Tuesday, June 9, 2009

What is happenning Ricky?????????????????



Cricket Australia has a huge task ahead of them before the all important Ashes.

Is that Ashes that important? Yes it is(for that two teams).

But more than a world championship? Certainly no.

Then Why are they doing that?Thats the million dollar question to be answered.

Srilanka gave the knock out punch to India in the 2007 World Cup Group Stage. So its an encore for them. But the team on the receiving end wasn't something anyone expected. Its the "Aussies".

One team that was tipped to be one of the main contenders for the title. What went wrong for them. Losing the first match is not new for them. They lost to Zimbabwe in the previous ICC world 20-20. But in the next game they destroyed England to reach the Super Eights. Their main performers were their openers Haydos and Gilly. But yesterday against Srilanka, the team just didn't look like Australia. They may argue that they lost to a Chris Gayle onslaught and to Ajantha Mendis' Mystery. So atleast now they should accept that their players are not the world class players they project. They are ordinary players just like players in every other team like India,South Africa, Newzealand and Srilanka. On that day if eveything gets going they'll fire otherwise will be drubbed by the opposition. They're not the type of players who fight the odds to perform well. Not that these players are not talented but there is always a axe on their neck to perform in the form of Cricket Australia.

Till a year back the Australian Selection System was adulated as the best in the world. Even India tried to adopt it during the Chapppell era. But that won't work always. India paid the price and now Aussies have paid it. I'm not trying to tell that the Indian System is any better. I don't think there is any such thing called "system" here in India. Thats altogether a different story.

Coming back to the Aussies, I don't think any player can confidently play if there is a one match score constraint on them. This applies to the bowlers also. When Shane Warne retired, they tried Stuart Macgill, Brad Hogg, Beau Casson, Jason krejza, Nathan Hauritz. If this list continues,then CA's job is no less simplified.

They have the talent but they're not properly nurtured into world class. That will happen only when they are given the proper chance. Shane neither picked all those five wicket hauls in first few matches nor produced the Ball of the century on debut. He was an exceptional talent. If they want their players to emulate him in the first few matches itself, then they're in for a lot of trouble.

This is what I meant in the first paragraph. Instead of talking about the so called Ashes, CA can concentrate on building their team. England is known for what the Australians are doing right now. If they don't correct themselves, then Australian Cricket ironically will emulate the English Cricket.

Saturday, May 9, 2009

Good game spoiled by reasons other than football

This week after the Chelsea Barca match, I sent an SMS to my friend who is a Barca supporter saying that the final is going to be between your team and my team and the credit for that should go to the Norwegian Tom Henning Ovrebo. He replied like a Barca Stereotype that chelsea deserved to lose for all their negative tactics. When I asked about the referee he simply said "He helped us". 
     Chelsea can claim that most of the decisions went against them but a fact that Barcelona's dominance in Nou camp as well as Stamford Bridge was quite conspicuous with their more than 70% possession. After the match Drogba,Ballack were castigating the referee for disallowing four penalty decisions in favour of chelsea. But Are Drogba and Ballack rookie footballers? Absolutely not. Then Is that the way professional footballers react to referees?. In the semi finals between Manutd and Arsenal, we saw how darren fletcher reacted to the red card. That shows the class of the footballer. Even in that match the referee had made an error.
      This chelsea outrage just overshadowed two brilliant goals from Michael Essien and Andres Iniesta. Decisions went against both the teams. One such is Eric Abidal's red card. Replays clearly showed that Anelka tripped himself and no foul was committed by Abidal. But chelsea will not open their mouth about that. Barcelona was the better team in both the legs in terms of possesion and they only looked like scoring. I don't agree with my friend in this that chelsea deserved to lose but it can be reframed as Barcelona deserved to win.
      Referees are humanbeings and all humans make mistake but there is a threshold for that. That holds true for the players too. There are billions all over the world watching them, following them. They need to bear that in mind. All players are good players. The way they exhibit themselves on the field differentiate them from great players. 
      Controversies aside. The Stage is set in Rome for one of the best Finals the world has ever seen. After this semifinals the whole of England will watch it like a England Vs Spain match. Lets hope in this match football wins rather other nonsense.