K World

As I’ve told already, I hate Oz. Now, after seeing the outcome of second test match, I can tell that I found a reason to hate it even more. Thinking from their perspective, they always had a problem with India. It became visible when they lost to India in the T20 World Cup. With that trophy, they wanted to complete their cabinet and name themselves ‘true’ world-champions. But, India has shattered their dream and sent them home without that trophy. After that, they have seen a whole country celebrating the victory their team and making their team damn rich and super heroes.

Now, from their perspective, one can easily tell that, if - Indians perform like Oz, they are anyway now treated as sample-Gods, they would have been treated like real-Gods. On the other hand, Oz, even with their fantabulous performance, only 59% of their Aussie population is interested in cricket. Infact, ‘Footy’ is ‘most’ watched sport in Australia and more Australians tend to participate in Swimming than Cricket. These reasons are enough for Australian Cricket Players to hate be jealous of ‘Indian’ Cricketers. The outcome of that jealousy is nothing but their desperate attempts to win the game.

Well, yeah. Australian cricket team + 3 Umpires, managed to convert a losing-game into a draw-game and later into a winning-game today. Hats off to Indian players for their patience. I became sick after just watching those replays in news. I’m sure that many Indians who watched match would have been even more pissed off. Indian team proved that they have very good patience at the end of the match by not hitting any of the umpires of Oz players.

Well, yeah, just another fact before ending this post. This post is not to support bad game of Indian team. This is just to make note of bad attitude of Australian team. Indians indeed played badly, but not as bad as to lose the match. For Umpires, Steve Bucknor Fucknor, this is the time for you to retire and Mark Benson, what the heck were you doing on a cricket ground ???

Number 42 is going perfectly wrong with Sachin. He missed yet another century today in his 90s. Sachin looked at his best in today’s match playing all over the field but couldn’t convert it into a century.

He missed a century for the 6th time in last 21 innings while he was on his nineties. Three of them, he was out for 99. He is dismissed in nineties for the 14th time in his career today.

Sachin’s last century was against West Indies (exactly 100) back this year in January. Well, to be frank, I don’t care whether he gets a century or not as long as he is playing as good as ever. But, missing century for six times while being on nineties in the same year is certainly bad luck.

Tendulkar’s dismissals in the 90s this year: [1]
99 (143 balls) South Africa Belfast 26-Jun-2007 run-out
93 (106 balls) South Africa Belfast 29-Jun-2007 bowled
99 (112 balls) England Bristol 24-Aug-2007 caught (wk)
94 (81 balls) England The Oval 05-Sep-2007 caught
99 (91 balls) Pakistan Mohali 08-Nov-2007 caught (wk)
97 (102 balls) Pakistan Gwalior 15-Nov-2007 bowled

Hope Sachin will get his 42nd century next match itself.

PS: According to rediff, it’s 6th time in last 19 innings and 16th time his career. If you know correct number, let me know.

Even though, all my optimist expectations on World Cup became true, I had a very pessimist expectations on outcomes of Indian win.

1. Twenty20 World Cup will be conducted once in every two years. Does that mean, once in two years, there are more chances of mobs burning effigies of cricketers or cricket board as well as state governments pouring money on cricketers.
2. Yuvi is given 1 crore as well as a Porsche 911 by BCCI for his 6 sixers on England and 70-run knock in Aussie match. India played like a team where Yuvi made his mark in 2 out of 6 matches, where as contributions of players like Gambhir, Uthappa, RP Singh, Irfan Pathan, Bajji and even Sreesanth were of greater use in remaining matches. We need to remember that Yuvi was indirect reason for the defeat with NZ giving 38 runs in 3 overs (20 odd runs in single over) runs in single over and scoring just 5 runs in the match. When each and every player played an equally important role in the series, those two giant goodies from the board went only to Yuvi which can certainly make remaining players think.
3. Goodies given to the players by their respective state governments is a different thing. But, this is made an issue by players of another game, Hockey. Indian Hockey Team, which won Asia Cup without losing a single match and with record performances like thrashing Sri Lanka with 20-0 certainly couldn’t withstand the step-motherly treatment for the national game by central and state governments and is now planning to go on a hunger strike.

When a go-straight brain like mine could see so many problems, I wonder what would those complicated brains perceive all this.

Taking all these complications into account, Indian Government either has to check all these goodies given “only” to cricketers or it should start giving bank checks with similar numbers on it to players of other games too.

Update: The complicated brains have started analysis on “Why was Team India in the back row ?” while the front row was occupied by great ministers of Maharashtra and greater BCCI crowd. Great to see that it became a political heavy weights’ meeting rather than the function to honor the World Cup winning team.

I always had hopes that India will reach finals of any tournament I thought I would never see them as champions. Finally, thanks to captaincy of Dhoni and God of luck; India did it.

Won final of a tournament - Made me happy
Final of World Cup - Made me damn happy
Final against Pakistan - I’m jumping with joy !!!

I jumped with joy as soon as India won, but I forgot that I’m sitting the living room where there is a fan above my head running at its highest speed. Result - India won, I had a very bad cut on my hand (I can see a nerve !!!) First thing to do in the morning is .. to consult a doctor.

Thanks to Dhoni, Gambir, Pathans, RP, Sreesanth, Jogi, Imran Nazir, Misbah for a great final. Thanks to Yuvi, RP, Irfan, Dhoni and Sreesanth for a great tournament. Thanks to Agarkar for staying outside final eleven. Even bigger thanks to Sachin, Sourav and Rahul for staying out of the tournament itself. BTW, to be very neutral, Pakistan was at its best today. They played a very good game - just, the God of Luck was looking at us.

Update : Cut was too deep. Had to go to doctor now itself. Came out with two stitches

23 March 2003, South Africa
Finals - World Cup Cricket. Dream of a nation and prestige for a nation. Dream shattered by The Mighty Oz.

22/23 September 2007, South Africa
Semi Finals - Twenty20 World Cup Cricket. A team of youngsters with most of them playing their first international series. On the other side, its The Mighty Oz, but without their kingpin Ponting. Odds of winning for the World Champions were double than that of India as per newspapers, former Indian cricketers etc etc.

Indians started slow, but Yuvi came out with a brilliant knock of 70 in 30 balls to help India in keeping a respectable target of 189 on the board. Aussies made a decent start and were on the winning edge till 14th over. Daemon named “Hayden” was walking down the pitch to hit the balls over the boundary line. Same thing happened in 2003, when Ganguly couldn’t do anything and gave up trying something new. This time Dhoni had a trick to support his bowlers. He kept just behind the wickets even for the pace bowlers to make sure that the batsmen won’t walk down the pitch and not only just hit sixes but also hit down the confidence levels of the bowlers. I don’t know whether this worked out or not as those sixes didn’t stop, but bowlers were atleast not on their worst confidence levels. Sreesanth was aggressive, extremely good in his bowling and sent two dangerous batsmen - Gilchrist and Hayden to pavilion. Bajji was very good in saving the runs. Indians were never tensed through out the game even when Aussies were in a commanding position of the game, thanks to new skipper Dhoni. They just played a comfortable game. Finally, its the pay back time. Indians took their revenge after four years by sending the Mighty Oz out of the tournament by winning over them for the first ever time in any World Cup.

I’m sure that Aussies are no Gods but daemons but, today’s match reminded me one quote from the movie Superman

For Surely As Night Follows Day, There Comes A Time When Gods Must Die

My optimist side of brain was correct in sensing the best ever World Cup final, Cricket can have - India Vs Pakistan. Pakistan never won on India in a world cup. The max they achieved was a tie in this world cup. Pakistan is playing extremely well. It undefeated in the total tournament. But, Now, my optimist side of the brain senses the best ever World Cup win India can have - A World Cup final win by defeating Pakistan. Lets see what’s going to happen. Good Luck Team India. Still, My biased heart loves you without Sachin and Sourav.