I think Faisal Sharif should stop. He seems too stupid to write these days. Go do movie journalism. You can never ..I mean never call Steve to be a selfish person like Tendulkar. Tendulkar plays for personal records. And for once if a man felt like not tampering his reputation as undefeated on home soil, so be it. He deserves it. And the made 350+ in a day. SO what are you blabbering about? Are you just trying to be in limelight by creating a non existent controversy ? Go wash your face.
RE:BS
by Arpan on Jan 11, 2004 03:30 AM
I whole-heartedly support your comments! Editors like Faisal just starve for cheap publicity & they indeed have a big appetite for such stingy hype & can go any length to bask in 'shameful' glory. These editors are paid just to demean others. One petty chance they get & they make a mountain of a mole.
Also your comparison between Steve Waugh & Sachin Tendulkar is highly justified.
As a captain he elevated his team in unparalled heights. As a batsman,everyone knows about his batting performance. Every batsman should learn from Steve waugh to get the experience. He is the right batsman at right time. No one forgotten his career in the forthcoming generation.
IF Steve was ahead of team then What was Ganguly doing on 4th morning of this test-match with those field settings for katich and gillespie.I thought Katich was batting on 200+. If anybody saw that and knows abt cricket,he will surely understand why india spoiled their own chances of winning test-series abroad. There are not many team who after scoring 700+ runs go for such field settings and that too for a batsman who has hardly played 7-8 test matches. Atleast Waugh brought his team in the comfort zone.Gilchrist was not promoted because he didn't click when he was promoted in MCG test and currently he is in a lean trot. Instead of focussing on Indian's lack of ability to clinch the issue,blame is laid on waugh.
196-4 was not a very safe position. Australia's first aim was not to loose the test. imagine one more wicket at that stage, 200-5...and 38 overs left. match was clearly in India's favour at that stage. and Gilchrist was woefully out of form in this series, while Katich was high on confidence after great batting against kumble and company in the first innings, so Steve's this innings was more of a match saving one for Aus, and final assault came, when Aus was out of danger and Steve tried to reach to a historic century.
Faisal in this article and the electronic media in general have displayed a typical meaningless intellectuality of so called pseudo-analysts who probably dont relate to anything by their innocent heart. Forget your analysis dammit, and salute the true icon of modern cricket. No matter how one agrees or disagrees with that mental disintegration theory of steve, every cricket lover sees Steve as a hero. As every great man will have some question marks, so will steve. Thankfully at least indian players have paid rich tribute to the legend that is steve. Dravid, Sachin, Laxman, Saurav and host of others have hailed him as a hero and their inspiraion. So much so that laxman dedicated his masterly hundred to steve. The elite commentry band of Star sports couldnt do any better than some mockingly praising comments on steve throughout the series, always taking a dig at the farewell of a great. But he deserved it. Steve you are a hero to all of us even if the so called elite panel of commentators and indian analysts dont think so.
In the Fifth Day's play ,while Irfan Pathan was bowling well and after getting the price wicket of ponting,why did ganguly took him off the attack.Even agarkar was given only 10 overs.irfan pathan was getting good reverse swing also.Ganguly did not allow them to bowl and made kartik,sewag and sachin to bowl.was this done to give a fitting farewell to waugh.
I suppose, "All or nothing" Australian side is more visible when it is not a test rubber at home which is at stake. And how gettable really was 247 in 38 overs (6.5) with 6 wickets in hand in a test match - Gilchrist not in such a great form? It is kinda silly to heap blames on Aussies for being defensive, when we a) Dont enforce the follow-on when we cud have done it b) Give them too steep a target. Agreed it was far more important for us not to lose. Even for them, it is still better to level the series than to lose it in front of a home crowd at the farewell test of their Captain.
I wonder what the author is trying to convey, when rest of the world feels that Steve was lucky enough to escape with a tie. The result most likely seemed to be different from what the author seems to wish, had it not been for the poor umpiring.
Whatsoever, the author always seems to bark at the wrong tree.
