Excellent article. You have hit the nail on the head. When we performed so badly on doctored indian pitches & allowed Austalia to amass over 300, anyone with common sense can gauge what would follow down under.
We need to stop being emotional & react practically to situations like Mr. Aravind. We have the longest tail in International crack. We find even our well established batsmen moving away from the stumps while facing genuine pace & short pitched stuff....than what else could we expect from the tail enders.
We have spinners, who frankly dont deserve to be in the team...& the one who deseres to be in...is actually out... people like Harbhajan & Kumble used to thrive on doctored indian pitches which were prepared to spin like a top, but now thwy are unable to perform even on such pitches...& are in the team by virtue of their past glory.
As far as batting is concerned, we have only 3 batsmen...Sachin, Dravid & may be Laxman who could probably bat on pitches across te glo
That India doesn't stand much of a chance in the upcoming series against Australia is an understatement. What you have said is true, atleast in my opinion, so I will not vent my spleen on the same stuff. However, the question that begs to be asked is Is this the best team we can muster up? The answer, sadly, has to be yes, if the challenger trophy was anything to go by. The guys in the team know it and couldn't care less about improving their performance. They are under absolutely no pressure for their place in the side because there are no suitable replacements. How many of those playing in the ongoing Ranji matches are actually knocking on the doors on Indian cricket? As the game is already in considerable decline in England and the West Indies and in general most other parts, with the exception of Australia, where it is played, the lack of quality in the Indian domestic circuit may cost the game dearly, what with India being the financial super power of the cricketing world. It is time the Board took notice. After all money is the one thing it understands.
I wonder who called Lavakere a novice in cricket writing!!! I have been reading and hearing him for over a quarter century. We Indians tend to glorify the foreign correspondents / commentators like John Arlott, Jack Fingleton etc. (who by the way were fabulous, no disrespect to them) but no one respects a Chakrapani, a Lavakere, a Setalvad or a Raju Bharatan.... pity.
The modern day Indian cricket 'lover' has the attention span of a 3 year old kid and tremendous arrogance to back up this 'noble' trait..
Coming to the Indian team, well, its going to be one hell of a tour for them, going by the taste of Hodge leather chasing they have already got in the opener. Let us hope they settle down to the line / length required, fast. Wishing them all the best.
I think Mr Lavakre and the rediff team has some axe to grind with Ganguly, or should I say the Indian Cricket team (barring Tendulkar of course - he can appear in as many comms as he wants). If this is the case why don't you guys stop writing about cricket? Thanks for the footnote Mr Editor, Mr Lavakre could only have been an umpire and I can imagine his umpiring must be at par with his feelings about Indian cricket. He wasn't around to write an article when we won against New Zealand. Left to himself, he would love to see the team losing every time so that he could write such moronic articles, his bread and butter. And as for rediff, well it is high time we all started boycotting their articles on cricket because they are biased and lopsided. As always, I wish well again to our cricket time. They will bounce back sooner or later I am sure and I would suggest Mr Lavakre to save the morsels he gets from rediff so that he could live through that.
The analysis of the tail is quite true. The opposition must be getting ready mentally after India loses 5th wicket. The performance of the tail is predictable as follows:
Srinath (when he played) : Skying a ball and running to the other end for a non existent single, shouting chal-chal-chal. Result RUN OUT.
Kumble : Starting slowly for a single to give strike to a more skilled batsman, diving in the end with the bat out of the ground. RUN OUT.
Harbhajan : Trying to hit a six over long on/mid on, getting a leading edge. CAUGHT AT MID OFF/BOWLER.
Agarkar: Yorked, BOWLED.
The remedy I think is to have these blokes bat in the nets with an additional 5 KG weight at the bottom of their bats. They should be taught to block the ball rather than score runs. How often have we failed to even consume the full 50 overs in a one day?
Each and every point you've raised in this article as well as the one prior to this ("It's the basics, stupid!") is very valid. I thought that earlier article was a great analysis of whats wrong with the Indian cricket team at the moment and I said so on my website too.
Right now, the disaster is truly waiting to happen down under unless by some weird quirk of fate, ability or Australian dollars, we manage to pull off a win or two against the rampaging Aussies.
I found the editor's note funny..When people like Arvind writes such stupid articles, rediff's sports editor is forced to justify by explaining his credentials..But Mr Editor, Umpiring is a different ball game compared to being a player facing deliveries at 150Mph from folks like Brett Lee, Akhtar and co ...If folks are retired,let them watch cricket on their tv sets comfortably and not bother about writing these kind of articles to discourage the cricketers who have gone to Australia on a challenging tour ! Why cant you encourage them to do their best regardless of the result? If they dont give 100 % , I can understand but in the twin series,our cricketers did try their best against the best cricket team ...This piece of article is just disgusting !
