings yields 31 runs but that is understandable as Vaas and Arnold stay put till the end. If anything the relative ease of scoring for Sri Lankan lower order bats during end overs should actually be some cause for joy to Indian players as the pitch betrays signs of easing up there.

Must say something though - Sri Lanka are certain title contenders this time. They are way too poised in all situations not to reach the semis.

The match has resumed and I must sign off.

Cricket And Coaching: Being Judged On Uncontrollables

Angshuman Hazra — Mon, 19 Mar 2007 08:33:29 EDT

Bob Woolmer succumbed to a heart attack following Pakistan's shock defeat to Ireland that led to the team's World Cup exit. I have diligently avoided commenting on performances of coaches because their job, as I see it, is almost unseen to a common cricket viewer like me. But at these times you try to imagine yourself as a cricket coach of an international side. The question that comes first to your mind is: How stressful is it for cricket coaches to be constantly judged on parameters, many of which are beyond his control?

As a coach in any team sport perhaps you come with a vision of making a positive impact on the performances of a set of individuals aiming to function as a team. You decide that you will shut yourself from external praise / criticism / opinions and do your job as planned but find it hard to do so with communication hitting the roof these days. You see players in your team and find a similarity between them and yourself.

You notice a difference though. The players are judged on individual performances but the captain and you are judged on team performances. That automatically signifies that the players are almost entirely dependent on their own performances on the field for their rating points but the skipper and you have no individual scores except team wins. The skipper has an individual role to play when the team gets into the ground but not you. You have an individual role unseen to all but the players and administrators.

Now we come to perceptions of the role of a coach. Many ex-players believe coaches have a peripheral role to play and the skipper is responsible for team performance. However there are occasions when a coach gains the stature of a super coach. This effect is augmented in countries where people are emotional and perennially in search of shining heroes and shady villains.

This blow-up takes a bigger shape if cricket is one of the few fields where your folk see themselves as world beaters. Things get further exhilarating for you if the media and people don't see their captain as too clever irrespective of the reality. It has a positive effect on your share of plaudits. Some of the phenomena you get credited with when the team succeeds are:

The team performance takes an upswing soon after you join the side,

The team shows improvements in fields earlier thought to be its weakness,

The skipper suddenly takes a few smart on-field decisions in the following year, decisions that are thought to be beyond him.

Slowly but surely you are accorded the status of a sorcerer, someone with a knack of working wonders with people and turning also-rans into champions.

The flip side comes when the team falters. Now you get to learn of the essential problem with not having an individual role to be assessed on. You may still be thinking that you are doing your job well but the team is struggling because most players are. You are prepared to take some of the blame for that but not all. If you are a born leader you will take it anyway without a word of protest, but it seldom goes down well in the digestive system.

It is quite like a skipper scoring a century chasing 240 in a losing cause. Skippy gets blasted for his handling of bowlers in the opening overs but gets praised for the fighting innings later on. In your case you got only praises when the team did well. You may think you did certain things improperly at the time but it did not matter; people were searching for their shining heroes and you were one of them. Now that the tide has turned you can resign yourself to morph into the shady villain that pubic are looking for. They are unaware that you may be still scoring centuries with your unappreciated work.

Only tough people can continue performing in such situations for years. If you are Bob Woolmer you are a tough cookie. You avoided quitting your roller-coaster job of coaching Pakistan for greener pastures. Difficult as it is to coach a subcontinent team, it certainly took even more out of you to switch to this extreme mode if you are coming from lands where your role in the team performance is understood better by the game's followers and, maybe, the players and administrators as well. You prepared yourself for a lot to happen, or at least we can say that you backed yourself to take most things that could happen.

If you are Bob Woolmer you will be long remembered for your role in revolutionizing your (i.e. coach's) role in the international game. These tributes state as much.

Cricket World Cup 2007: Two Surprises, That 'Upset' Two Teams

Angshuman Hazra — Sun, 18 Mar 2007 05:44:12 EDT

Yesterday’s results

India lost to Bangladesh and Pakistan to Ireland. India batted way below par at the two ends of their innings and the Pakistan batsmen succumbed to Irish persistence in not allowing them to score. Indian bowlers were too wayward to defend 191 and the Pakistan bowlers didn’t have enough to defend. India are still hoping for two wins and some winners’ luck to qualify for the next round but Pakistan are out of the world’s biggest cricket tournament by the fifth day.

We can go on and on elaborating on the surprise results of the two 17th March games in this fashion. But are we giving credit where it is due? Probably not. Yes those results were surprises, but they were not upsets in the true sense of the word. An 'upset', so far as history of such matches go, is a loss that resulted mainly (sometimes solely) from the big team playing badly. I'm not sure that was the case yesterday either at Trinidad or at Jamaica (unless we have reports of post-match upsets of a visceral kind in the Pak camp).

Bangladesh and Ireland in this World Cup

Unlike other wins of Bangladesh in other tournaments and series involving big teams, these wins are no one-off shows. Their matured game and the warm up result against New Zealand indicate otherwise. Ditto for the Irish. In fact the latter deserve a bigger applause for making full use of their county exposure to make up for lack of matches against international sides.

I gladly take back the words from an earlier post of mine. Ireland and Bangladesh were not doing too much too soon by surprising big teams in warm up matches. They were merely serving up warnings. Then, to come into the World Cup and do it against teams that were already aware of their shock value speaks of self-belief, meticulous game planning and talent in the ranks.

Bangladesh game plan

I did not see much of the Irish game except in highlights. But I watched a new look Bangladesh unfurl at the biggest stage. They were slightly aided by the ever-prepared-to-choke Indians but the win belonged to only to Bangladesh.

Bangladesh reminds us so much of the Sri Lankans in the 1996 tournament. They have a number of attacking batsmen with just one (Nafees) or two (Bashar) likely to get near a hundred. They have a swashbuckling opener (Tamim Iqbal) who announced himself in yesterday’s match, and looks good to score a few in the Powerplay overs whenever a loose delivery comes him way. That bevy of enticing, accurate, strangling slow bowlers in their ranks is ably supported by one very good pace bowler, Mortaza. Just what the doctor ordered for the West Indian grounds.

From their choice of bowlers I suspect restricting opposition batsmen to a low total and chasing it down to be the Bangladesh game plan for the tournament. (Yesterday’s match will lead them further on that path.) They even have an interesting plan for the chase. I noticed that most of their top, experienced batsmen like Bashar and Ashraful had moved down the order to propel the finishing act in a chase, if required. It may not be the greatest plan against top sides for an anchorman like Bashar to come in so far down the order but the Ashraful move looked a good one. They will need a combination of striking ability and big match experience in case the asking rate climbs.

It will be interesting to have them bat first though. Their flashy batsmen are likely to struggle a bit. And while their spinners can expect assistance in the afternoon on drier pitches that may not always happen, as the pitches tend to hold well on the first day. On the flip side, Mortaza and his medium pacer mate Rasel will be hard pressed to give those vital breakthroughs.

Indian woes and hopes

As for the Indian fans hoping to see India proceed further from the Group of Death, they have to add the following to their list of daily prayers:

No rain on India’s match days.

India bat first against Bermuda and put upa total of 350 plus.

India win both their remaining matches (with the top seven firing in both).

Either Bangladesh beat Sri Lanka, or Sri Lanka thrash Bangladesh badly.

Bangladesh-Bermuda game getting washed out.

The equation, as it stands now, is elaborated by Cricinfo's Anand Vasu here. India have to overcome two major hitches to make the best of the controllables. [Those are, besides the accepted perennial minuses of lethargic fielding, inconsistent bowling and, increasingly, the Sehwag form problem.] Both of them reside in the Indian middle.

The Indian middle overs bowling led by Bhajji is not hot and everyone except Bermuda can expect to be let off the hook at that stage. Sri Lanka did that in three consecutive games last month and will be hoping for the same again. Also India's middle and lower order batsmen have no plan in place to counter the loss of early wickets even after so much exposure to these conditions over the last year or so. Bangladesh administered Lara’s methods to Team India and the latter demonstrated their continued ability to freeze in the face of accurate slow bowling. Ones and twos are just not their cup of tea.

Let's hope for the sake of Indian cricket lovers that these 'middles' are not 'upset' anytime soon. As Dr. Mardy quotes Ovid in today’s Quote of the week newsletter:

"Chance affects everything. Let your hook be always cast; in the stream where you least expect it, there will be a fish."

PS: A few weeks back Harbhajan publicly asked his lower order mates to contribute more in West Indies. Look at Bhajji’s two innings since landing there: He casually gave catching practice to the cover fielder first ball in the Holland match, and was bowled attempting to cut a ball inside stumps yesterday. This, when each of the occasions, required a senior player like him to play sensibly and stay on. Perhaps that ‘contribute more’ call from Harbhajan was just a surreptitious request to Pathan, Zaheer, Munaf and Agarkar to share his quota of scoring runs.