Cricket and Hockey: A Mixed Sunday For India!

India fielded a full-strength team today against Australia in its do or die match in Sydney. But, when you concentrate on rotation-experimentation instead of trying to win matches, when your ego-play gets prominence over cricket and when you mess up things unnecessarily even God does not help you when you finally wake up to reality. Team India exemplified that fully today in the tenth match of the CB Series one-day cricket played in Australia.

They wanted Zaheer Khan desperately today, but he was declared unfit. When he was fit you did not consider taking him! Even then, the Indian bowlers did a decent job getting Aus restricted to 252/9 in allotted fifty overs—a total that was very gettable. This time captain handed over the ball too to the vice captain Sehwag who obliged him with three wickets bowling the last over of the Aussie innings too. For the first time the Indian captain placed his full faith in the big three of top order. But it came too late.

Sehwag failed again with the bat getting out to the Demolition Man Hilfenhaus. Tendulkars’s run-out was the most tragic incident of the match. After that failure after failure including both seniors and youngsters with bowler Ashwin getting the highest individual score of 26! God thought you just did not deserve to go any further in the tournament.

And yes! India is out of the CB Series except for an improbable technicality of winning their last match against Sri Lanka with a bonus point and hoping that Aus beat SL in the last league match of the tournament.

Team India must learn its bitter lessons from this devastating Australian tour. It’s now or never for them if they really mean to improve their performance overseas.

Meantime great news from Indian hockey—the national sports of India! Indian Hockey Team qualified for playing in the London Olympics thumping France 8-1 in the Olympic Qualifier final today evening in New Delhi. Yes, the past king of hockey now has to qualify now-a-days for the Olympics by playing a tournament involving six teams! They won all their matches in the tournament and now are set to figure in London Olympic 2012 Hockey. Yesterday, the dream of playing in the London Olympics was cruelly broken for Indian Women’s Hockey Team when they lost against South Africa.

Hurray for the National Sport of India! And, shame for the cricket billionaires who care the least for their country India!

Tri-Series Cricket: Sri Lanka Beat Australia Again! Do or Die For India!

After winning the toss and electing to bat first Australia did post a challenging total of 280 runs for 6 wickets in allotted fifty overs at the ninth match of the Commonwealth Bank Cricket Tri-series yesterday played at Hobart in Australia.  Dashing new-comer Forrest scored a brilliant century with masterly support from skipper Clarke who scored 72.

But the total did not prove to be enough with the Sri Lankans going great guns while chasing. Skipper Jaywardene led from the front making a quick-fire 85 opening the innings. Chandimal proved his consistency by making a superlative 80 that almost saw Sri Lanka through. Sri Lanka achieved 200 runs as early as in the 37^th over and seemed to be coasting to an easy and emphatic victory. But after his dismissal in the 45^th over Australia made a temporary comeback with wickets falling and the asking rate rising. Spirited Sri Lankans overcame that and achieved an exciting victory by 7 wickets with just 4 balls to spare.

Now, Sri Lanka is almost through to the finals with 15 points followed by Australia with 14 and India in the bottom with 10 points. Every team has two matches each at this stage and rotating-experimenting-ego clashing-divided Team India must win their remaining two matches to entertain the thought of figuring in the finals. If they lose tomorrow’s match against Australia both Sri Lanka and Aus will be in finals. If they win tomorrow but lose the second match against Sri Lanka, Aus will have to figure it out in their last match helped by a very healthy net run-rate. India might still harbor some hope of reaching the finals losing one, but winning the other with a bonus point plus drastic improvement in net run-rate. In the unlikely case of India winning both their matches they will be straight into the finals and the last match of the tournament between SL and Aus will be the huge virtual semi-final for the other finalist.

What are India’s options? Hardly encouraging at the moment. They may consider stopping rotation or experimentation, but this could come as too late now. Top order batsmen are yet to settle down in some sort of a form or consistency and the youngsters are not at all predictable. The young pace bowlers are bound to get affected by their recent experiences with Zaheer Khan hopefully making a comeback. Irfan Pathan, if persisted with, will be another crucial factor. They must in any case regroup well and fast and give an all-round robust performance as a national team playing for their country’s pride. Unfortunately, this looks a doubtful proposition at the current state of affairs with the team.

The insensitive Indian cricket Board denied the very existence of any rift or any problems within Team India. You must understand! The Board has been terribly busy preparing and  raising money for the forthcoming IPL-Season Five and for making it a grand success. For their gratification all star players to figure in IPL-5  now playing  the Tri-Series had had good practice except perhaps for Manoj Tiwary. If club cricket brings in more bucks for the Board why bother about national team’s performance and so-called national pride! Finally it’s money that counts!

For the time being it’s over to Sidney for Sunday’s match between Australia and India.

The Celebrity Punch!

Hindi movie (read Bollywood) superstar hero Saif Ali Khan punched a South African businessman of Indian origin at a restaurant of five-star hotel in uptown Mumbai on the night of February 21, 2012. The superstar was in the company of his Bollywood-heroine wife Kareena Kapoor and few other friends including more celebrity actors. Saif was arrested and released on bail the next day evening.

The day following the midnight brawl all Indian news channels started devouring the huge story carrying bytes of the victims—South African businessman Iqbal Sharma and his dad-in-law. Saif Ali Khan could not be traced the whole day and the Mumbai police visited his residence leaving summons to come to police station immediately. The superstar was to be arrested anytime, cried on the news channels.

Iqbal Sharma revealed that he went to the restaurant along with his dad-in-law for dinner and they were deeply distracted by the noise emanating from the adjacent table occupied by the superstar and his friends. They complained repeatedly to no avail and finally decided to leave the hotel. At that time Saif chased them and punched Iqbal on his nose that started bleeding. His dad-in-law was also punched and pushed down the stairs by Saif’s friends. Getting admitted in a local hospital Iqbal further alleged that all in Saif’s group behaved like rowdy elements.

By evening of the eventful day Saif Ali Khan, eldest son of Indian cricket legend Tiger Pataudi who died only five months back, surrendered to police. He was arrested immediately and released on bail immediately too. Section 325 of the Indian Penal Code under which the actor was framed allows bail though imprisonment under the same section could go up to 7 years if found guilty in due course of trial.

Saif Ali Khan lodged a counter-charge alleging that Iqbal punched him first after a heated argument during which ladies in his groups were also insulted and humiliated. He only acted in self-defense; the movie hero fumed adding that the hotel close circuit cameras would definitely vindicate his stand later. Unfortunately latest reports today suggest that there is no CCTV footage as there were no cameras in that area where the fighting took place! 

                                                                 
                                                                    Read more...