FUTURE CUP WIN & Signs of Future Team India

We are getting back in shape, a Sign of Relief and Excitement shows in the faces of all Indian Cricket Fans!! We are trying to forget the world cup misery and let go of it with the new wins from India Team.

India won the Future Cup Series 2-1 against South Africa by thrashing them in the final match by 6 wkts. Yet another superb finish by Yuvi steered Team India to win the 2nd match in 3 ODI match series. It was India's first one-day series triumph outside the subcontinent since their memorable Natwest Series win in 2002.

Flashback - Revenge against Bangla Tigers

After coming out of great failure in Worldcup, Team India played some good cricket against Bangla Tigers in their own territory. The series was really well planned to take the revenge against Bangla for their win against India in Worldcup paving way for India early exit. We won both the one day and Test Series. With both wins, Team India reviving back the image they lost against Bangla Tigers. But that still doesn't pure anything to show the world that we are way better team.

Tour in England & Ireland

After a short break, Team India is touring England and Ireland. Its a outing after 5 years since 2002. This tour has its own importance of being played on the foreign land against top teams after their exile from Worldcup. Its expected to be a real test for Dravid and team especially young guys to showcase their performance to bring their talents on the table which will eventually help to build a strong side for future Team India.

Somethings to be noted. India Team is going on to this tour without the star opener Sehwag failing to get selected and favorite spinner Harbajhan. Another special note, the team will be traveling without a full time coach after Graham Ford refusing to take up the position.

Match with Host(Ireland)

They started off the tour against the host Ireland in Belfast. We played with 5 bowlers Agarkar, RP Sing, Sreeshanth, Piyush and Ganguly. We were able to restrict Irish for a total of mere 193/all out and chasing them brilliantly to win by 9 wkts. Sachin showed good signs of his great form returning back with excellent knock partnering with Gautam Gambhir. We won this match with great ease.

Future Cup

With the good start and a win under the belt with loads of confidence, Team India came on board to play 3 match One day series against South Africans for the Future Cup. Team India jumped to 3 match series against South Africans. This tour is somewhat different comparing to others. Its hosted by England and Ireland but we get to play different teams like South Africans and Pak's otherthan the host.

Ist Match Vs S.A

Toss - SA won the toss and elected field first.

India Batting - Sachin played yet another excellent innings to score 99 missing a hundred. His partnership with Dravid took the team to a reasonable score added with last min run from Yuvi and Karthik to put up a score of 242/7.

S.A Batting - Started off with ease and able to reach the target with some great batting by Kallis putting Sachin's effort to vain. They won the match by 4 wickets to lead the series to 1-0.

Points to be noted - We went with few new faces like Chawla and RP Sharma hoping them to shine and gave yet another chance to show their tricks. We also played only with 4 full time bowlers in a hard bowling pitch which might have been on more reason for losing this one. Chawla showed some signs of being a good bowling hand for the team.

IInd Match Vs S.A

Learning few things from the previous match, Dravid choose to enter this 2nd one with 5 full time bowlers.

Toss - India won the toss and elected to field first. Its a good toss to win on yet another pitch which favored bowling.

SA Batting - With 5 full time bowlers and few part time bowlers in hand, dravid played it well to restrict South Africans to 226/6 in 50 overs. Zaheer and RP Singh came out with some good spell taking 1 wkt each supported by a very good bowling by Yuvi. He was able to contain as well take 3 wkts in his 9 over for just 36 runs.

India Batting - Following the same techique, Sachin and Ganguly started off well to put a good opening partnership. 17th 100 run partnership by this pair which is the highest in record. Ganguly supporting Sachin's know like good old days able to take the team half way to the win. Sachin missing again his hundred with just 7 runs. At one stage, we were all set to win by flash suddenly 4 wickets fall in just 8 runs. Yuvi and Karthik join hands at the last min to take us to the finish line with some great batting. India won by 6 wkts.

Points to be noted: 5 bowler technique worked. Sachin setting yet another milestone to reach 15,000 runs first ever by batsmen to mark the history. Yuvi and Karthik sensible batting to finish the match with great win.

IIIrd Match Vs S.A

Leveling the series, both teams want to win this match to take the series home. It became a crucial and series decider. Rain interrupted and shortened the match to just 31 overs.

Toss: India won the toss again and elected to field first.

SA Batting - Dravid boys came back with same vigor from the previous game to reduce the Africans to 29/4 at time but failing to stop them. A great partnership from Kemp and Gibbs allowed them to put 148/7 in 31 overs. Excellent bowling by veteran Agarkar with 2 wkts, RP Singh, Zaheer, Ganguly (2wkts) and part timer Sachin.

India Batting - Sachin and Ganguly partnership couldn't able to serve long enough. Dravid and Yuvi tried stick on the grease for long time to take the team to good score. Then Yuvi joined by Dhoni putting their head on the ground to show their a sensible and responsible partnership steering us to taste the win of the 2nd match to take the series home. India won by 6 wkts, 5 balls remaining.

Points to be noted: Yuvi seems to show great confidence and composure in the tense situation. Dravid as a WALL played important role to build a good score. Dhoni tried to make an impact with the last min runs to help reach the finish line.

Man of the Series - Shared by Sachin and Yuvraj

Sachin's, the great shared his Man of the Series with Yuvi praising him for his batting which took us to series win.

Future of Team India

Just 3 match wins aren't enough to say that Team India is all shinning and glowing. But we can confidently commend on the team's performance and great come back against the strongest team in the world. We are surely heading on the right path for building a strong side.

We got some good young players, trying to mix-n-match them to suit the pitch and day of the match to make them shine and show their talents will help to find a right choice.

Dravid, as a captain still need to work on lot of things. He needs to brainstorm on bowling logics to finish a team after a some incredible bowling attack. Seniors Sachin and Ganguly showing their compassion and getting back to their form is refreshing to watch. Zaheer and Agarkar both coming back with great rhythm with good line and length is surely a plus for our bowling arsenal. This all will really help to boost the moral of the team.

Yuvi, a well suited candidate to do the job of savior and way better than Sehwag is growing confidence on his every match. Its real good progress of the team. Gambhir proved that he is still a batting material for the team. Chawla so young to the team has lot more to work at but really showed some good bowling. Karthik also came back with great knocks and making use of his chance on 2nd match. Dhoni not doing so well, needs to continue to strive at his batting. Powar, yet another bowler who is making some good impression in his contained bowling attack. Last but not least, RP Singh is gaining moment with his bowling attack will be a good support for Zaheer.

All in all, these matches really showed lots of good signs for a well balanced India for the future to hold. Team effort never fails and these matches proved exactly that truth.

We have a great match coming up with Pak's tomorrow. Don't miss out!!!

JUDGMENT DAY - MACHINES WON AGAIN

The final showdown which had the fiarce ending we never seen before finally decided the winner of this fierce battle. Aussies came out as never defeated unstoppable WINNERS of all time.

They proved themselves yet again, that they are the TRUE DEMIGODS of Cricket by taking away the world cup one more time and making the marks in the history book of cricket for the 3rd time continously.

Bravo to their excellent and untarnished effort.. They have demontrated one of world class true team work putting total dedication on every match by sticking to their game plan and vesting their confidence in this final game to win this World cup tournament 2007. They deserve this one 110% and they outclassed every team which played this tournament.

SL's did give a good fight. At one point of time they had the leading edge to win the game but somehow lost because of incublent weather which didn't support their effort. Better luck next time guys..

Miracle never happened as I learned the lesson. Miracle only happens when we aren't expecting it. As the Judgment Day of Terminator I(movie) ended with MACHINES winning the MEN. his Tournament also ended with a big note of AUSSIES MACHINES WINNING this WC 2007.

We have to wait for another 4 more years to see who is going to win fight against this MACHINES.. I had a good time with varied collection of thoughts in this worldcup. So long to all the cricket fans..

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Judgement Day or D-Day, whatever you want to call it. Tomorrow is a big and important day in the history of One Day Cricket. Its the finale of Worldcup 2007. In this 9th world cup final, Aussies and Lankans will be facing each other to decide their fate of their dreams to take away the prestigious cup.

After more than a month long deliberation and more than 50 matches, we are finally going to witness the battle field filled with men from two different teams with varied temperament and great aggression, capable enough to threaten each others and spoil one of their lifetime dreams. At the end of day, its the fight between Men(SL) and Machine(Aus).

Aussies, the 11alien players from outerspace who played like programmed machines in every matches with a mindset of no tomorrow. Its palpable from their win of every match, they been waiting for this day. They are so determined to destroy the Lankan's 11men army into pieces to with ascertain mentality to put hattrick on winning the cup 3rd time. They want to send a message to the world by putting a unimaginable showcase, to prove the fact they are the true DEMIGODS of Cricket..

Lankans, on the other end who are coming from the small island, reaching this battle field second time, thrashing their hurdles with varied powerful arsneal and great will power. They totaly believe in the 11men true dedicated army to fight against these machines. They had faced only one failure but poped back up with great vigor to avoid any insipid moments which other teams faced. They are now well oiled army men who are just waiting to unlease their power to show that MEN can beat the machines.

Quick Flashback: The past World Cup final winners are,

1975 - West Indians

1979 - West Indians

1983 - India

1987 - Australia

1992 - Pakistan

1996 - SriLanka

1999 - Australia

2003 - Australia

2007 - Aus or SL ?!

Who is going to take away this Presitigious cup? We will find out tomorrow. I am going to put all my bets on Lankans(especialy they are neighbors) who have the capability and will power to surprise Aussies to make the Miracle happen. Otherwise, it will endup as a one sided show down.

All in all, I am hoping for a very good match which should be a feast for the eyes to watch. Who you are going betting MAN or MACHINES ?!

Judgement Day - 2007

Judgement Day or D-Day, whatever you want to call it. Tomorrow is a big and important day in the history of One Day Cricket. Its the finale of Worldcup 2007. In this 9th world cup final, Aussies and Lankans will be facing each other to decide their fate of their dreams to take away the prestigious cup.

After more than a month long deliberation and more than 50 matches, we are finally going to witness the battle field filled with men from two different teams with varied temperament and great aggression, capable enough to threaten each others and spoil one of their lifetime dreams. At the end of day, its the fight between Men(SL) and Machine(Aus).

Aussies, the 11alien players from outerspace who played like programmed machines in every matches with a mindset of no tomorrow. Its palpable from their win of every match, they been waiting for this day. They are so determined to destroy the Lankan's 11men army into pieces to with ascertain mentality to put hattrick on winning the cup 3rd time. They want to send a message to the world by putting a unimaginable showcase, to prove the fact they are the true DEMIGODS of Cricket..

Lankans, on the other end who are coming from the small island, reaching this battle field second time, thrashing their hurdles with varied powerful arsneal and great will power. They totaly believe in the 11men true dedicated army to fight against these machines. They had faced only one failure but poped back up with great vigor to avoid any insipid moments which other teams faced. They are now well oiled army men who are just waiting to unlease their power to show that MEN can beat the machines.

Quick Flashback: The past World Cup final winners are,

1975 - West Indians

1979 - West Indians

1983 - India

1987 - Australia

1992 - Pakistan

1996 - SriLanka

1999 - Australia

2003 - Australia

2007 - Aus or SL ?!

Who is going to take away this Presitigious cup? We will find out tomorrow. I am going to put all my bets on Lankans(especialy they are neighbors) who have the capability and will power to surprise Aussies to make the Miracle happen. Otherwise, it will endup as a one sided show down.

All in all, I am hoping for a very good match which should be a feast for the eyes to watch. Who you are going betting MAN or MACHINES ?!

MIRACLE YET TO HAPPEN...

Worldcup is in the last leg of its season before we get to the D-Day for the final game. We have seen enough matches already including some good numbers of fight backs and revealing revenges. We also happen to witness few nail biting finishes and countable number of cricket hero's coming on top to make their marks in the worldcup history book.

The group league started with a big bang showcasing some big scoring matches by the top teams. Everybody started whining about the minnow teams added to the worldcup. But some of these mediocre teams did prove their prediction was wrong and never failed to surprise us with their astonishing and intangible performances beating and eliminating some worldcup favorites.

Including few top teams, most of the minnow teams are thrown out of the league with sand griping defeat and got eliminated badly. The Top 4 teams which made to the next level of Super 8 showed some appealing performance. Other 2 teams were able to make it to the stage by past experience.Lastly 2 minnow teams which happen to make to the Super 8 with their great effort.

In the Super 8, these teams are striped off naked to show their real skill with no excuses. Their lavish luxury of beating minnow teams were no longer counted enough to make their step forward. Out of these, only one team came out never losing their stripe with few others got beaten atleast once and remaining others ended bowing down and giving the final salute for their dreams to take on the cup.

The one team which stands out till now like a pinnacle, invincible and unbeaten is the forever Australian DEMIGODS of Cricket. They were never beaten once in this worldcup. They showed their great temperament towards each game and ascertain on winning every match by never losing control in any of them.

I was expecting for the kiwis and Srilankans to come close to give them a fight in the Super 8. But it didn't happen. In their match with S.L, they won convincingly by 7 wkts. Next comes the Kiwis, they couldn't even start thinking about their strategies and they were all out for 133 losing by big margin of 215 wins..

I believe anything is possible and especially in this one day cricket it is very much possible. Tomorrow starts the real battle which we all been waiting so long to choose the first team between Kiwi's and Lankans which will face the mutual other on the D-Day.

We need a miracle which is yet to happen. A miracle that can only be made possible by a planned strategy using the right arsenal on right time to shake Aussies top order with a continued momentum to break their mid order to finally get to the final ones.

Without a master plan, its really tough to break their strong 11 men cricket army fighting for their world cup dream. Do you have a strategy for the miracle?!

Can they be STOPPED?!

I keep asking this questions to many of my cricket friends from the day one world cup started. Its not just because I don't want to see them winning their 3rd continuous world cup. Its just a question which comes out with great fury and furious as a cricket fan like anybody who like to see a new winner on the stage now. Its time for a change of face.

As you guessed, I am talking about the unstoppable Aussies. At this point of time, they have played 6 matches and salvaged each opponent in all corners with their all round capability. They are invincible and keep proving that every other match.

But any champion has to go thru a tough time once or while. They been thru theirs by getting their fingers burnt well enough, losing the series to kiwis before entering the world cup.They faced their demons and now they are playing like cricket DEMIGODS. Somebody is yet to give them a good fight. We are still yet to see a team in this world cup who will make them pay their dues and run for their money atleast once.

From their first game on, whether they are batted first or made to chase they never showed one bit sight of weakness in any of the matches. S.A tried their best to test them a bit but didn't go close to the extent to squeeze them out. That's kinda of unfortunate from S.A side being a world number one rated team and couldn't able to give a tough fight.

Lets quickly browse thru their performa in world cup past matches..

Group Matches

Ist - 334/6 - Won by 231 runs thrashing Scots to 131/10

IInd - 358/5 - Won by 229 runs folding Holland to 129/10

3rd - 377/6 - Won by 84 runs bowling out S.A to 294/10

Super 8 Matches

Ist - 322/6 - Won by 103 runs beating W.I to 219/10

IInd - 106/0 - Won by 10 wkts reducing Bangla to 104/6

3rd - 248/3 - Won by 7 wkts taking revenge with Eng - 247/10

I wanted to summarize for the very purpose to show how they outplayed every team they played against so far. It clearly shows their vigorous game plan. They never scored anything less than 320 in the matches they batted first and when they were asked to chase, they always won very comfortably.

They have 10 men batting lineup with 5 full time bowling bulldozers(no Bratt Lee). Each and every one in the team is playing like its the end of the world, showing they are the best in the world starting from the captain till the tail enders.

At this moment, only 3 teams are capable of atleast coming close to giving them a good fight. But we already saw S.A failing to do their job by getting beaten badly. So I have my eyes out for the other 2 teams, Kiwis and Lankans.

If these 2 teams can keep their arsenal well oiled and ready before meeting Aussies. I can assure either of these teams would give a tough time for this unstoppable Demigods. At the same time, Aussies as we have seen before will try to maintain their stand in this worldcup yet another time to be unbeatable.

Is it going to be Kiwis or Lankans who is going to give us the feast we all been waiting to watch in this worldcup? I am going to bet on both, hoping for a miracle to happen. Until that time, we have some more exciting matches to come..

I am hungry for yet another thrilling clincher, thanks to Lankans & Bangla Tigers feeding my worldcup fire..

World Cup is finally heating up..

Cricket is always been a game of uncertainty and shocking moments. It never fails to surprise us especially in times when we aren't expecting the most.

Its has been proven once again from the past few days with back to back thrilling matches.

Srilanka won against England in a nail bitting thriller of the last over. An amazing defence against England with their fielding and bowling attack paved an unexpected win. It shows an uplifting fact that Srilanka's continues to gain strength to find their place in the Semi's.

Today another unexpected upsetter by Bangladesh beating the TOP ranked ODI team in the world by 67 runs with their excellent fielding and energized bowling attack..

I been asking people in the cricket forum whether we will have an upsetter in the Super 8 matches. Most of them played it safe and shared their views that its not actually Super 8, its merely Super 6 as Ireland and Bangla are just happen to get here..

I strongly predicted that Bangla will try to upset and give atleast one match winning performance. I predicted them to take a toll against W.I as we all know they are one of weak team and to claim a good win over them. But they showed that they are far better than once again by taking on an unimaginable win against S.Africans..

This shows their aggressiveness, confidence and unbeatable, unstoppable urge to win the matches. They don't have anything to lose but played a determined innings. With their good young batting lineup (which sometimes fallen of the ground by good bowling) especially Ashraful and Ahmed showed once again, they can shine on hard times.. A good knock by Ashraful really helped to get a good score for Bangla.

We all knew that 25o won't be an hard target for S.Africans. Then comes the bowling attack with three left arm spinners who had a huge role to play and they did exactly that with some perfection. Razzak and Sakib were the key men who brought about the collapse in the South African batting.

The Bangla tiger are delighted and they have proved a point once again today. "If there is a WILL, there is always a WAY". This victory by Bangladesh sends a strong signal to W.I and England that they shouldn't take them for granted. It also opens up chances for the Windies and England to fight hard for a spot in the Semis.

Well played Bangla Tigers.. Way to go !! Hats off to the great effort..

With these last 2 matches being a real entertainer, finally World cup is getting the heat of its own and seeks attention from the cricket fans for some more good ones to come.. Now I can surely bet on Bangladesh beating W.I with yet another performance.. Are you with me?

W.I: Does they still have a tiny bit of chance?!

We all been watching the West Indians getting beaten up by high calibre teams like Aus, NZ and S.L. left and right. They couldn't able to even score a mere score of 200 either by batting first or chasing. I know they are weak but they put a good fight in the league matches. I was hoping for them to win alteast one match against the big teams. But it didn't happen till date.

Their bowling is not the very best and batting depends on ly on 2-3 players like gayle, Sarwan, Chandrapaul & not to forget Lara whose performances can't be counted on everytime and not really consistent.

In the current points table below,



They stand-in just ahead of the minnow teams with Net R.R of -1.177.

We all know at the end of the Super 8 matches. Four team needs to be packed up and sent back.. We are sure that the minnow teams who made to Super 8 by their good effort in league matches won't have very good chances making it further.. So counting them 2 in the packup list, we are looking for the 2 more teams from the unknows of 4 teams as we all know Aussies and Africans will make it easily. Its going to tough fight between Kiwis, Brits & Lanks with W.I being the wild card on the bunch.

W.I already played 3 matches and lost of all of them real bad. They still have 3 more matches to go.. Next match is another tough one with S.Africans. If they win last 2 matches, they will be still out taking into consideration the way Brits and Lankans are playing.. Its a tough deal for the Host team and also Lara's last chance to raise the cup.

I am sure they don't have the capability to fight Aussies so no way they can go to finals.. But I am rooting for N.Z/S.A to go to finals.. If they need to go, then we need a weaker team to go to semi's.

I still miss the W.I team in 1990's. Where is the W.I team we all used to watch out as a big threat with good arsonels on both departments with Peterson bowling and Greenidge batting? I don't it thing we will ever get to watch that kind of team again..

Anyways, If they have a dream to go forward to catch the cup with an upset, they need to start shaking something now and try to think about staying in the grease much longer.. Do you think they will pull pack together?

Its all over for now.. Whats next?

There is already lot been said and done to show over anger and frustration. Every news channel I turn, they show people torching the players pictures and taking rally to show their rage on this shocking failure by our Indian team. As a country men, I would have to say that their outburst is expected and reasonable. I even showed mine in the discussion forum as soon as we lost to Srilanka.

I think we are failed by our fellow country men in this cricket battle. A long awaited dream to hold the world cup for another time is been spoiled and vanished just at the first gate/step by the poor showcase of men in blue.

There are 'n' number of blogs all over this internet floating around to cruse and complain about our teams poor performance in this world cup. There are also blogs which starting to talk about the new team india, how to revamp the team, who will be our next coach and so forth. There is also some news and blogs on how players shed tears and trying to cop-up with all this happening. They are also human and they are the first to get impacted by all these failure. They are the reason and they are the cause for all these things.

In Sulekha, I been seeing lots and lots of bloggers coming out of their caves to show their anger in words to shut off their burning fire inside them which is totally understandable. Cricket is been a life blood for most of us including me since we are kids. Its been feed thru our body as another protein like milk to enrich our life in someways. So I have to say that their anger towards our team is expected but that doesn't mean that we have to go out of our limit to trouble their family. There is always a limit for everything. I will never support that kinda of activity.

I think enough being said and its time to say enough is enough. We showed our outburst and anger in lot of ways and we leave the rest to be handled in a proper manner.. Being said that, we wonder and ponder on whats next for us and for the Team India..

As true cricketers, I think there is still lot more matches yet to be played in this world cup. We should start to let go of the sad moments and try to get out of the dull zone. We should start cherishing this time of world cup moments by picking your own favorite team in the super 8 and start supporting it. We only get this chance once in 4 years and we should not just shut our interest that our team is out and whatelse is there.

I know its easy to say then done. Time will always help to heal and makes things better. So doesn't sweat on the past, just try to dwell on the current moment and cherish it. We can always go back to support our team when they are ready to take on the next battle. We will always be there. So go and pickup your team in the super 8, let it be any good sub-continent team like SL or BL(like to give preference since they are our close neighbors.) or W.I who was an underdog or 2 time loser RSA. Try to enjoy this worldcup. There is lot more left to watch and cheer.

For the Team India, there are lot of speculation about revamping the whole team. Throwing out veterans, finding new blood, fining them heavily, banning them from adverstisement and much more.. There is still lot to come.. I don't want to comment anything on it. If its all for good reason, it always encouraged..

Whatever it may be, our chance for this world cup ran out and we have to wait for our next one. There is still 1460 days left and lot will happen during this timeframe. I hope things will change, they will fall in place and surely pave a way to a strong team which we can believe and support for the next world cup..

Lets cherish this moment as there is lot left to be played.. Be a sportman, a true cricketer. Join us in the sulekha discussion form for more fun talks...

Dravid Captiancy: What can he do better ?

A historical unforgettable defeat and a historical unimaginable win, these are 2 extreme end of our team under Dravid Captaincy.

Indian Cricket fans all over the world are mauling about how Dravid fared as a captain in the last 2 world cup matches. They are neophytes who didn't even know anything about cricket going loquacious on this topic. On the other end, there are experts(including chappel I hope) who are analyzing the data and digging to the bottom of it to suggest some valuable advices to him for the next match.

We been seeing lots of blogs lately in this cricket section talking about these matches and Dravid captaincy. I even published blogs on the match results and commented about his captaincy in my blogs.(http://houstonvijai.sulekha.com/blog/post/2007/03/we-will-be-back-back-with-vigor-and-vengeance.htm, http://houstonvijai.sulekha.com/blog/post/2007/03/bravo-india-but-its-not-over-yet.htm)

The important question we all wanted to be answered is, Did Dravid prevail successfully as a captain under pressure?

He is king'ed as the captain more than a year ago. He was able to bring on some good wins both in our home soil and some outside the territory. He managed to lead the team in difficult and failure times. Since those matches are just league matches, we didn't put those under our microscopic view to test find faults.

As soon it comes to worldcup, every matches falls under our radar screen for the clean lab test on each department. We start to complain about bowling, batting, fielding and captaincy all together. We as fans always do this and its common for any fans in any sport I have seen. There is anything wrong in it. But we should also appreciate the fact he took over the captiancy without much of an experience and he is been doing pretty good job.

Captaincy is a leadership skill which can't be learn thru books. It has to be gained thru experiences. You can be a good team player but it doesn't mean that you can take on as a leader and be captain. It didn't work well for Sachin. Leadership skill needs people management ability to go friendly at the same time hard on your teammates to accomplish the best for your team. Its a special skill.

" A good leader is not one who creates best followers. He is the one who creates best leaders"

As per me, he still miss lots of hard capabilities which is important for a captain to excel. We have seen good captiancy's from Kapil, Azy & Ganguly. They had the aggresiveness, power to move the team for their purpose, survive under tensed situation and make wise decisions. All these capabilities are a must for a good captain.

Things he should have done in the last 2 matches as per the critics are,

Bangladesh Match: He didn't make the proper decision after winning the Toss as per the pitch condition. He did make proper bowler options and didn't use them well enough to get the wickets to give pressure to the opponents.

Bermuda match: He made a good decision on changing the batting position to get a good score. Also why Agarkar was included in the 11man team. Why can't we use Sreesthanth or Irfan ? He also missed on using Sachin earlier to get some break to bundle them soon. Also I wonder why he don't want to use Ganguly as an extra bowler.. These are some vital questions from these matches.

On SL match, taking all the past into consideration, we all have different match options in our mind ready to suggest to our indian team. I am seeing a strong discussion in the sulekha forum about it.

Some say, we should dump Harbhajan & Agarkar and have Irfan and Kumble. Others say we should have a good batting lineup not the one we used against Bermuda. Experts mention, we should bowl first to restrict them for low score and chase it with our strong batting line up.. Its really locaquios topic at this time since we have only one match to decide on our future in Worldcup.

I think, we should make use of Irfan's all rounder capability to add extra batsment strength to the team with the bowling ability. Kumble would be my choice against Harbhajan.

Who knows, whats going in the Carribean dressing room ?! No one knows.. But as a vivid cricket fans, did we ever miss a chance to brainstorm options for our team in this situations. So why waste thinking about, lets do it.

If you were Dravid at this moment, What do you think is your best squad for the D-Day against SL? What do you do best to win the match? Shoot it out...

Bravo India. Its not over yet..

Didn't I tell you in my previous blog(http://houstonvijai.sulekha.com/blog/post/2007/03/we-will-be-back-back-with-vigor-and-vengeance.htm) we will be back and back with vigor and vengeance. I think they heard us. Heard our countrymen cry for a good showcase. They didn't fail us, atleast this time..

What a splendid, spectacular innings by Indians? It not only created the marks in the world cup history but also given a big alarm and threat signal for SL's. This might even play against by wakening the wild side of SL to perform well on Friday. I can already hear some scaristic comments already that we can only make this kinda of score with minnow teams like Bermuda which no one can easily spot in the map.

There is always somebody to complain and comment about everything our team does. We really went mad at them on the way they played last saturday but we never lost our confidence against them. They came back up to prove that they will try to make our dreams come true. Whatever it may be nobody can change what had happened. Great Innings and unbeatable total marked the books of the World cup history.

I really saw the total sulekha forum went wild tracking the himalaya score. Everybody starts to share their joy with different posting on the world record. Its a good time to cherish. Its a great team effort and good decision made by the captain(atleast this time he thought of something better).

Uttapa seems to be the scapegoat this time. He had a good chance to shine but didn't materialize it.. If we can give second chance for sehwag, we sure definitely can give you one more chance, hold on Uttapa :-)

A very good partnership for the 2nd wicket. Ganguly did struggle a lot but got the act together finally after his 50 and smashed some good sixers. He has lots of dot balls in the first half of is innings which got compensated by the sixers on the next half. He gave a good standin for sehwag. Sehwag did play a good innings to prove that his skippers believe didn't go in vain. :::I would root for W.I.: :what's going on with this match ?! : never checked this one yet. Good variety of shots to score 114 of 87 balls including 17 4's and 3 6's. We hope to see this continue through the innings..

The change of positions to send Dhoni next played to maintain the RR was a good decision. He didn't play is natural game but try to rotate the strike to give Ganguly more to bat. Expected some flying shots by ended with a mere 29. Next comes Yuvi. I expected our WALL(Dravid) to walk down but another surprise to see Yuvi. He played an outstanding matured innings with lots of SIXERS. Next comes Sachin to the field. I even forgot that he is still there. It was not his usual game but he played a real sensible cricket to keep the run ticking and rotating the strikes with Yuvi.

It was a great knock by Yuvi scoring 83 or 46 balls with 7 6's and 4 4's. I was hoping to see the fastest century in this world cup but it proved to be too greedy at this time. He should have contained himself and stayed for another 2overs. Then comes Dravid. Just gave strike to Sachin and at the last ball hit SIX which is really fantastic.. Good finish by the captain.

All-in-all a great show putup by our Indian team. It made history in all aspect. Highest score, Highest number of SIXERS etc.,

Being said all that and getting carried away with this record and praising our boys innings, India still has lot of work to do. If we can play with this confidence, vigor, determination and aggressiveness. We can sure to beat SL and then cross our fingers and pray for the SL/BL to fail. First thing first, we just need to get that job done by defeating SL with a good margin and wait for other things to fall in place.

Worst case - Calculations are on :

If we win SL - India - 4 points

If Sl win BL - SL - 4 points

If BL wins Bermuda - BL - 4points.

All team will have equal points and RR comes to play. This match should give us a boost in the rate. We should be able get to Super 8 convincingly if BL and SL fail in their matches or rain spoils to give us advantages or we have to watch out for their low RR's.

We always digged deep hole to ourselves and get to a tense moment like this one and tried to get out of it. Its not new for us. We never entered convincingly to super 8 one time but we always made it there. So like anything country men, I am also hoping we will make it this time too..

Lets cherish this wonderful and start worrying about the other permutation & combinations later.. Any thoughts about the other options in the calculation ?!

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

We just won Bermuda by 257 runs and that is the highest margin of win in terms of runs in ODIs.

There is still lot to worry about our bowling and Captiancy. Can we fight against SL with this bowling which doesn't have power and aggressivenes.We should have bowled them out long back. We got 8 wickets and couldn't finish the last 2 wkts tail enders. Is it worries yo uand gives sign to other teams that our bowling loses strenght.

Why dravid wants to keep trying Agarkar if he is expensive ? Why can't he try Sachin earlier ? Why he didn't try Ganguly. Lots of questions to be answered..

Lets hope he sort out these questions and get ready for the big one yet to come..

We will be back. Back with vigor and vengeance.

What went wrong today? What had happened out there? Why didn't we bat well? Does these teens just outplayed us? These are the questions that should have been discussed by Dravid with his boys and analyse the fact to get to the bottom before we step forward to our next one.

We all know there is lot of pressure and a big load on Dravid's shoulder because we as country men as great expectation to win WC. But we also need to understand they can only get there one step at a time. I share same frustration that every other for our team losing to Bangladesh.

One day we blew out everything and play the very best to beat top of the line. Before we digest that, we are swept away by getting beaten up a thriving/minow teams. I know it had happened to us many times and we let it happen to us again today. Did we always need a eye opener everytime?

I am might not be an expert but as common sense cricketer sharing some similar with other cricket fans in the discussion forum. We all feel that there are lots of things which went wrong in today's match. Lets get to the bottom of it, atleast just for our satisfaction. Hope chappel, dravid and the boys would have done this analysis before they go to the next 2 matches. Lets hope so.

Toss: We are lucky to win the toss. Caribbean salty wind blowed to favor us to get the tails and Dravid won the toss. He knows the pitch is dry and he is sure that its going to hard for 10-20 overs. Why didn't he take the advantage of that to thrash the Bangladesh team for low score and win by chasing it. He already set his mind to bat first to score like S.A against Holland but it didn't happen. Its a failure.. Also why he didn't pick up 2 spinners as the pitch is favoring it. Did Dravid should change and make proper decision game plan as per the conditions prevailed not just taking the preplan?

Batting Lineup: Its good to see Ganguly back in WC with Sehwag. We expected to see a good first wicket partnership. But something got paltry and we ended up losing one wicket after other. Is it because the Ist wicket didn't give the confidence boost?

I know we need to give chance for Sehwag to try and get back to his form. But there were lots of warning inside and outside the cricket circle about bangladesh bowling. Did Dravid should have reconsidered the opening options? Did you think Sachin and Ganguly opening might have worked better ?

Sachin couldn't prevail the good pace bowling. Dravid(The wall) himself failed to stop the fall of wickets. But Yuvaraj with Ganguly helped us to reach a respectabe score. Dhoni also failed today. We have 3 ducks. We have to depend on the Bowlers to do the batsmen job. If they can stand for 6 overs and score 30 runs. We should not blame the pitch after 20-30 overs. We should blame the team confidence and mentality to stay there to play hard.

Bowling:Bowling was just mere ok. How come Agarkar came in the 11men team ? where did Pathan and others go ? He was always expensive and never played line and length. Zaheer did try hard to get it straight and bowled 2 maidens. Munaf tried hard but not at his best in his second spell and got few wickets but he became expensive too. Dravid tried Yuvaraj and Sehwag. Luckily Sehwag got 2 wickets when its just merely 20 runs to win when its all over.

Why didn't he want to try Ganguly's medium pace ?? Harbhajan bowling didn't make any good impression. He couldn't get the ball to spin at all. I think Kumble will never get to retire. He is the googly man we wanted..

Overall, our bowling doesn't come close too Bangladesh teens.

Fielding: You all know how we fielded. There is no aggression. There is no power. There were missing catches. Runs kept coming in singles and doubles except few dot overs.. We still should be able to defend the score if we bowled well in the first spel and field well.

As a captain and team, I don't see vigor and aggressiveness. Something is missing in the team. We have to find the mising factor and sketch down the power game plan for the next 2 matches. Otherwise we will fail hard and will let our country mens dream fail too.

I surely want to commend and give kudos's to the teen(tiger) team. They really played as well matured game with lots of composure. They really bowled well. They just played their natural game that what they all said in the post game interview. Rassak and Rafique stroke again to get more wickets to restrict the team. I know there don't have nothing to lose and they played just their best.

We failed in all the departments comparing to them. They really showed maturity and good composure as a team. But they still have long way to go..

To Conclude, our team has to wake up now otherwise it will be too late. We have to come back hard and hard enough with vengeance to win every game..

There is no need to get to the extreme to torce their houses and so forth. I know we love our team a lot and thats the reason we couldn't just take this defeat. Lets give them some space and hope they will be back. They will be back with vigor and vengeance.

Worldcup 2007 - Collection of Important Match Highlighs

This blog has some creative video previews of Worldcup 2007. It will also get updated with important Match highlights from Youtube..
http://crickettivo.blogspot.com/

Interesting Astrologer Prediction

This is a interesting forecast from Ganeshspeaks.com website which came as the news in Sulekha. Looks like the time well spent to figure out totally a different scenorio and tried to be on the safe side. He is a true Astrologer :-) I won't recommend him. Please Read on and add your funny comments...

*******************

Millions of cricket fans are desperately waiting for the kick-off of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2007, scheduled on 13 March 2007 in Jamaica, West Indies.

Taking the charts of all the Countries participating and the foundation dates of respective boards along with the all the available data of their Captain and Coach Ganesha has following observations and predictions about World Cup 2007.

Group Matches
Considering the planetary positions on the match day and their effects on match playing countries and their players Ganesha feels that in this round 8 teams that qualify for the next round would be

Australia
South Africa
India
Sri Lanka
New Zealand
England
Pakistan
West Indies
Semi Finals
Astrological aspects favour following countries for Semi Finals

South Africa
New Zealand
West Indies
Australia, Sri Lanka and India almost have same chances to qualify for the 4th spot.
India's Fate for Super Eight Matches
India's fate will heavily depend on the 4th game of the super eight matches. Toss will become very important and to chose bating/ balling will have strong impact over the game's outcome.

Probabilities of winning
If Australia reaches semi final as a Second or 3rd team they may have better chances to make it to the final.

If Australia reaches final they might not able to win.

If New Zealand reaches semi final as a 4th team they may not able to enter Final.

Even though New Zealand is playing extra ordinarily these days, they may not able to become World Champion.

Ganesha feels that South Africa, Sri Lanka and West Indies do have very good chances to make it to the final. Toss and choosing correct alternatives will decide the outcome of the game on that particular Day.

Ganesha feels that we will have a new world champion this time. Considering recent history of world cup winning country, even if logically it seems that a particular country might win, this time with surprise this logic may go wrong and we may have a new world cup champion emerging.

West Indies might be the Dark Horse in world cup 2007.

*******************

To read more, visit http://cricketworldcup.ganeshaspeaks.com/worldcup_forecast.jsp

A True World Championship

Can you imagine calling Ranji Troply as World Championship Cricket or think of calling Nehru Hockey Tournament as World champion Hockey Cup. No way right!! We can't really name that way because its all local trophies played within a country and between different states.

Only in America, you hear about World championships all the time. Let say their American Football. Hold on, its not soccer :-) I am right on saying it. Its american football which only people live in america can understand(i am slowly getting into it). If you watch, it similar to rugby but more physical than that.

Then comes Baseball World championship. They play Baseball leagues from Apr till Oct which overlaps with Football season from Sep - Feb. You might have a slight thought that they are playing with some other countries who knows how to play basefall and football. No, they are not. Its all played between different sponsored and well payed teams only in Americas.

When I got to know(7-8years back) about the World championship for football, I immediately asked my american friend. How many countries do they participate in this tournament? He is like, Did you ask how many countries ? No, its all inside America. We play between different teams all over America and who ever gets to win the final game are called World Champions.

I am like WHAT ?! My question as you all can guess, then why do you call World champions if you don't play with any other country. He is like "I don't know ?" The usual word I don't care answer which you hear from any american. They been calling it that way because the media calls it that way to get more sponsors and publicity.

Then he asks me about CRICKET. You play a game similar to baseball with Wicket. And I tried to explain to him more in detail. He is like, "You guys play for the 5 days or one full day". Thats too much work and too long of a play. I said, may be. I know, you want everything easy and simple.Thats what makes it more exciting. So I figured they don't like our CRICKET. I think they don't like it not for game sake, they won't like because its from Britain.

Truely speaking, are these Football and Baseball world championship up to other worldcup level ? May be the hype, publicity and money floats around can match up to the other worldcups but I don't think these cups can't be truely compared to other worldcups. The other aspect of it, you only have people from America watching these football & baseball championships. Compared to other worldcupls like Soccer and Cricket are watched by people all over the world.

Why do they call World Championship? I guess because nobody in this world plays these games and they don't have anybody else to beat outside their terriotory. Most of all, they don't open their eyes to see outside world. Funny fact of the matter is most people in America don't know anything outside of America. They always think America is their only world.

When President Bush was asked in 2000 election campaign about India, he couldn't able answer. May be he might have answered like, 'Is it in Europe?!. Who knows. Yeah right, It was in Europe now its in Africa. If the President itself couldn't answer about the outside world, how can we expect others to thing outside America. I know its changed a lot since then.

A True World championship is anything but a true fight between different countries from all over world to take away a CUP worthy of lifetime. There is more than the sports aspect in the world championships. It has sharing of culture between different countries, spreading the sport, bringing people and players together from different countries and much more..

Thats what I call a World Championship and thats what it's all about.

Bangladesh: Can India take them for granted ?!

World cup is on its way with a great start. We already saw W.I beating PAK comfortably with their mediacore bowling. Today, we have some interesting match between Canada and Kenya. I am betting on Kenya to win this one. They bowled out Canada for a low score of 199. Australia is taking on its first match in this world cup with Scotland. My guesses, they have to win with a great margin.

Most of all, we all are eagerly waiting to see our boys in the first match to be played with Bangladesh on Mar 17th. I know Indian team is totally prepared to rock and roll in this world cup. We hope to start our tally with a convincing and comfortable victory over bangladesh. But I am just bit worried about the way Bangladesh is been playing all these days.

As the other blogger(Naked Cricket) mentioned in his blog
http://nakedcricket.sulekha.com/blog/post/2007/03/the-a-player-in-a-b-team-bangla-v-s-ind.htm, they have some good players on their side.

Do we have to be concerned a bit and not to take them for granted ? I guess so. They a have the small history on their side to upset big teams. Lets back up a bit and take a look at the warm-up matches they played.

They took on New Zealand in their first warm-up match. The Asian minnows pulled off the first shock of the ICC CWC by beating the Kiwis by two wickets in a warm-up game on Tuesday leaving Fleming to carry out an immediate inquest on what went wrong for his highly-touted team.

New Zealand captain Stephen Fleming, who came here celebrating a whitewash of world champions Australia, admitted they had been brought down to earth by Bangladesh. He said,

"It was a poor performance," said Fleming who had a miserable day with the bat failing to get of the mark.

"Nothing went right. We batted poorly at the beginning (the Kiwis were 34-4 at one stage) and did not assess conditions that well. We knew it was going to be tricky at the start and we fell flat on our faces.

Pace bowler Mashrafe Mortaza proved to be the hero with bat and ball along with left-arm spinner Abdur Razzak. For Bangladesh, it was a morale-boost to have a win ahead of their first round matches. It don't matter whether they won in warm-up match or actual league match. Its a good win thats all it counts.

Next they played with SCOTLAND. They sent them spinning to a seven-wicket defeat to make it two wins out of two. The slow left-armers Abdur Razzak (3-25) stuck again in this second match in succession along with Mohammad Rafique (2-16) who proved to be good.

They restricted Scotland to th mere 152-9 off their 50 overs at the 3Ws Oval before Bangladesh stormed to victory with the best part of 16 overs left thanks to an unbeaten 57 from Captain played a very responsible cricket played to bring the team back to win this match.

Overall, they have a good improved and balanced team under Dav Whatmoore as the coach. They have good pace and spin bowler as their main arsnel support by an improved batting line up.

Being said all that, I know we(Indians) are also a greatly balanced team as the coach GREG CHAPPELL mentioned. May be we shouldn't be much worried about this minows beating us but at the same time we shouldn't take them for granted.

This tiny fire ant squad can really pinch hard which might hurt us in the long run. So at first place, India shouldn't give them a chance to think about winning. am I right ?

Bets on for today's matches - Mar 14th

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Current Donor Lists: Ashwin- $25
Donors & Sponsors are welcome. Please email me for more details at helpindia2007@yahoo.com

Current Points:

Start Betting on:

Match: March 14th AUS vs SCOT

How will Aus win(like in 25overs and runs) ?

Please put your bet scores either as comments or in the forum for each betting questions.. Let me know of any suggestions...

Quick Team Health Checkup

AUSTRALIA

Key players: Ricky Ponting, Mike Hussey, Stuart Clark

Notable absence: Brett Lee (injury)

Strengths: Professionalism, superior fielding, depth in batting

Weaknesses: Arrogance, stubbornness when things go awry, recent poor form of Bowlers

Overall WC record: 41-17-1

World champions in 1987, 1999 and 2003

SCOTLAND

Key players: Dougie Brown, Gavin Hamilton

Notable absence: Ian Stanger (not selected)

Strengths: The professional experience of the likes of Brown and Hamilton

Weaknesses: Another team that is out of its depth at the international level.

Overall WC record: 0-5

Match: March 14th CAN vs KEN

Who will win this match and How they will win ?
Please put your bet scores either as comments or in the forum for each betting questions.. Let me know of any suggestions...
Quick Team Health Checkup

CANADA

Key players: John Davison, Ashish Bagai, Umar Bhatti
Notable absence: Don Maxwell (not selected)

Strengths: Arguably the best bowling attack among the minnows

Weaknesses: Mostly amateur batsmen who will be out of their depth against international bowling sides

KENYA

Key players: Steve Tikolo, Thomas Odoyo

Notable absence: Martin Suji (injury), Kennedy Otieno (not selected)

Strengths: A tendency to punch above their weight class

Weaknesses: Not enough recent cricket against top sides

Overall WC record: 5-14-1

Check out the list of live score links at

http://houstonvijai.sulekha.com/blog/post/2007/03/live-streaming-live-scorecard-useful-website-cheatsheet.htm

Live Streaming and Live Scorecards - Useful Weblinks Cheatsheet

Most of the matches starting around 13.30 GMT time except the matches in Jamica which starts at 14:30 GMT. I know the timing works better in favor of people in india since its falls during the night time. They can watch every match live on the television in their bed.

 

But for people in USA like me and other places, the match timings might fall during the workday. We might have to sneak thru the work hours to check scores in the web while we are working. So I thought my list of website collection will be of great use. I have experienced some problems when I only dependent on one site. Sometimes they might be slow during the peak. Its always good to have a list so you can try out different sites whenever needed.

 

 

To check your broadcast timings, I added the chart which helps you to convert and get your local timings according to the zones. http://atm.geo.nsf.gov/ieis/time.html

 

Here is the list of websites. I have used few of them so I am adding my ratings for your purpose.

Live Streaming:

http://www.action8cricket.com/watch_live_cricket_online.htm

(looks promissing, I am going to try)

Live scoreboard:

http://www.sulekha.com/cricket

http://www.cricinfo.com/worldcup2007/ Rating:slow at peak http://www.rediff.com/cricket/index.html Rating:Good and faster - vastly used http://thatscricket.oneindia.in/ Rating: fast - not used

http://in.sports.yahoo.com/cricket/ Rating: slow
http://worldcup.cricket365.com/live/ Rating:seems to be fast - not used http://cricket.expressindia.com/worldcup/07/ Rating-seems to be fast -not used http://www.chennaionline.com/cricket/Worldcup07/index.aspx Rating:Good & faster

http://cricket.123india.com/ Rating:seems to be fast

May be Highlights:

http://crickettube.com
http://cricketvideosunplugged.blogspot.com/2007/03/world-cup-opening-ceremony.html

 

Track the points using user friendly excel:

http://www.excely.com/cricket/world-cup-schedule.html

 

 

Please try out these sites and add your experience as comments for others benefits. Also please don't hesitate to add any new sites if you find it useful.I will try to add more links if I come across few more..

Bet and Benefit:Start betting on WI vs PAK match

Whats Bet & Benefit?
Please visit this blog  Sulekhites, Are you ready to gamble?  for more information.

Note: This is not a scam or scandal. This is legitimate and not anyway connected to Sulekha.  Also I am not trying to boost my ranks in the blog by doing this game. Its sole purpose to have fun and help the non-profit organizations in our country. Its a WIN WIN for all.

All proceeds go to NGO's. Please participate and have fun and help us to raise fund.

Current Donor Lists:

 

Ashwin- $25

Match: March 13 - W.I vs PAK

 

Start Betting  on:

 

Ist Session

If W.I plays first, What will be score on 25th & 50th Over ?

If PAK Plays first,What will be score on 25th & 50th Over ?

 

IInd Session: Chasers

If W.I chasing, What will be score on 25th & 50th Over ?

If PAK chasing,What will be score on 25th & 50th Over ?

 

Finally, who will win the match?

 

Please put your bet scores as comments for each betting questions..  Or any suggestions let me know..

Quick Team Health Checkup
PAKISTAN

Key players: Inzamamul-Haq, Mohammad Yousuf, Shahid Afridi

Notable absence: Shoaib Akhtar, Mohammad Asif and Abdul Razzaq (all injured)

Strengths: Unmatched ability to score heavily in the last few overs and uncanny knack for coming back strongly after defeat

Weaknesses: Without Shoaib and Asif the bowling loses its teeth; tendency in the team for infighting

Overall WC record: 29-11-2

World champions in 1992

WEST INDIES

Key players: Brian Lara, Chris Gayle, Shiv Chanderpaul

Notable absence: Runako Morton, Fidel Edwards (not selected)

Strengths: Experienced top order batting lineup; confidence high playing at home

Weaknesses: Bowling attack that is no more than average among the top teams, with no quality spinner; tendency for the batting to collapse when victory is in sight

Overall WC record: 31-16-1
World champions in 1975 and 1979

 

(Courtesy - Toronoto Stars)