Idle musings

    IPL 8 has ended with a winner that few would have expected in the middle of the tournament. Mumbai Indians appeared unlikely to qualify for the knock out stage. Before that the cricket World Cup ended with a more predictable winner. It would have been a fairy tale finish for New Zealand had they won the cup. This was reality though. The professionalism of the Australians came to the fore in the final as they dismantled the New Zealand batting that had faced few tests.     After the world cup, there has been IPL 8 of course. Also, England faced West Indies in an engaging series that promises a new dawn for West Indies cricket. West Indies has uncovered a couple of young stars who can play a lead role in time to come. The first test between New Zealand and England was an absorbing one. New Zealand was in control for the initial part of the test but then in a couple of sessions, England inched back in and soon took the upper hand. It was an engaging conte...

TWENTY 20, CRICKET AND INDIAN CRICKET     Yesterday, the first one dayer between India and Australia was washed out in Bangalore. The Australians have made an ominous beginning to the Future Cup. After being 90 for 4, they ended up with 307/ 7 in 50 overs. The "pup" Michael Clarke made 131 off 130 balls. Romesh Powar's bowling was rusty  : he gifted full tosses as the first ball in the first couple of overs of his second spell. The well-settled Clarke and Brad Haddin needed no second invitation and duly clouted the balls for sixes. R. P. Singh also erred in line, bowling to the leg stump of the right handers. Again this was capitalized by the Australians. This was a match that we would have lost 8 times out of 10.     Before the match, there was the usual war of words and Andrew Symonds was quoted as saying that he was amazed by the (over?) rection in the Indian media to India's Twenty 20 World Cup triumph. He needs to understand India better if he ha...

MY DREAM INDIAN CRICKET TEAM The Cricket World Cup ( http://www.cricketworldcup.com ) is in progress in the West Indies and yesterday, we lost to Bangladesh. In my opinion, Dravid erred in choosing to bat. Perhaps, the plan was that we would get good batting practice for the later matches in the first innings and then we could restrict them. Of course, the Bangladeshi bowlers had other plans ;-) The morning "juice" in the wicket was rather venomous. In the early part of our innings, the ball moved around just enough to keep our batsmen quiet. It took Yuvraj's belligerence to cut the shackles loose. I wish Dhoni had built on Yuvraj's knock. I expect that the two of them will be very important for India's chances in the World Cup, particularly against Sri Lanka. In my view, Dhoni has the maturity to play a steadying role in the middle overs since he can also run well between wickets. Yuvraj and he are the two best runners when we bat. If they come to bat in the mid...