First thing first, Congratulations Team England on EARNING #1 test team spot by thrashing team India. You just outplayed Indian team in every department.

Things which can go wrong to loose a big series with bigger margins, went wrong for team India in this series… factors like; bad coach, poor team selection, poor form of key players, injuries, bad strategies, poor implementation of strategies etc. are they key factors to loose a test series with bigger margins… and here ALL went wrong for Team India.

• Not so good Coach
  • The main and very vital part of any team is the quality and ability of a coach to let team know there weak points and work on those point. No matter what and no matter how good you are verbally and how good you are technically, nothing is better than teaching players practically. This is the foremost differential point between the Kirsten and Fletcher.  Kirsten use to use to show them their mistakes and work with players practically, due to age factor Fletcher is not able to do it that way, and that is why Fletcher has failed miserably to lift Indian team. Fletchers failure highlights as even after being England’s coach for considerable amount of time still unable to find the weakness of the players.
  • Fletcher has failed to make good strategies against the team England, which is why Indian bowlers looked very ordinary. Its not like Indians were not getting the swing like the English players, it was poor planning against batsman which made them look more club bowlers than international bowler. Again, Like batsman he failed to work with bowlers with their mind set, with their strategies, with their action.
• Poor team selection
  • What team BCCI selected for important tour like English tour is a mystery. Abhinav Mukund was not exemplary in West Indies tour to get chance to play in English soil when your main opener  was going to join later. apart from that selecting just two 100% fit openers for the tour was another mistake. More over one of them was newbie. Considering India’s record, India does well in test if their openers do well up front, this was the biggest mistake done by BCCI.
  • Each spot has its own importance in the game. Like openers, #6 spot is also very crucial position to bat. After Saurav Ganguly, we are yet to find one who can fill in Saurav Ganguly’s big shoe. Yuvraj Sing looked promising, but failed to deliver consistently. Suresh Raina looked promising but his inability to play short ball done him miserably. One who can consider to be at #6 spot should be able to play Fast bowling as well as spin bowling well. And that player should be able to play with top order players as well as Lower order players. BCCI should look aggressively for #6 spot.
  • Selecting Zaheer Khan with out testing his fitness proved very crucial in this tour. No one denies that he is very good bowler, but what’s the point selecting the one who is not 100% to deliver?
• Poor form of key players
  • Drop in form of key players is also a worrying. Its very heartening to see legend like Sachin Tendulkar struggling to score runs in this series. He is looking very ordinary in this tour. Observing his dismissals in this tour one can easily identify that Sachin Tendulkar is not sure about his off stump. He is poking his bat out of off stump which is very bad considering his standard. One can understand if he is unsure of his off stump for inning or two, but from last few innings he is getting out with similar deliveries. First time in his career he looked very ordinary against the swing bowling.
  • Gautam Gambhir is also struggling with the form. His footwork is not certain. That’s why he is falling over. VVS Luxman is known to play rising ball, but his technique against swinging ball never was good, so even he has failed to deliver.
  • Harbhajan Singh the so called spear head of Indian spin attack has struggling for his form for last 12-15 months. He didn’t deserve the place in the team but yet on the name he got picked up ahead of other players.
• Injuries
  • Veerendra Sehwag was injured before the series,Zaheer Khan got injured in Lords test, Sachin Tendulkar was suffering with viral fever,Gautam Gambhir also got hit in same test. Harbhajan Sigh got injured in Nottingham these injuries hurts Indian team.
• Poor strategies and Implementation of strategies
  • This can be counted as failure of coach and Indian think tank. They failed to strategies against the players. They failed to find out weakness of batsman / bowler. They failed to play the game their way.

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For the 1st 2 days, India was on the top… 1st day India has their foot on England’s throat… when England were 8 wickets down for 120 odd runs, and then there after they managed to score 221… what shit that was? why couldn’t they finish it off?? according to me it was combination of poor field placing, poor strategy and poor bowling performance by bowlers in the end… some how Harbhajan managed to pick the wicket of Broad to restrict to a score which was looking below par…

Indian Innings start was horrible… what that shitty Mukund was thinking about when he played that shot?? was he playing domestic match? was he playing on 100? sh!t happens… then Dravid and VVS Luxman took the charge and controlled the game till the VVS got out… then came India’s most loved player… Sachin, who looked good but… couldn’t carry on… Raina was giving catching practice… Yuvi played the one of the very good inning of his career after he dropped by KP… after the fall of Yuvraj… India lost the control from there… India was at decent total 267/4… with 46 runs lead… with 6 wickets in hand… but from there India ended the inning on 288 with just 67 runs lead, lost 6 wickets for 21 runs… I’m not getting the perfect word for this collapse…

About England’s 2nd inning, I just don’t want to open my mouth… you will see only BEEP BEEP BEEEEEEP BIP BEEP…

We all know India has been slow starter… hence the practice match gets the importance to the core, and in recent past BCCI never kept a practice match for team India. but it was good to see that Indians played a practice match on this England tour… but all goes in vain..  

Lords test started with very high note… this test has immense importance as this was 2000th test match and 100th between India and England.

Day 1

On day 1, 1st day ball was moving quite well… India started off well with 3 maidens on trot, and sooner Zaheer khan picked up two crucial wickets for India early on before he suffered hamstring injury.

As soon as Zaheer went back to pavilion, MS Dhoni deployed defensive tactics… poor thinking… taking wickets on regular interval is the best way to keep other side on check

Day 2

Day to started and MS Dhoni didn’t changed his defensive tactics, which helped England to put up good score…

Surprised to see Harbhajan got into defensive mode as well… he surrendered to the situation with out trying to fight that situation.. hardly seen any fielder around the bat… when Zaheer is not there on the field, automatically Harbhajan becomes the spear head of Indian bowling attack but he failed yet again to lead the attack… I failed to understand his tactics to bowl right hand batsman round the wicket… absolutely negative strategy.  You just keep LBW out of the question when u bowl like that… Murlidharan became successful with this line doesn’t mean even you will be successful with similar strategy… alas…

though Praveen Kumar’s excellent spell came on day 2, but it was bit too late… England declared on 476… at that very moment I felt… we lost the lords

Last few overs England asked India to bat and we did managed to go to day 3 with out loosing wicket

Day 3

It was decent start on day 3… Gambhir got out to a peach of delivery by Stewart Broad… this wicket was well set by Broad… 2 short of good length away going deliveries and next fuller in swinging delivery… then comes Dravid… THE WALL… and he stood by that name and scored unbeaten century…

Along with Dravid, Mukund was also playing nice… he was scoring in a good pace…just before lunch break wide of off stump delivery done him… he dragged that ball on to stumps…

Then comes the lord on lords… he was running temperature… still he stepped out to save India… he played out the remaining time and India went 2 down to lunch on day 3… After lunch Sachin started smashing balls and looked good till the Broad’s out swinger did him… once again it was classy bowling by Stewart Broad… after Sachin’s dismissal… all Indians just came on to bat as if its just their duty to be present on the crease… Praveen Kumar smashed few balls here n there to avoid follow-on, but India end up 186 runs short which was a huge margin on Lords

India got out just few minutes before the stumps at day 3, and England survived

Day 4

India started off well on day 4 to claim 5 wickets early on… thanks to ultimate bowling performance by Ishant Sharma… he was looking good… he was running hard, pitching in right areas.. he was able to move the ball both ways… and he got wickets under his belt… England was 62/5 at lunch and Eoin Morgan and Matt Prior were on crease that time… that time I felt now India is showing why they are called #1 test team of the world… I thought now India has grip on this test… now India can pull of the win…

day 4 second session was disaster… surprised to see Raina started the new session… which was terrible terrible terrible decision… though Ishant came forward to say that he needed break… but I sense that he is just trying to defend his captain to be in captains good book… they took the advantage of this… and got settled.. Ishant took Eoin Morgan’s wicket… but by that time Prior was set… he carried on to make yet another century at lords… again England declared on 268/6 after Prior’s 3rd century at lords… 269/6 score suggest how poor captaincy and bowling was, when England were down at 62/5. England gave India 458 as target.

Gambhir was injured by Priors slog sweep, so he was not available for opening… and hence Dravid came to bat with Mukund… Mukund yet again done by Broad’s away going delivery… which he dragged on to stumps… then Laxman and Dravid steadied the ship and India went on to stumps 80/1… both were looking good… looking strong… again Indian fan woke up and started saying, we can save this match… but Day 5 was still there to be survived…

Day 5

Dravid got out early on day 5… and then Indian line up collapsed like pack of cards… they just didn’t applied themselves on the crease… mixture of poor batting and excellent bowling performance by England done India… and India lost the 1st test after tea…

What I feel is, keep England’s good bowling aside… India actually lost due to bad decision by Dhoni on 4th day’s second session…

After the 3rd season, the contracts of the player were ended and apart from retained player every one was in the AUCTIONED… and in the auction Mumbai Indians bought big players. Deccan Chargers Rohit Sharma was the best buy for Mumbai Indians.

With core remains intact and the new inclusion likes of Rohit Sharma, Munaf Patel, Andrew Symonds… Mumbai Indians were very strong unit on paper… I repeat “ON PAPER”.

And as expected, they started their season very well… Lasith Malinga, Harbhajan Sing, Munaf Patel taking fifer each, Sachin hitting his 1st ever T20 and IPL century, Out of the world fielding… everything was going in MI’s way… Mumbai Indians way… after the 9th game of Mumbai Indians they were on top of the points table, with just one defeat, needed one victory in remaining 5 matches. Everything was like a dream run…

And after that, it just turned upside down… Batting started choking… fielding started looking ordinary… Mumbai Indians started loosing… after yesterday they lost 3 games on trot… if they were playing good and loosing… I was okay with it… but playing bad is not acceptable…

I consider Sachin Tendulkar not less than god… I usually don’t speak or listen against him… but this is underlined that Sachin is not a good captain.

Dream run turned nightmare for Mumbai Indians

15th of May is suppose to be my birthday… but never felt any excitement for my birthday… never felt that my parents were ever willing to celebrate my birthday… no parties no gifts not going out… nothing…

Birthday suppose to be the happiest day at  least for the youth… but for me its never been any special. I lost the number since how many years I’m not ABLE to or not celebrating my birthday.

I remember, when My last birthday got celebrated I don’t know how old I was… but that time none of my friend turn out for my birthday, since then I don’t remember my parents have celebrated my birthday… my so called friends did not turn out was that my mistake? why I was getting punished?

There is no one on planet earth who don’t like to receive gifts… forget about birthday gifts… and when you receive your birthday gift from your parents that makes you feel happy… that makes you feel top of the world… but I don’t remember when I got my last gift from parents. Its not like my parents don’t give me any thing… NO… they do give… they love me very much… but birthday gift is birthday gift…

It hurts. Gift is a token to remember the occasion… but I hardly have anything in my cupboard… and it hurts more… when you see they giving gift to others on their birthday… My elder sister gets something as her Birthday gift… my brother in law gets gift on his birthday… its only me who is unlucky about it.

And that’s why I never felt my birthday as any special day for me… take example of today… they bought ice-cream as my parents grand son wanted to eat ice-cream of my birthday not because… it was my birthday and to celebrate they called them… its not a story of my this birthday… this is the story of all my birthday

it hurts every year…

BCCI has selected 15 men squad who will tour to west indies… 1st ODI series after the world cup. Exciting… really not. Few expected and few unexpected inclusion in the squad.

Let you know the squad:-

Squad:

• Gautam Gambhir (captain) : As expected, Gautam Gambhi is the only one who can lead the side well in absence of MS Dhoni, He has shown his capabilities when he 1st captained Indian squad in home series with New Zealand. apart from that, he brought the cricket in to the Kolkata Knight Riders team. Only good choice to be captain in absence of MS Dhoni
• Suresh Raina (vice-captain) : This player has potential to be the vice-captain, and he displayed his ability in Chennai Super King… but can not say that he can be future captain.
• Parthiv Patel (wk) : As MS Dhoni  is out of the tournament, we need a wicket keeper who can bat a bit, but Parthiv Patel as replacement to MS Dhoni…  not worthy… Dinesh Kartik would have been better choice to keep wicket… but I guess in absence of Virendra Sehwag & Sachin Tendulkar his ability to open the inning gave him the place in the squad
• Virat Kohli : Leading scorer for India last year, fabulous performance shown by this lad recently… he had lead the U19 team which has won the U19 world cup… he can be the next captain, so for me it could have been good move to make him as vice-captain to give exposure to the think tank.
• Yuvraj Singh : After becoming the Man of the Tournament in recently concluded world cup, he deserve the place in the team touring to West Indies. Expecting him to fire in West Indies as well
• S Badrinath : He got another chance to represent the Indian ODI team… well deserve place in the team.
• Rohit Sharma : This lad has the potential to be one of the finest cricketer in the world. He has potential to play all three forms of the game. He has shown his class in domestic tournament, and this is the time he should show his talent on international platform.
• Harbhajan Singh : No one can argue on this mans inclusion in the team… he is the integral part of Indian squad… be it Test be it ODI or be it T20… his inclusion is like default
• R Ashwin : This young off spinner is the only other spinner who can bowl the mystery carom ball as effectively as master of the carom ball.He is very intelligent spinner and his ability to bowl in the power play gives added advantage to bowling department
• Praveen Kumar : Very unfortunate to miss out this bowler at the start of the World Cup 2011.A street smart cricketer. On his day he can trouble the best batsman in the world. His ability to swing both way make him very dangerous bowler to handle at start. Only problem with this guy is at times he leaks crucial runs in death.
• Ishant Sharma : In the IPL he is the ONLY fast bowler who impressed me with his bowling…
• Munaf Patel : After the inclusion in team touring South Africa, he is a different bowler all together. He was the UNSUNG hero for Indian team in the recently concluded world cup. His ability to hit the right spot is amazing.
• Vinay Kumar : NO comments… for me… he just don’t deserve. There are kind of players who plays good only in domestic level… I guess S Shreesanth should have been picked ahead of him.
• Yusuf Pathan : only one question? WHY? Alright he has not been used properly in world cup by MS Dhoni but I’m not able to see any sort of form with him… for me… he is BIG NO… If you are giving chance to youngsters… Robin Uthappa, Paul Valthaty, Saurabh Tiwary etc. deserve chance over this fellow.
• Amit Mishra : I just wanted to know What BCCI is thinking while selecting him over P Ojha?
• Wriddhiman Saha (wk): LOL

What I feel is, there are few players who are consistently getting ignored by the BCCI, and as always I hardly have any clue over it. Robin Uthappa, Ambati Rayudu, Saurabh Tiwary, Irfan Pathan to name few.

Lets talk about them

• Robin Uthappa : His ability to hit ball out of the ground, ability to keep wickets, ability to open the innings are few points which favour’s him to get selected. At present his form is also with his side, more over he looks the only player in Indian cricketers who can pull or hook the ball comfortably,very unlucky for not being selected in the squad.
• Ambati Rayudu : Again unlucky one not to be picked. He is sound with his technique. He can hit hard, perfect for playing at no 3 slot. Ability to conquer one end is arguably better than any other player in the squad.
• Saurabh Tiwary : This mini Dhoni also can hit big sixes and we all have seen his ability. he could have been choice in place of out of form Yusuf Pathan.
• Irfan Pathan : This guy is now completely out of his injury. In the IPL at start he didn’t impressed me, but later on as he started getting his normal swing back, he looked as deadly as he use to be when he was on peak, pace is a still concern though.

To conclude, I feel the selection is somewhat justified… inclusion of few unlucky players could have been better choice… in all team looks good and balanced

Yesterdays match was nightmare for Mumbai Indians fans like me… It certainly was not their day at all… apart from Sachin wining the toss, nothing went for Mumbai Indians

On paper Mumbai Indian team is invincible. Likes of Sachin, Rohit, Symonds, Pollard, Malinga, Harbhajan Sing only these names can create panic in opposition. And then Ambati Rayudu, Aiden Blizzard are few players who are capable of any upsets.

Many will say that decision to chase was not correct, but I’ll say if you have choice… why not take advantage… doesn’t matter if how little that advantage is… so for me… I’ve no issues with the decision.

Sachin won the toss, there after nothing went for Mumbai Indians… start was bad… Mumbai Indians just managed to restrict Kings XI Punjab… Thanx to superb intelligent bowling by Munaf Patel and brilliant brilliant brilliant fielding performance by Pollard… Pollard took the catch of this IPL season so far to dismiss inform Shaun Marsh.

Mumbai Indians some how managed to restrict Kings XI Punjab on 163. Chasing 164 in 20 overs for the batting line up consist of Blizzard, Tendulkar, Rayudu, Sharma, Symonds, Pollard, Suman, etc should have been easy task… but eventually they messed up the chase.

Mumbai Indians collapse started with fall of Sachin Tendulkar’s wicket. That wicket is fallen due to unlike Tendulkar shot by Little Master. Ball was moving around and Pravin Kumar is a kind of bowler who can trouble even the best batsman with his intelligent swing bowling. Pravin Kumar is best when ball swings around. Sachin just kept following the swinging ball, and just manages to give CATCHING PRACTICE to Shaun Marsh who took that catch easily.

Then comes Rohit Sharma, the player on whom you can rely on… started nicely before he overbalanced himself while playing leg glance to Bhargav Bhatt. Gilchrist is smart keeper… he dislodged the bails in time to stump Rohit Sharma… there on nothing happen which can actually discuss… Mumbai Indians succumbed under pressure… and started choking. Dismissal of Andrew Symonds was the display of pathetic running between the wicket by Rayudu… which is very unexpected…

Just another defeat in Mohali… my friend Amish Joshi who is actually very good at keeping stats told me that Mumbai is yet to win a game at Mohali and Chennai… getting defeated is actually not concern… but the way Mumbai Indians are getting defeated is big worrying factor…

Sachin is getting out cheaply since he scored his maiden century in IPL… then openers are failing to give cracking start consistently… are actually factors to be taken care off….

No matter how Mumbai Indians are played this game… one fact is unchanged… Mumbai Indians is the team which looks very formidable and very tough team to defeat…

Amazing movie… but one time watch

Chalo Dilli… is the movie I never planned to watch it just happened that we planned and we executed that plan… that’s how I saw that movie today in the afternoon

Just 2hrs movie… but full on entertainment… at no  point of time you will feel bore… in the end you will feel… man how those 2 hrs went by is really unnoticed

I don’t know how many will agree to my rating… but I’ll give for this movie… Vinay Pathak is star… real BIG star… amazing… you can watch any of his movie… you will enjoy to the core… combination of Lara and Vinay Pathak is itself very funny

This story is all about owner of multi millionaire industry, and her  journey to Delhi… what happens when she met a very ordinary man from Delhi… its a one time must watch movie

Congratulations Rajasthan Royals

Who could have predicted that formidable side like Mumbai Indians will tumble under 100 runs? This day is one of those days Mumbai Indians fans would love to forget as soon as possible.

Day started in very high note… just the note was high else everything went downhill for Mumbai Indians. First up the captain of Mumbai Indian lost the toss three times in a row in this IPL 2011. As master read the pitch, he said pitch will go slower and lower, and stroke play will be tough… which proved wrong by Rajasthan Royals batsman in the end

If we think what went wrong for Mumbai Indians is everything… in the start Mumbai Indians batsman could not match up with the pace and bounce of the pitch… precisely top 4 batsman tried to go after bowlers too early. Saying this after the game might be easy, but in the past we have experience that team who tours to Jaipur, fall in pitch trap… pitch look like batting pitch upfront, and batsman try too high scoring on the pitch which is actually very slow and low, and end up 20-30 runs short of the par score… that’s what happen with the Mumbai Indians

After putting to bat first, as always Sachin look very firm… got boundary and single in his 1st 2 deliveries, Jacobs hit a six to Watson and Mumbai Indians camp aimed too high on this track

After the fall of Davy Jacobs Mumbai Indians  started losing wickets in regular interval… that lead to the loss of momentum and Mumbai Indians looked CONSOLIDATING every time. Not take credit away from Rajasthan Royals, I feel Mumbai Indians batted a bit poor.

On the other hand, Rajasthan Royals knew the target… they knew its not a big target so the start was very cautious… and chased down the total very easily

In Mumbai Indians bowling, I feel Sachin was trying everything to take wickets… He gave Malinga 2 overs upfront… as two world class batsman were on crease as opener… which I guess was okay move… then giving ball to Harbhajan after the field restriction and after ball getting a bit older… expected move… but here I failed to understand, when Harbhajan was bowling quite well over the wicket why he turned to round the wicket?? then to the batsman who are very good in hitting the ball over mid wicket or straight. Alright, if he had bowled on or out of off stump, which would have created angle and giving him opportunity to take wicket… but he was bowling middle and leg stump line which was a bit easy to hit… it might be my own opinion…

Over all, Mumbai Indians had very poor day… which Mumbai Indians fan will love to forget… and will concentrate on the next game…

Go Mumbai Indians!!! Duniya hila denge hum!!!