Team India finally met with an accident.

After escaping two very near accidents, Team India finally met with an accident at Motera. Luck is one such thing which don't remain with you forever and that's what happen with Virender Sehwag and his team. Team India managed to win first two ODIs where luck played important part but finally luck went to the West Indies camp leaving India in all sorts of trouble. There is no surprise because this loss, expected by fans after the performances in first two ODIs. But one man who survive through these accidents is Rohit Sharma, who stood tall in all three games and helped Indian team in winning two games  and almost the 3rd one, had he got little support from one of the top-order batsman. As they say cricket is a team game and each and every player have to contribute,  if team wants to win. Rohit Sharma looked too classy in his three outings and I feel he deserves the place in test eleven ahead of Virat Kohli. Rohit Sharma is far more talented than any other youngster and this reflects in the way he approached this series.

Indian team must blame themselves for this loss because players like Sehwag and Gambhir missed the practice session ahead of this all important ODI and that lack of practice reflected in their performances where captain and his best friend scored duck. Winning combination also tampered with and Abhimanyu Mithun included at the last moment because Chief Selector K.Srikkanth wanted Abhimanyu Mithun to play this ODI, so tampering with winning combination is also one of the factor. 

Now West indies have tasted the blood and they will come hard in next two ODIs, so Team India have to play out of their skins to win this ODI  series but all depends on how well our top-order performs. I believe Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir are ideal as an opening pair and with Australia tour near, they have to start opening together to build the rapport and momentum between them ahead of all important tour. Parthiv has done nothing substantial with the bat so far in the series, so he should be batting in lower order. 

Ideal No.3 is Virat Kohli and I think Rahane deserves to be in the team in place of out-of-form Suresh Raina who looked completely off-colour in his international stints in last few months. Ravi Rampaul is one man who haunted India badly in last 2 ODIS and Indian team have to find  out the ways to tackle this Rampaul factor. Sunil Narine who made his debut  for West indies looked quite impressive. He will definitely trouble Indian batsmen in coming matches, so Indian batsmen have to adopt simple policy of attacking this mystery bowler, if Indian batsmen play him defensively then he will definitely do lot of damage in coming matches.

Now two ODIs remained and selectors have included Irfan Pathan in the team who is in sublime form this Ranji season. Pathan has picked up 21 wickets at an average of 14 in 4 games, he played so far which includes 3 consecutive 5 wicket hauls. But I must say he is unfortunate to become the victim of selection bias as after performing so well in domestic cricket he is not selected for Australia tour. instead Abhimanyu Mithun got the nod ahead of him because Mithun hails from south zone and Chief Selector is also from south zone. So its a clear bias because Mithun has done nothing for Karnataka team this season. But since he hails from south and that went in his favour.

Team India have to work hard in remaining 2 ODIs if they want to win the series. If India lose this series and top-order batsmen continue to fail then team will go to Australia without any confidence which will affect their performance in Australia as well where they failed to win single test series so far.

Run-rate dipped in absence of mighty Sehwag….

 

He made his debut for India as a middle-order batsmen and scored century against South Africa at Bloemfontein in his debut game. Looking at his batting style Sourav Ganguly who was captain of Indian team during that period asked Sehwag to open the innings and after that move history of Indian cricket changed many times  and new chapters added to the history of Indian cricket.

Currently Sehwag is the most ballistic opener in world cricket, in all forms of the game. His sheer presence in the middle, creates nightmarish situation for the bowlers around the world. Nobody expected this success of Sehwag considering his unique hand-eye co-ordination technique in which footwork is minimum. But lack of footwork did not  affected Sehwag’s progress in international cricket, especially in test cricket where technique is considered above everything.

Indian team won many test matches in last decade only because of Sehwag’s quick start at the top and it is Sehwag’s brilliance which helped Indian team in becoming the king of World Cricket. Sehwag is a completely unique batsmen in world cricket not because of his style of playing but also because of his views and thinking about his own batting. There is no complication theory in his batting as ‘ball is there to hit he will hit it’ and in doing so sometimes he dispatches good balls out of the ground as well. He is having clear mind and simplistic approach which makes him stand out above all the cricketers.

Why did I wrote so much about Sehwag. Answer is simple Indian team is missing him badly  So far in 3 innings of two test matches,  Indian opening pair of Vijay and Mukund struggled badly and their pair didn’t survive for even 5 overs. So in the absence of Sehwag Indian team is missing some zing at the top but good starts are not only the factor, Indian team’s run-rate also dipped badly in the absence of Sehwag. Indian team with Sehwag at top, scored at an average rate of 3.70 runs in last decade in the test matches they played and in first session of the test match, team India scored at an average rate of 4.60 runs in last decade.

But in West indies, now , run-rate of Indian team shattered badly as their average run-rate in two test match is paltry 2.20 runs and in first session it is worst as it dipped to 1.80 runs which clearly shows what impact Sehwag has on the game when he bats. Looking at other aspect of this, Sehwag, with his blitzkrieg batting dented the psyche of the opposition bowlers which helped middle-order batsmen to play comfortably without any pressure. Hence Sehwag factor made batting  easy for the great Indian middle-order. Credit for much of the Indian middle-order success in last decade goes to Sehwag and now we can see easily how Team India’s batting and run-rate is struggling without Sehwag and that too against weak bowling line-up of West Indian team.

So Sehwag is the man for all season for Team India and lets hope he returns to cricket with England series next month and increase the run-rate once again. His batting is like rock music which force bowlers to dance on its tunes

.

Sri Lanka squandered advantage. India eager to start campaign with a win.

 

Sri Lanka controlled the game in first session of 2nd test match at Lords after winning the toss but failed to capitalise on a good start provided by their bowlers. Lankan bowlers proved Dilshan’s decision correct when they picked up 3 quick wickets upfront which included the wicket of in-form batsmen Jonathan Trott and Captain Strauss. But Cook had other ideas and he got perfect support from Ian Bell as duo helped England in reaching safe total. Matt Prior and Eoin Morgan further strengthen the position of England. Prior is still not-out and looking good to get another hundred. Bell, Cook and Morgan scored brilliant half-centuries. It was unfortunate that Cook got out on 96 and failed to get one more hundred but he certainly saved England from embarrassment.

Sri Lanka did everything right in first session but lost their way in second session  and they allowed England to claw back from the hopeless situation. Lankan bowlers however picked up six wickets at the end of first day but advantage is with England now as they are in comfortable position to dictate terms. Lankans really missed Malinga and Muralitharan and it was written all over on their day’s performance. Score was 22 when 3rd wicket fell but Lankans allowed England to get away with huge score at the end of first day. Tough times ahead for Lankans as series loss looming large over their head.

---

India eager to start campaign with a win.

Indian will start their Caribbean safari today with one off T20 games. On paper both teams are equal but in betting market India is favourite to win today’s contest.

Pitches in Caribbean are much like sub-continent nowadays and this will certainly help the Harbhajan & Co.  Looking at Indian team it has some exciting talent and this talent have to perform on this tour because this tour will decide future of these young cricketers. it’s a golden chance and needs to be grabbed with both hands.

India will open with Pathiv Patel and Shikhar Dhawan,that is sure. In middle–order India have players like Kohli and Raina who are in tremendous form and they will be supported by Manoj Tiwary, Yusuf Pathan and Badrinath. All these batsmen had a great IPL and will be looking to transfer their good form in International cricket. Who ever perform well on this tour will certainly get the ticket for England which will be following Caribbean tour. It will also test the captaincy skills of Suresh Raina who will be leading this Indian team 2nd time in his career. Duncan Fletcher have big challenge ahead of him.

Looking at bowling, India have only Ishant Sharma who is genuinely quick. Likes of Munaf Patel, Vinay Kumar and Praveen Kumar are  swing bowlers. They will not get enough assistance from the slow low pitches of West Indies. According to me spinners will going to play big role on this tour as we all saw how Pakistani spinner Saeed Ajmal destoryed the West Indian batting recently.

Looking at West Indian side, they are bit below par in the absence of Chris Gayle, Kieron Pollard and Dwayne Bravo. But they are in re-building phase and they will try out few youngsters against India. Among all the players Darren Bravo and Andre Russell looks like good talent. Apart from these two players West Indies have players like Lendl Simmons, Ravi Rampaul, Devendra Bishoo, Marlon Samuels who can turn the tides in the favour of home team.

I think it is going to be an even contest considering both teams don’t have the services of their  frontline players.

---

The squads

Suresh Raina (c), Parthiv Patel (wk), Shikhar Dhawan, Rohit Sharma, Manoj Tiwary, Subramaniam Badrinath, Yusuf Pathan, Virat Kohli,  Wriddhiman Saha (wk), Harbhajan Singh, Praveen Kumar, R Ashwin, Munaf Patel, Ishant Sharma, Amit Mishra and R.Vinay Kumar.

---

Darren Sammy (c), Christopher Barnwell, Devendra Bishoo, Darren Bravo, Andre Fletcher (wk), Danza Hyatt, Ashley Nurse, Ravi Rampaul, Andre Russell, Marlon Samuels, Krishmar Santokie, Lendl Simmons.

---

Knockout round begins with Pakistan v/s West Indies

Group Stage is over and now ICC Cricket World Cup 2011 is heading towards business end. Now on  teams have to win all the 3 matches they will be playing in order to become the champions of ODIs. Pakistan will face West Indies at Mirpur, Bangladesh in first game of knockout. Pakistan will certainly get lot of support in Mirpur  and they will feel themselves at home while playing in Mirpur which gives them little edge.

Pakistan played superb cricket during the group stage and surprised everybody. Captain of  Pakistan team, Shahid Afridi re-invented himself as a player in the tournament and lead from the front. I think whoever questioned his credentials as captain must have got their answers. Now if Pakistan go on to win the World Cup then it will be icing on the cake and Shahid Afridi will become national hero. Pakistan team just lost one game in group stage and emerged as topper in their group leaving Sri Lanka and Australia behind. Although Pakistan topped the group but unpredictability still prevails and good example of that is the loss against New Zealand. So their victory in the quarter-final cannot be taken for granted.

Pakistan showed good team-work during the group stage and every member of the team contributed towards the good performance of team. Waqar Younis must be a happy man as of date but there are lot problems also which Waqar Younis and Shahid Afridi have to address and rectify them. Pakistan's top-order failed in the group stage badly and there was lot of chopping and changing happened so they have to go in with correct batting line-up.  They have to promote Kamran Akmal as opener along with Asad Shafiq because Akmal was their opener in many matches and use Mahammed Hafeez at No.3. They have to promote Umar Akmal as well to No.4 because he is too good player and simply wasted at No.6. This move will allow experienced campaigners like Younis Khan and Misbah Ul Haq to control the game and make that middle-order strong. Apart from that Afridi and Razzak have to shoulder some responsibility with the bat. Afridi is very talented with the bat but he is not taking his batting seriously and thats where Pakistan face problems. Against Australia in a league match Pakistan was near to the victory and sensible cricket was required there but Afridi came in and played reckless shot which was not required according to the match situation. Although Pakistan won that game but that shot could  have easily gone against the Pakistan aslo. So Afridi have to be sensible and bat according to the situation if he wants to win the elite trophy.

Pakistan bowling is good and doing well in the tournament. Afridi is the leading wicket-taker in the tournament and he is spearhead of Pakistan bowling. Umar Gul and Razzak are supporting Afridi very well and if they include Shoaib Akhtar in tomorrow's match then they will prove more dangerous to their opposition. They have big problems with Kamran Akmal's wicket-keeping as poor guy kept dropping catches throughout the tournament. Pakistan's lost to New Zealand only because of the dropped catches. However Kamran Akmal showed the signs of improvement in the match against Australia where the took few catches and this will give him some confidence. 

West Indies entered into the knockout stage only because Bangladesh had poor run-rate as both Bangladesh and West Indies shared the same points at the end of group stage. During group stage West Indies failed to beat top teams like South Africa, England and India so their is big question-mark on their capabilities to beat the top teams. They must be happy that they are playing Pakistan in Quarter-Finals which has unpredictability factor attached so  West Indies also have equal chance of winning the match only on the basis of Pakistan's unpredictability. West Indies although don't have many big names but they certainly possess two or three explosive batsmen in their ranks who can change the course of  game. Chris Gayle missed out against India due to injury so it will will be interesting to see whether he will play or not but West Indies must be keen to  play 80% fit Chris Gayle and that will give big boost to their batting line-up.  They also have to promote Keiron Pollard to No.4 and give him more overs because he is one player who can win games single-handedly. Youngster like Bravo, Edward, Russell have to support their senior pros if West Indies wants to march ahead in the tournament. Inclusion of Shivnarine Chanderpaul will bolster their batting ad they need experience in the middle-order badly.

Bowling of West Indies is quite good and they have found new teeth in Ravi Rampaul who bowled superbly against India and picked up his first 5 wicket haul. Return of Kemar Roach will certainly bolster their bowling and leg-spinner Bishoo has done well in the tournament. Only worry for the West Indies is the form of Sulieman Benn who failed to impress in entire tournament. If West Indies drop Benn from the team in crucial encounter then it will not surprise anybody and they have to drop him to accommodate Kemar Roach.

Mirpur is a venue which supports spinners because of its slow and sluggish pitch and that will give definite advantage to Pakistani spinners and West Indian batsmen looks vulnerable against the spin. So good encounter in the prospect and Pakistan will certainly go in this match with advantage.