CricDigs Blogs

So we have lost the second T20 too. The team is down. But i am on a high because my match analyses are getting the approvals from the great minds in cricket. Immediately after the first match i had written that trying to hit too many big hits did us in. The same thing was said by Dhoni and many cricket experts later. Did i say something very insightful or something that was just plain obvious about the first match? Anyways, please allow me to stay within the fools’s paradise to think that my analyses are too good, in depth, and insightful (even if they are not) as long as they are accurate.

If you say that my first match analysis was not deep but accurate then i sincerely welcome that. There is a HUGE positive in that. This means our team is making obvious mistakes which doesn’t require a cricket pundit to detect. Which in turn means that we can easily correct the mistakes and win.

We made mistakes again in the second match. Our batsmen never looked comfortable in the match. We tried to play better and didn’t try for the big hits totally. Well that was a mistake. In a T20 match we should try to go for the big hits but must space them. Just when we were about to getting settled the New Zealand bowlers unsettled us. Awkward and hurried shots bereft of any confidence, indecisiveness, and the signs of pressure characterized our batting. Bowling was a shade better than the first match. Ishant Sharma was not so reckless and Pathan bowled sensibly this time. Still we lost the match. Though the scores were tied with one ball left to end the match, we were never close to the New Zealand performance. They dominated the proceedings right from the word go. Or more appropriately we let them dominate the proceedings.

Two straight defeats. But hey, it is no big deal. The fact that Yuvraj scored a fifty this time proves that when two or three of our batsmen will hit the big scores New Zealand will be put to the most grueling tests. You saw a glimpse of that when Pathan took two quick wickets and then when NZ needed 24 runs from two overs. The tension was quite palpable in the NZ benches. Butler was chewing his nail. Unfortunately, the scores were not big enough. In both the T20 matches only one batsman clicked each time. In the first one Raina and the second one it was Yuvraj. What makes you think that Raina, Gambhir, and Yuvi will not click in a single match? Why cannot Sehwag, Gambhir, and Jadeja not take the responsibility in the next match? The story will be different when 2/3 of our top batsmen score the big runs and others chip in with nifty contributions. And this is going to happen soon. Butler will chew off his fingers. Just watch out.

You can’t read too much from one defeat that has come for India in a T20 match, considering that they have been winning pretty much everything they have played over the last year. However, one wasn’t expecting the whole team, I mean nearly every batsman playing so carelessly that too after we had gotten off to a pretty decent start. Sehewag was literally butchering the ball and a very, very small ground. Had the cared to hang around just a bit more, he would have literally scored a century through hitting sixers only but it wasn’t him who is to be blamed. Instead, the rest of the batsmen who followed him seem hell-bent on spanking every ball out of the park. Why? No one really knows. I guess they were trying to score 220+.

The other thing that stood out was the limitation of players like the Pathan brothers and Rohit Sharma in analysing the situation and trying to stick around until some momentum could have been gained. I guess it wouldn’t be a bad idea to have Jadeja instead of Rohit, as he is a tight left-arm bowler and can hit the ball equally far away and could add to the all-round strength of the team. Talking about all-rounders, it seems that Jacob Oram is always playing in the matches against India and the rest of the time he spends recuperating from his injuries…just kidding — he is among the most under-rated players in international cricket and in T20s and ODIs he is good enough to win the match for his team given his ability to counter both pace and spin and can hit the ball as hard as any Indian batsman.

A loss or two was coming India’s way anyways, but one aspect that stands out in every match is that besides the combination of Zaheer and Ishant there isn’t a single bowler who is even as half as good as either of them. No one including Irfan, Munaf or Balaji is in that ‘zone’. Yes, Praveen Kumar could prove to be the surprise package given the conditions here. Anyways, hoping India squares-off by winning the next one.

Actually they are the rock stars. With flat chests, strong and lithe physique, and tattoos on their bodies they look like rock stars. Their game also rocks. Jacob Oram’s catch, Brendon McCullum’s controlled innings, and the bowlers’ hard work gave India the jolts. New Zealand outplayed India in every segment of the game. They deserved to win.

Alright, enough of sportive pleasantries, let’s get down to some match analysis. There is no need to be harsh on our players. They are winning more matches than they are losing. One loss is no big deal. In fact, there are a lot of positives that we can carry to the series ahead. The first thing that comes to mind is the way Sehwag, Raina, and Yusuf dealt with the New Zealand blowers. It can be safely concluded that our batsmen need not be wary of the pitches nor the bowlers. Sehwag was absolutely relaxed and hit the sixes with ease. He got rattled when Gambhir got out. Raina played as if he was playing in India. Coming at one down, he stayed till the end. He worked hard without struggling despite the fact that wickets were tumbling from the other end. That will be an inspiration for other batsmen. Yusuf Pathan was Yusuf Pathan.

Our batsmen got out in quick succession not because of the pitch or excellent bowling. If that was the case Raina would have struggled to hit the half century. But the fact that Raina played comfortably despite little support from the other end shows that our batsmen got a little carried away by the “Rock star” tag. Of the 162 runs scored 102 runs came from boundaries (13 sixes and 6 fours). We need to show some restrain. Virendra Sehwag must be feeling bad. He started off in a relaxed way and hit clean shots. He could have easily scored a fifty here. Sehwag’s fast paced scoring is very much required for the game. But there was no need to go for big hits immediately after hitting three sixes consecutively. Same with Pathan – three consecutive sixes and then gone trying to hit another one. Raina hit 5 sixes, but spaced them. A little restrain from Sehwag and Yusuf could have added another 40 runs in this small ground. A score of 200+ could have told a different story.

The winning team batsmen got only 88 runs in boundaries (8 sixes and 10 fours). They ran between the wickets to fetch the runs. While our batsmen stayed at one place and strummed the guitar they ran around the stage and rocked the crowd.

They call him Big Freddie, Yorkshire’s cricketing pride, one among the few quality all-rounders the world of cricket has to offer and one among England’s only two match-winners — that is Andrew Flintoff for you and he is perhaps, the most precious English cricketing commodity along with Kevin Pietersen. What they forget to mention usually is that he is also among the game’s most injury-prone internationals although he is very effective indeed. The ECB and Flintoff’s personal preferences in him making a comeback to the side after his most recent injury are going to run into a tussle for sure.

There is no denying the fact that players shouldn’t be stopped from participating in non-international matches if there is good money to be made and Freddie is being offered in excess of a million dollars. However, how do you support this theory when the player is simply unable to keep himself fit even for one season and is so precious to the team’s interests? England and Wales Cricket Board’s David Collier can’t be blamed when he says that they don’t want Flintoff from playing in the crazy format of the T20 between a busy season that will see England play a lot of test matches. Even former England captain and a big supporter of Freddie— Nasser Hussain has openly criticised the ECB for not being more strict and in his opinion, Flintoff should have been simply told that his body just wasn’t good enough to take up so much pressure and hence, he needed to preserve himself for international duties.

This may sound unfair, but then think again, if a player is habitually injured nearly every alternate season and is integral to the team winning (in England’s case, probably for winning anything at all) something credible, shouldn’t he at least listen to the cricketing body of his country? Would we tolerate if Dhoni would repeatedly get injured only to show up match-fit for the Chennai franchise of the IPL and keep on missing international matches?

History is totally against India. Statistics say that we haven’t won a single series in the last 41 years in New Zealand. In the last series led by Ganguly we lost 0-2 in tests and 2-5 in ODIs. The irony is that we never made more than 200 in any innings of the test matches in that series. The wickets will be seamer friendly. Our bowlers could do well, partly because they are good and partly because NZ doesn’t boast of many top class batsmen like we have. Ishant and Zaheer should hunt well. But our batsmen hold the key. If they put up decent scores and stand up to their reputation we have a fair chance to win. If Sachin, Dravid, and Laxman do well in tests and Sehwag, Gambhir, Yuvraj, and Dhoni can justify the “rockstar” label we will have a huge concert.

There are other things that could affect the outcome the series. India going straight into a match without any practice or warm up match will work in NZ’s favor. And they want to cash on this. NZ wants India to lose the very first match to get an edge. India will have to cope with the conditions as quickly as possible. The practice sessions at the nets are the only time they get to adapt.

New Zealand will be keen to not let a chance slip by as they did in Australia during the recent Hadlee-Chappell series. Vettori will be extra cautious to let any chance go by this time. And probably he will want to come strong right from the word go utilizing every advantage to his favor, including valuable tips from John Wright who knows many players and their chinks. And the New Zealnd side has a good mix of talent. Talents like Grant Elliot with an average of 52+ in the last ODI series against Australia could test our bowlers. But the most interesting contest will be that between our batsmen and their bowlers. That will largely decide the fate of the series.

Victory can do funny things so also can defeat. It can decide resignation timings. For instance, it hastened Mahela Jayawardane’s decision to resign suddenly. He was contemplating resignation and even retirement but was not sure of the timing. The current loss to India served one positive purpose at least. Defeat also creates confusion. Dilshan the stand-in captain for the T20I was of the view that they lost the match because of the absence of the five key players: Mahela Jayawardene, Kumar Sangakkara, Muttiah Muralitharan, Ajantha Mendis and Farveez Maharoof. But the selectors had rested them for each one of them looked like someone who has lost his keys.

Defeat made the Sri Lankan players look like a high school outfit pitted against a strong college team. Ajantha Mendis was sorted out before the series began. Our batsmen read him like you read the advertisement on the huge billboards. When the Pathans burnt it up they could only hold their hands up in abject surrender.

The Lankan defeat affected the home crowd as well. They showed their talents by throwing objects into the field. The selectors on their part threw a fit at the sloppy fielding. Finding the scapegoats is a common thing after defeat. Arjuna Ranatunga found a few among the people running cricket in Sri Lanka. Interestingly Ranatunga was sacked as the Chairman of the selection committee in December. The Lankan defeat provided him the opportunity to hit verbal boundaries against the officials.

Winning was good for Indian players and viewers. The clueless Sri Lankan players made it fun.

The player that has taken the highest number of wickets in the world, Muttiah Muralitharan conceded after his team was beaten fair and square by India that they lost to the best ODI team.

It’s hard to remember when were we so happy about team India. Since the big win in the T20 World Cup we are gaining the status of an “indomitable” team. Every time we go into a match the expectation is positive. And most of the times we are not disappointed. It doesn’t take a cricket pundit to see that the current Indian team is the best we have ever had. Only one team gets closest to the current lot of winners – Kapil’s Devils in the 1983. There never was a dearth of talent. But often the mix was not proper. Good batsmen didn’t have support from bowlers. A lot depended on the spinners. And the leader was found lacking the winning attitude in testing situations. We have won matches but not in this manner - dominating and annihilating the opposition totally.

The team always had good players. But now we have excellent performers. A good player plays well but fails at crunch situation. How often haven’t we seen the top players not measuring up to it in the past? A good performer plays to win. Got the point? The current lot of players performs when it is required. Tendulkar, Dhoni, Yuraj, Sehwag, Gambhir, Raina, Zaheer, Ishant and so on - if we look at the performances these players, they have the averages that are not in any way superior than the players of past (barring Tendulkar and Dhoni). So what is it that they have extra? The moxie. They are oozing self confidence. They are hungry for victory. They go out to win. If one fails the other comes up with a match winner. Whatever the reason for the inspired performances, the fans across the globe have enough reasons to celebrate. Hope the sizzling performances continue. The number one spot beckons, but there is no demand or rush.

Nearly every newspaper in India is reporting on the same issues regarding India’s tour of New Zealand. One, their need to acclimatise to the cold and windy conditions and second, that they are overwhelming favourites to put it past the Kiwis. As far as the one-dayers are concerned, I too agree to a large extent that the Kiwis are a bit short-changed for talent when it comes to playing on high-scoring pitches — and that is exactly what would be offer for the five ODIs. However, it could be different story for the test matches. For starters, the Kiwis bowl very well in home conditions and I am not too sure that the Indians can actually blank them out on the home turf. Agreed, it is more than likely that India will win both the one-day and the test series, but saying that it is going to be easy is bordering on absolute stupidity.

The Indians are known to be slow starters and they don’t tour this part of the world very often. Most of them have little or no county experience, at least in the recent months leading up to this tour. Again, most of their batsmen are very attacking and huge swingers of the bat. This is something that could go against them when it comes to playing the new ball. I am not trying to say that the likes of Tendulkar and Dravid are going to fail against the much lesser experienced and honestly, outclassed Kiwi bowlers, but overwhelming favourites? I really don’t think so. This is going to be real close content. I am guessing something like 3-2 for ODIs and 2-1 in the test matches in favour of the Indian team. Whitewashes? Forget it. As far as the T20 match stands, these one-off entertainment-only sort of matches don’t mean anything really. Can your really say that India would lay claim to be the best T20 team by winning a single match in Sri Lanka and one in New Zealand? At least, make it a three-match series guys.

The second test match between the West Indies and England started off under one of the most embarrassing circumstances for the WICB. How else can you describe a test match being put-off because of an unfit and under-prepared outfield? One had to see the images that were circulated on the net and shown on TV, I am not talking about the pitch’s repair that was being carried out but the people tending to the outfield. At some places the feet would almost sink in by two inches! Then the test match was shifted to another nearby venue — again, something we don’t see very often. England were trying to compensate for being humiliated by a very young West Indies team in their loss during the first test match — again, we don’t often hear about the West Indies being on the winning sides against good test sides.

When the match eventually got underway, Strauss — the England captain finally found form and the ECB must have had a sigh of relief. Their huge total in the first innings ensured that the Caribbeans could never win the match and it was going to be either a defeat for them or a draw. It was only Sarwan who came to the party in both the innings for them and yes, Chanderpaul was yet again, pretty impressive. The match had just started to go in a customary manner when the Stanford scam news hit the channels. It was reported that some of the national cricketers of the island nations of Caribbean too could be questioned.

As the last day approached, the West Indies were trying to salvage a draw and did that end in an anticipated manner? Obviously, not and the match was dragged to the last over and the last batting pair of the Indies somehow managed to scrape through without being dismissed by batting out more than ten overs! It just seems like this test match was destined to have something extraordinary or controversial going for it throughout the five days. Vivian Richards after whom the original venue for the second test match was named has expressed his utter disgust at the state-of-affairs in the national stadiums here.

At the moment the Indian Cricket teams (Tests, ODIs, T20) have been performing consistently, both at home and away. Will they take that momentum and improve on their past “mediocre” at-best performance while playing in New Zealand?

While listening to a couple Cricket talk-shows I have heard a few different opinions. Some people think that India will “clean-up”, both the Tests and ODIs. Some think that it is the Final-Frontier for the Indian team and then there are others who are a bit more skeptical.

I belong to the “more-skeptical” category. Any side is more dangerous when playing at home, but the conditions in NZ are specially dangerous. The wickets there could be considered as opposite of that in India and the not-so-glamorous NZ bowling attack can prove more than handful. Of course this time around the Indian pace bowling attack is pretty potent and it could become the battle of batting experience and there India does have a significant upper hand (at least on paper).

So if we look at the ICC rankings, then in the ODIs, it is a battle between the #3 (India) & #4 (NZ) and in the Tests, it is a battle between #3 (India) and #8.

Let’s see which team plays according to these rankings….