Ryder Cup

Preparing for the Unthinkable

My worst nightmare seems to have come true.

do i still go the west indies if india doesnt make it to the super8 ? would i like to watch the bangla tigers play instead of india ?

I'm going there 100% on my own personal expense and am shelling out a small fortune on this. I was taking my wife, 2 kids and my parents to this event. I had bought the follow the India team package - all of India's Super8 matches and the semi-final and final. I've bought non-refundable tickets to and from the west indies. I've also bought non-refundable tickets between the islands following team B2.

What if India doesnt qualify ? we were planning to book the accomodation over this weekend, but somehow have hit the pause button now. we're not going to shell out any more money till Saturday nite, when we will know 80% of the answer (since the Bangla - Bermuda match is on25th and it will be all-clear only after that !).

The only good thing arising out of all this is room rates (which are ridiculous right now) may actually touch sane levels...

Here's hoping for the best !

Thinking the Unthinkable

Pakistan is out of the World Cup. India has at least a 50% chance of following them.

I dont think Ireland's win over Pakistan makes my comments about minnows in the previous post wrong. Its great to see, adds to the excitement of the World Cup but it happens after too many one-sided matches. I mean, is it ok to play smaller teams if in one game out of 20 they cause an upset, while in the remaining 19 they get massacred ?

India - i cant believe they did this to themselves. I had spent the last two weeks discussing with different people about the threat Bangladesh (and i dont classify them as minnows) posed in the world cup. their results leading into the tournament have been there for everyone to see. Yet we walk in prepared for a stroll in the park....

There was only one good ball in all of the dismissals (the one that got Dravid) and one case of bad luck (Sachin - the ball bounced up off his pads). The rest were bad shots. The dot balls issue is not new. routinely in the champions trophy, we were letting between 120-180 dot balls go by which is criminal in a game lasting only 300 balls. We seem to have gone back into the mode of waiting for the bad balls (which are increasingly becoming an endangered species) / manufacturing 4's off good ones (increasing risk of getting out) etc. Sometime back Dravid used to be very good at this - he would reach 50 having hit 1-2 fours and still having a strike rate of 80+. He seems to have forgotten the art of doing this. And everyone else seems not to have bothered to learn.

The players responded the right way the last edition after their sputter against Holland and the collapse against Australia (both of which i had the misfortune to witness live). Can they do it again ? I hope so with all my heart, but the mind...thats another story !

The Silence of the Lambs

I'm watching the third massacre of the tournament. Its also the third match where one of the big boys are playing one of the smaller teams (also known as the minnows). Co-incidence ?

The first two resulted in defeats of about 250 runs each...this one looks like its heading the same way. Gibbs has already set a one day record for hitting the most runs in an over - 6 sixes ! Do you think it merits the same awe as Jayasuriya's 30 off Ameer Sohail / CZ Harris ? Or Afridi's 30 off a Jayasuriya over (some delicious irony here...) ? I think the answer is obviously no

So, some more questions

• are the matches exciting ?
• do the players get excited (the big country players) ?
• does it really help the minnows to improve ?

While the answer to the first two is definitely no, the funny thing is i've never heard a minnows player complain about it..they all feel it helps them improve, its almost as if the routine thrashings they receive are good for their soul !

I think it is good for the smaller teams to play the big boys. After all, that is how we pick up skills in every sport - by playing against people better than us. However, there are two further questions

• is the world cup the best place to do so ?
• aren't we cheapening the achievements of the past by allowing the new records equal footing vs past ones which were against much stiffer opposition

I think the answers are obvious - we really need two separate tournaments...

And we need some way to ensure that the matches against the minnows do not count as full internationals - maybe like shares we can have class A shares and class B shares....

Its no fun watching the massacre...it reminds me of school yard bullies at work against the weaker boys...never enjoyed watching that either !

Team Selection

Hi ! The team looks good...

However, this is where I'm concerned. Usually Indian teams have only done well when they have been no-hopers / have had very bad results leading up to the major tournaments. This was true in '83, in the 1985 Benson & Hedges championship in Australia and also more recently in the 2003 South African edition, where we went after being roundly thrashed in New Zealand.

There are a few major concerns - Virender Sehwag and Irfan Pathan are both lacking their confidence and their customary spring in their step. To me, even Yuvraj and Munaf have yet to prove their full return to fitness. However, the good news are Rahul Dravid (my most valuable player for India for the last 5 years), Sachin, Saurav, Uthappa (for me, he's our joker in the pack), Zaheer and our two tweakers - Harbhajan and Kumble. Dhoni has yet to really prove himself outside the Indian sub-continent and i fear that most teams will have worked him out now. It remains to be seen if he can add new dimensions to his batting but since he is a very good keeper as well, its a risk worth taking !

The funny thing is that barring one or two selections, not many people would have chosen anyone different. And that is good news - not many of our competitors are in this enviable situation ! Here's hoping for the best !