India Vs Australia ODI Cricket Series: Rains Lead 2-0 !

If the 7-match One-Day-International cricket series between India and Australia in India is divided into two, then Australia has won the 3-match series 2-1 and in the on-going 4-match series rains lead by 2-0 with the 4^th ODI at Ranchi washed out by rains during India’s chase of Australia’s 295/8 and the fifth ODI at Cuttack today abandoned without a ball being bowled. For Team India it is all the more uphill, because already losing the first ‘series’ now it has to draw level with ‘rains’ to have a chance of beating Australia in the 4-match series and by doing so wining the BCCI-desired 7-match Series. The richest cricket Board of the world, BCCI, does possess a magic wand to get it’s ‘desires’ always sweetly translated into realities. And why not, it still has N Srinivasan as its diehard President despite all the ‘odds’. It has also maneuvered South Africa into sweet submission accepting the alms of a Two-Test and Three-ODI Series to be played in South Africa so that it can have its magnanimous wish of letting Sachin Tendulkar bow out of cricket in all Board-Glory.

After the first three one day internationals, the focus was Indian cricket for its traditionally inadequate bowling attack—more explicitly so in this series. The Indian pacers were in total disorder giving away runs in abandon and hardly able to penetrate. Ishant Sharma gave away 30 runs in a single over in that Mohali match that finally allowed Australia to snatch win from jaws of defeat. However, the magnanimous Board declared along with its chief ally MS Dhoni that one or two match performance cannot be a yardstick to throw out an experienced bowler. But then, in the Ranchi match Ishant and Bhuvaneshwar Kumar were in fact dropped with Mohammed Shami and Jaydev Unadkat as replacements. Of the two only Shami had an inspired spell capturing three wickets as Australia still managed to amass nearly 300 runs batting first. That brings us to one more point of focus for Indian cricket.

From inadequate bowling to indifferent fielding. Team India dropped as many as 7 catches in that Ranchi match much to the embarrassment of the captain at his home ground. If you have been willing to believe the spirited Indian cricket commentators all along then you already must have formed your opinion that the young Indian side has mustered a superb fielding expertise. The moot point that comes to our naive mind is where to put the lights on—bowling, fielding, batting to short-pitch deliveries, batting on green pitches, the cricket Board offers or only on the money-spinning entertainment show. Whatever, there is unanimous opinion that presently focus is on the Rains and Weather. With the fifth one day international at Cuttack abandoned today due to heavy rains over the week the remaining two matches at Nagpur and Bangalore respectively are only going to decide where finally shift the focus to. One more point if you are still with us, there are three days to go before the Nagpur match on 30^th October. Why nobody thought of a reserve day? Even in Ranchi it could have been provided for.  Well, ours not reason why, ours but to have our moneys worth.