I think its an very important observation made. However, firstly, congrats to Saurav n boyz for the wonderful start in the ICC champ. It may be against Kenya but a win is a win, a prize is a prize, no matter how small it is, it should be always given the due respect, specially in a sport.
Having said that, I believe Laxman is a serious corner of thought. Its time now to think practically rather than going by the name. Lets face it, Laxman is not a very good player but one day cricket needs more. He is now somewhere where Rahul Dravid was few years back. Luckily Rahul knew a bit about wicket-keeping and fortunately Ganguly knew that Rahul knows keeping. So, Rahul steered the ship and cemented his place. Laxman however, does not show such potent or improvisation and then you need to think that when Tendulkar comes back, would you still play Laxman at no.3 and let Ganguly become a mere slogger. To my mind thats not good thinking.
To Ganguly's wonderful innings, well I would have liked him to get a century and stay there till the end. Let Mr. Hayden keep barking. Perhaps I would request him to offer free coaching to subcontinent teams once he retires if he is that much keen on subcontinent's cricket.
Prem I agree with the point you are trying to make. But I believe the major problem lies between Ganguly and Laxman. Ganguly is best suited only to two positions: opening, and like laxman - one down. And Laxman is best suited at only one position - one down. And then we have two more like that - Sachin Tendulkar - opening and Veeru - Opening. So how to make adjustment between these top 4? My one suggestion would be opening with Sachin - Ganguly - tested and proven pair and let laxman play at 3. I think that would give us solid start..and have Sehwag play at number 6 - I dont think he is right candidate for number 4 or 5 but for that Yuvraj has to drop down to number seven because Kaif, Dravid will play number 4 and 5. And if we go with 6 batsman then drop Yuvraj or Sehwag but Sehwag to me may be wise option even if he is not batting too well considering his ability to pickup wickets against all opposition. But what if Laxman fails? In that case Sehwag jumps from 6 to 1, Ganguly 1 - remaining stays the same with Laxman on bench and Yuvraj playin in place of him. Now I am realizing what a mess it creates when all bunch of guys r so telented!
It is good to see Ganguly in runs, and if two nineties in two consecutive matches don't silence his critics nothing ever will. He has his ups and downs, but for all his faults, he is as fierce and majestic as a tiger (and perhaps looks as lethargic too at times). I wish Ambati Ryudu was in the team already, and as current form dictates, Dinesh Mongia deserved a fair chance as well.
Similarly it is incredible to see Prem back in form; dropping Prem off this cricket reporting thing is like not picking Tendulkar for Indian cricket team! I hope you will ahve lot more to write about in near future.
VVS Laxman is good for tests but not onedays as the author rightly said. Once upon a time we had a person called Ravi Shastri who the team bore for a lonnnnnng time for is so called battin stabiity (without runs ofcourse) and then was kicked out by public demand. Is history going to repeat itself ???.
I agree with the views. If Laxman has to play, then he has to play at No. 3 or not at all. Personally, I would like to have some youngster (even Gavaskar, for that matter) in the place of Laxman and have Dravid at No. 3. That youngster will be a better fielder, a better runner and maybe a little lesser bat. We can live with that. Also, we need a specialist keeper. The wicket of Vaughan in the last ODI of the Natwest series and the caught behind off an inside edge of Bhajji's bowling in today's match v/s Kenya underlines the importance of a specialist keeper.
prem panicker seems to think that ganguly played a mature, unselfish innings for his team where as ashish magotra seems so think that his innings only reaffirms mathew hayden's comment about subcontinent cricketers being selfish. two conflicting articles on the same day and on the same web site. you see my problem?
since opinions are like back orifices - everyone has one, here's mine. for all the talk of india being an example of unity in diversity - it still remains a very racist country. i am a bengali and though i'm not a big fan of ganguly's batting myself (yo sachin!), the fact remains that he has an excellent one-day record in batting and has handled the pressures of captaincy well even though he's not mike brearly. whenever i meet guys from delhi, punjab or haryana, they assume that i like fish, rabindra sangeet, ray movies and am a big fan of ganguly and as if it is a crime to do so. i'll be glad if i'm proven wrong but i can't help it if i feel that the continuing criticism of ganguly by some people and the comment made by a delhi girl i knew that she doesn't like tagore because he wrote jana gana for queen victoria are both racist in nature.
RE:conflicting reports on ganguly's innings
by arc on Sep 13, 2004 10:32 PM
same case here with me, boss (i'm in delhi). good to see fellow bengalis firing out against this racism. these ppl will never even bother to look at records. with all tributes to sachin, cumulative runs scored by ganguli till the end of asia cup had always been more than sachin in equal no. of matches (i'm not bluffing, consult a statistician if anyone dares). need more proof???
In my opinion Laxman is not reqd. in the shorter version of the game. He is best suited for tests. It would b unwise to make him play ODIs and spoil his test match game... He is a choker. Eats up the run rate...
