Drunk and naked

Imagine your manager came to work drunk and naked, staggering all over the place and his mouth spewing obscene filth. Now imagine he gets promoted to be the CEO of your company. Unlikely? That’s exactly what’s happening to Percy Sonn.

Am I the only one concerned that the man who wanted Cronje back in the fold of cricket and questioned BCCI’s action against Dalmiya is going to become the next ICC president? Here’s what Dan (of the notorious Dan’s World) has to say about all that.

Looking forward

The second Test is done and dusted, and while we dominated them both, we failed to win either (although luck played a huge part in that). Here’s what we need to do moving forward:

• Drop VRV - Even if Sreesanth, Pathan and Patel all fall sick before the next Test. He’s dead-weight as far as I am concerned. I was suprised when he played in the first Test, let alone the second. And his batting makes McGrath seem like a top-order batsman. Personally, I’m not impressed with Sreesanth either and can’t understand what all the hoopla surrounding him is. At best, he seems mediocre. Munaf Patel on the other hand clearly has a lot of potential and will probably be a permanent member of the Indian pace attack for the next decade. The same can’t be said about Sreesanth. And don’t even get me started on Powar. That means we need to get some bowling back-up. Agarkar, Nehra and Balaji are worth another chance.
• Develop Sehwag’s bowling - Sehwag is certainly an under-rated bowler. A lack of control and variation holds him back, although his accuracy is acceptable. Bowling huge, ripping, off-spinners is not enough. Under-spin, top-spin, doosra and varied pace can turn him into a full-time bowler. Imagine that.
• Five bowler strategy - I’m a huge advocate of having five bowlers, especially when we usually have a couple that come cropper. Eventually, Sehwag could be that fifth bowler, but until then, we need to have enough firepower out to go that last mile and finish off the opposition. That’s another reason to get some back up pacemen. Inability to bowl out a half-decent batting line-up on the last day of a Test match doesn’t bode well for us. Plus, we seem to be doing alright in the batting department at the moment as it is.

Marginally outside off

Looking back on today’s play, you get the feeling that it could’ve gone either way. Not because of the players, but because of the umpires. So many appeals, so many close calls, and so many poor decisions. And that is why we need technology. ICC claims that their umpires get about 96% of the decisions right. As Mark Twain once said, there are lies, damned lies and statistics. The only way the umpires are getting 96% of their decisions right is if the ICC is considering all the flat-out ludicrous appeals in their numbers. Anybody who’s seen Kumble bowl knows what I’m talking about. The ball lands a mile outside leg, hits the pads and he starts appealing. Just plain ridiculous — both the appealing and the statistic peddled by the ICC. Let’s look at that from another perspective. Assuming there’s about one appeal every two overs (including the obviously misguided appeals), that makes 45 appeals a day, and 225 appeals in a Test match. Going by ICC’s statistic then, the umpires make about 9 wrong decisions in a Test match. If 5 batsmen in your team are wrongly given out, would you call that a high standard of umpiring?

Anyway, I don’t want to turn this into a war against the Luddites (or the ICC). Apparently, ICC is taking some steps to get more use out of the technology. What concerns me now is that the ICC is now going to have to come out with clearer rules on how to read technology. There were several LBW shouts today which the commentators dismissed as the ball having struck marginally outside off. Well, I beg to differ. If they’re partially outside off, then they are partially on off, right? The middle of the ball might not be on the off stump, but some part of the ball was well within the line of the off stump. And if you think about it, that’s enough to bowl a person out: the middle of the ball doesn’t have to strike the stumps. In any case, there will be a need for clarification on this issue, for “marginally outside off” means different things to different people.

To give credit to the ICC, after my initial scathing critique, they’re ringing in the crucial changes. Apart from experimenting with technology, they moved with surprising swiftness to clarify the whole Lara-Dhoni faux pas of the first Test. There are lots of such gray areas in cricket though, and ICC needs to weed them out rather than waiting for them to create a problem before clarifying on it. And as the game continues to evolve, more of these gray areas will pop up.

Wha..? (Part II)

Doesn’t moisture in the pitch mean that it’s going to assist the pace bowlers? What’s all this talk about moisture smothering sideways movement? I’m not saying the pitch wasn’t better to bat on the first day than it was the second, it certainly was; but how is moisture to blame for that? Did I miss something?

Merlyn

The English team has been making extensive use of Merlyn, the bowling machine, to combat spinners of the ilk of Muralitharan.

© Getty Images

As the saying goes…

One machine can do the work of fifty ordinary men. No machine can do the work of one extraordinary man.
— Edward Hubbard

Wha…?

A pack attack of Sreesanth, Munaf and VRV Singh? VRV Singh!? No Pathan, no Harbhajan!? You’ve gotta be kidding me.

Anybody got a clue?

So, there’s been a lot of confusion among some people that I know about the World Cup 2007 tickets. My understanding was that India could end up being B1 or B2 at the end of the first round (depending on their ranking in the first round). But looking at the Follow-A-Path for India, it looks like India will be given the B2 position if it makes it through to the Super Eight stage, regardless of whether or not they did better than Sri Lanka. That doesn’t make much sense to me. Does any of you know what’s going on?

I thought India was likely to be B1 and bought tickets accordingly. Did I miss something?

No room for Powar (Part II)

Name	O	M	Runs	W	Avg.	Econ.
Powar	29	1	153	4	38.25	5.27
Harbhajan	49	4	192	3	64.00	3.91
Yuvraj	6	0	27	1	27.00	4.50
Sehwag	13	0	61	1	61.00	4.69

Clearly, Powar hasn’t done anything great. His economy rate is the worst and his average is not that great either. We can easily have the part-time spinners fill in for him with little ill-effect, if any.

While he can bat a bit (ave. 6.50 from 3 innings in this series), he hasn’t done anything to show he can contribute big hits at the end. His fielding, on the other hand, is a huge liability. Simply awful. As is his fitness. If Ganguly can be dropped for his poor fielding (it wasn’t the only reason, but an important one nonetheless), then so can Powar. Hell, Kumble would be a much better pick than Powar. He would certainly bowl better, and can bat just as well.

My initial thinking was that Kaif would make way for Tendulkar when he comes back, but now I am certain it has to be Powar.

Here is Part I.

Lessons to be learnt

India’s hot-air balloon, rising dramatically over the last few months, has been popped by none other than the Windies. As we come crashing down to the ground, it’s time to reflect on what went wrong. I think we’ve basically forgotten the lessons that turned our ODI performances around in the first place. It’s time to get back to the basics.

1) Fielding: When Chappell first came on, that was one of the biggest improvements you noticed on the field rightaway. Players were making great stops, return throws were spot on and they were hitting the stumps 4 times out of 5 when they had a shy at the stumps. All of them, not just one or two players. Compare that to the dismal display in this series. Today, from 30 feet away with all stumps visible, Raina tried to knock down the stumps and missed. That’s fine. What was not was that he bounced the ball, and it went right over the stumps. When you bounce the ball, it has to travel more distance, and is slowed down quite a bit when it bounces. A non-professional like me knows that, so I’m surprised that Raina, one of the better fielders in the team, did that. What I am afraid of though is that nobody might have caught it, and they’ll keep on continuing to do that. Another aspect of fielding is fitness. After the initial efforts when Chappell came on board, it seems not much has been done in this area. Players need to be pushed beyond their current fitness levels.

2) Extras: We need to get them under control. Spinners bowling wides is not acceptable. Same thing for no balls. We have to try and minimize them. We did that against other teams earlier in the season. Bowlers need to regain that control.

3) Run-outs: Losing crucial wickets to run outs, especially when the player is just not alert, or being lazy, or trying to avoid being hit by the ball, is inexcusable. Get it right.

4) Tactics: Innovation, like in the real world, can go a long way in the sport. We certainly have the room to play, what with all the new rules. Experimentation shouldn’t end at playing with batting order. When defending a small target, try not taking the last powerplay until the 45th over. This could also be very effective when defending huge totals. In a game that’s obviously being won, send in Agarkar or Harbhajan to practice some biffing. Signalling to the wicket-keeper if you’re about to bowl a slower ball or down leg-side (suggested by Dean Jones) is a great idea. Make the tail-enders take their batting seriously, and have them practice slogging. During the early overs, it’s okay to go over the top. In fact, you want to. That’s the whole bloody point. Forget about trying to thread the needle. Sehwag is especially culpable because he understands this concept, and likes to hit in the air, but he hits it at a slightly above-head height. That’s catchable, and he’s often gotten out that way. Also, if you’re hitting it in the air, put a little extra effort into it. Convert those fours that land within two feet of the rope to sixes. Those runs addup. Sehwag can easily do this if only he gives it a little more loft.

If we can do these things, and pick the best team (that means no Powar), there’s nothing in the world that can stop us.

Did I miss any problems?

Cardinal Sin?

I’ve heard several people, including Rahul Dravid, my hero (yes, he has become the first person in my life to be conferred with that sobriquet), that not batting the full 50 overs in an ODI is “cardinal sin.” I beg to differ. For if you bat the 50 overs and don’t score any runs, that’s much worse. Of course, that’s an extreme example. The point is, being aggressive and getting all out in the 45th over is better than playing 50 overs but scoring fewer runs. In the last game, India couldn’t quite figure out the runs-wickets equation. With 9 overs to go and 4 wickets in hand, you’d have expected some aggression. But the Indians were so preoccupied with saving wickets that they forgot to score runs. In Rao, Harbhajan, Powar and Agarkar you had a specialist batsman and three players capable of a good biff. Yet, they just managed 24 runs from those 9 overs. 41 runs from 15 overs after scoring 211/3 from the first thirty-five is so far below pathetic, we’ll have to invent a new word for it.

What does this mean? India’s trailing to a side that recently struggled to distinguish itself from a third-grade Zimbabwean team. I’ve mentioned several times in the past that India’s real test will come abroad. Now that we’re abroad we’re struggling against a team in the bottom rung? Does this mean we haven’t improved nearly as much as we thought we did? Does it mean we can forget about winning the Test series? About being the best in the world? I am glad to say that the answer is no. Call it optimism or foolhardiness, but I predict two much easier wins for the Indians in the next two games.