Desicritics Category: Sports: Survey

FIFA World Cup 2006: Why Italy Won

Aaman Lamba — Mon, 10 Jul 2006 01:50:08 EDT

It's been a long month of late nights, leastways in this part of the globe. Despite India not having a horse in the race, metaphorically speaking, hordes of football aficionados and new fans watched most matches with as much gusto as a die-hard Gunner or Azzurri fan.

Speaking of which, the finals were tense and exciting in more ways than one. Whether it was Zidane's unceremonious send-off or players going down like bowling pins as they danced around their field of dreams, there was rarely a dull moment. The French seemed to be focusing on a defensive strategy, allowing their strikers like Zidane and the diminuitive Ribery to be marooned in a sea of blue while they guarded their 'little Gaulish village'. Zizou's penalty kick gave them early hopes which were held at bay by Materazzi's header soon afterwards. The Italian victory in the penalty shootout might or might not have been averted by Zizou's continued presence, but it must be said the 2006 World Cup finals were fought tooth and nail.

The question still remains - why did Italy win? Their initial grouping saw them take down Ghana 2-0, and draw with the USA 1-1. The knockout stage did not see them go up any of the top-seeded teams until the semi-finals, and the hairbreadth victory in the last few minutes of extra time over Germany in the semis gave them some hope.

If one looks at the French progression through the tournament, it is evident the Oriflamme did not fly with gusto for the team. They entered the tables with 14-1 odds, that slipped to 25-1 after their initial draws with Switzerland (1-1) and South Korea (0-0). Had South Korea not lost to Switzerland 2-0, they might even have gone home early. In the knockout stage, they slipped past Spain (3-1) in a match that was similar to the finals, with the French having possession of the ball only 39% of the time, and Zidane scoring the clinching goal. Their defeat of Brazil stopped many hearts, again thanks to the artistry of Zidane. The semi-finals were quite unspectacular, and displayed the trademark French approach of staying behind with the Camembert while a few explorers attempted colonization of enemy territory.

This tactic did not work against the determined and well-coordinated Italians in the Finals. They enfiladed the French defense time and again, particularly Materazzi and Grosso. The second half saw the French in a more aggressive mode, but to no avail. The lack of anger management by Zidane may have various reasons, from racial taunts to close marking by Materazzi, but had he and his fellow mid-fielders been given more support by his team-mates, they might have been able to finish the game victors.

As it stands, Italy takes home the Cup, and Zizou leaves soccer, perhaps under a cloud, more likely with lasting respect. The wikipedia article on Zidane has been temporarily restricted due to vandalism, and bistros across Europe, and indeed, the world will debate the state of football for a long time to come.

Postscript: Another reason for Italy's victory may come from somewhat unexpected quarters. Loyal Congressmen in India, and even Umesh Thackeray's Sainiks (taking a respite from exercising their right to protest), offered prayers all day for Italy's victory, given that their Dear Leader, and India's bahu, Sonia Gandhi hails from the land of pizza and Vespa, and today, Grosso.

Yep! There is Too Much Cricket

Aditya Kuber — Wed, 26 Apr 2006 07:15:18 EDT

India has had a hectic couple of years. As have the other top teams. Everyone wants to see you in action. But isn't that the price to pay for being good? So you play.

To be honest, it's not too different from a football club. Take Manchester United for example. In an average month, they play 4 EPL (English Premier League) matches and as the season progresses, European duty starts as do other domestic tournaments like the FA Cup. In the thick of it, they sometimes play as many as 10 matches in a month. And if they do better in a tournament like the Champions League, then more matches. But roughly, at the peak of the season, it's more like a match every third day or so.

Now, which tournament is their main focus? They all are. There's a price on winning. Each player gets only 12 years or so to have a go at winning as many tournaments as he can for his team. This, actually, applies to almost all sports. There are tennis players who play from January 1 to December 25. And again, the better they play, the more they have to play.

While you would say comparisons are not fair because while tennis and football matches can last at the most 3-5 hours and that too, once a year, maybe, cricket matches are routinely 8-hour affairs. True.

Let's take the team in focus: India.

From August 2005, they have played the following matches:
India in Zimbabwe: Aug-Sep 05 - 2 Tests (Ind won 2-0)
Sri Lanka in India: Oct-Nov 05 - 7 ODIs (6-1 Ind) and 3 Tests (2-0 Ind)
South Africa in India: Nov-Dec 05 - 5 ODIs (Ind 2-2 SA)
India in Pakistan: Jan 05-Feb 06 - 3 Tests (1-0 Pak) and 5 ODIs (4-1 Ind)
England in India: Mar-Apr 06 - 3 Tests (Ind 1-1 Eng) and 7 ODIs (5-1 Ind)
India v Pakistan (Abu Dhabi): 2 ODIs (Ind 1-1 Pak)

This makes it a grand total of 11 Tests and 26 ODIs (2 of which were abandoned).
Hours played (estimated): 330 hrs (Tests) presuming each Test lasted 5 days; 6 hrs each + 182 hrs (ODI); 7 hrs per match.

Total on-field hours: 512 hrs. Sure there's travelling and off-field activities and practise that needs to be considered and it definitely is a big part of the game. But assuming teams like Manchester Utd and players like Roger Federer are also travelling just as much and practising the same amount, let's leave that out.

Also, a player is not necessarily on field throughout the match. There are times when his team is batting and he is in the pavilion. Especially in ODIs. So let's assume each player spends half of this time on the field: That's 256 hrs = 11 days roughly. That is, on-field only. No breaks. No time to waste! Play!

Man Utd, since August 2005 has played:
UEFA Champions League: 7 matches (including qualifying)
FAPL: 34 matches (Premier League up to their last match against Tottenham on Apr 17)
Carling Cup: 6 (including the final that they won)
FA Challenge Cup: 4 matches

Total matches (till August 17; next match on Aug 29): 51 matches
Assuming each has lasted no more than 90 minutes, that's 76.5 hrs. That's about 3 days and 4 hours. No breaks. Run. Score. Dive!

Again, the reason I have not looked at some of the top players is because they do take a break from time to time--like Dravid did for 2 matches and Dhoni did--so consider that a constant. In the end, though, when you look at the numbers, they say that an Indian cricketer would play 11 days consecutively as against 3 days for a EPL player and the difference in monies is massive.

So based on numbers, there definitely is too much cricket!

Wanted Immediately - A Next Gen Dravid and Tendulkar

bevivek — Sun, 16 Apr 2006 09:12:14 EDT

Two weeks back I wrote a satirical piece on the lack of sound technique in the Indian cricket team.

Like most satires, it hid within a real concern.

The worry for India is that the batsmen of Generation Next, the people who presumably form the backbone of the team of the morrow - Sehwag, Yuvraj, Dhoni, Mohammed Kaif and Suresh Raina - have zip technique. Not a big factor in one-dayers where just one or two batsmen need to pitch in on a day, where the wickets are often belters and the dice are loaded against bowlers, but critical in test cricket.

India's recent test record on pitches that offer even a little bounce and movement shows that Rahul Dravid apart, no Indian batsman has got what it takes to play in such conditions. The Pakistani bowlers in Karachi and the English bowlers in the recent three tests in India ruthlessly exposed these flaws. No foot movement, shuffling across, playing away from the body, slashing at wide balls, inability to play the rising delivery with any conviction - the list of incompetencies is long.

In two or at most three years, Dravid would be gone. Tendulkar, once a player who combined technique and flair, is on his last legs.

Where are the Dravids and Tendulkars of the Next Gen Indian test team?

I don't see them anywhere. Do you?

A team without such players is a team without a backbone. A team with the Dravids and the Tendulkars allows the Sehwags and Dhonis to play their strokes. When the going is tough, they have the skill and the patience to hunker down and play for time.

A pointer to where the problem lies may be the BCCI's approach to forming the test and one day squads. In a puzzling reversal of the norm where the Test Team forms the nucleus of the ODI team, in India, the one day squad appears to be the foundation for the test team with a few concessions to playing 5 days such as the inclusion of a Wasim Jaffar.

But Jaffar is no Dravid, nor a Sachin and I would argue, not even an Akaash Chopra.

As a result, the Indian test team today is composed almost wholly of players with immense flair but little technique. A team perfect for the shorter version but disaster in the longer where there are no field restrictions, where multiple players are needed to put their hand up over 5 days, on tracks offering some assistance to bowlers and against good bowling attacks.

The suspicion in many minds highlighted recently by Ashok Malik in his Cricinfo article, Chappell's Faustian bargain, is that the coach, with the active collusion of the board, is focussed entirely on winning the 2007 World Cup and damn the consequences to our test cricket.

Prem Panicker and Dileep Premachandran have countered Ashok's argument, first by arguing that Indian test cricket's recent average actually is on par with the earlier era, i.e. all is well or at least not worse, and second, by saying that since no one watches test cricket, it don't matter much anyway.

Whatever the truth and whatever the cause, unless Indian cricket can find Next Gen players of class and technique, they risk becoming bunnies in the test arena, even if they be lions in one dayers. Of course, if we side with Prem's argument, this won't matter since test cricket is anyway well on the way to becoming history.

Murdoch's Law Of Extreme Sports

Nanda Kishore — Thu, 9 Feb 2006 13:41:42 EST

Here I am, watching Jimmy White and Steve Davis battle it out in Premier League (gasp!) Snooker. If you're thinking I've lost my mind a little bit, worry not. I don't sit down in front of TV every evening to watch grown men attempting to pot polished little balls as if their life depended on it. But such is sport, isn't it? It can be so trivial, almost absurd, yet require some sublime skills at the same time. To be fair, I do like snooker and nine ball pool (as opposed to billiards, that dreary cousin of theirs) - in fact I do enjoy playing nine ball pool myself, and I must admit it is a natural consequence of living in apartment complexes in America for too long.

At the rate we are going though, snooker is beginning to look more and more like the mainstream, mass (TV) spectator sport that it already is in the UK. Ah TV! Such a wonderful thing - what would I have done with half my lifetime without it? And the Sports Channels - these are in a class of their own. Especially when you have too many of them sprouting up in the hope that they can make it all hang together by getting some lucrative contract or the other. The more contracts a broadcaster has, the more sports channels they can conjure up, delivering a more comprehensive package to the paying customer. Of course, it's all about the customer.

Anyhow, when the contracts fail to come in, we have issues. Because we have a half-a-dozen channels each of which promises 24-hour thrill fests. Lest we upset the viewer - can't have that - we start pioneering. Did the BCCI bidding process turn out to be more complicated than getting land registered in Orissa? No worries mate, let's get Vijayan and Bhutia all fired up and unleash them, and some pretty young thing, on unsuspecting viewers. I mean, who decides Poker isn't really a television sport? Especially given the venue is usually a most tastefully decorated casino and that the winner takes in a cool couple of million greenbacks (displayed in all their glory during the course of the event). Or that podgy gentlemen firing darts in the middle of a grimy looking pub isn't worth the valuable time of young men who usually respond only to Kanye West? There you go - so we have extreme motorcross, where the names don't quite roll off the tongues because they're mostly Scandinavian; we also have Bass fishing, Texas Hold 'em Poker, Darts and so on and so forth.

But beat this - Fox Sports (don't ask me which one, they're all equally dreary - this is in Australia) has Cha-Cha (or was it Salsa?). And why not? The winter olympics has figure skating, doesn't it? Isn't rhythmic gymnastics an olympic sport? After all, all this is based upon a very sound principle - programming expands to fill the time available.

Cross-posted at The Blockhole.

Sports

Aaman Lamba — Thu, 26 Jan 2006 12:22:36 EST

There are more armchair-sports fans than for any other field of human endeavor. Sports junkies love to debate endlessly on Hall of Fame members, which team is better, why cricket gets all the press, and so on.

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