Journey is as important as the destination

Scoreline 4-1

Prasoon — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 18:21:53 +0000

With Chennai completing a clinical win, that’s the win-loss ratio of my picks in IPL till now. The only one I missed out on was Deccan Chargers as I backed Kolkata Knight Riders. Going by how the game went, it does feel very stupid to admit that. However, what I am waiting for is a nail-biting finish which still eludes us in this season of IPL.

I feel tomorrow’s KKR vs KXIP could be one of those closer games. Though lacking in bowling, KXIP have a decent enough batting line-up. On the other hand KKR depend too much on a few players and really have a shallow team. With weaknesses of their own to sort out, both should look to bank on their strengths rather than exploit weaknesses of the other.

Tip for KKR: Unleash Mendis. He might be able to achieve what Vettori did

Tip for KXIP: Look to out bat KKR. It is unlikely KXIP will be able to win on the back of their bowling

My prediction: KXIP should be able to pull this one off on their batting prowess

As for the other match Mumbai Indians look very strong. In fact their last match was won with out much fuss. No one appeared to have gone berserk with bat, except for Nayyar’s blitzkrieg, and yet they reached a score of 160+. It was more team effort than any individual brilliance, and I think that’s where most games in this IPL will be won. On the other hand Rajasthan Royals were miserable with bat. Seems their new owner was more of a distraction rather than a motivation.

Tip for RR: Play with some purpose. It is still T20, not a 10 over game

Tip for MI: Let Jayasuriya play in 1996 style. Even if he fails, there is enough depth in batting to steady the innings. If he gets off, the game is over

My prediction: MI should make it two in two. Previous year’s last ball loss to RR would have been anything but forgotten.

Prasoon

After all its Cricket

Prasoon — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 05:56:51 +0000

If you are an avid cricket fan and got both your picks right for the opening two matches, you are bound to feel good. And that’s exactly how I feel. The players’ performances didn’t turn out exactly the way I had thought but the results were what I had expected and written.

Whoever said that IPL will help prepare for T20 world cup, was bang on target. The conditions looked a lot like what can be expected in England. Going by the first two matches, the competition promises some thump and not just bang-bang. Bowlers won’t be mere spectators in IPL2 and a few matches (if not more) will definitely be won on good bowling. More importantly, the first day reminded how unpredictable and uncertain the game of cricket is. You write-off a player and he’ll make you eat your words, you make someone hero and he might end up embarrassing you. In short the game has no regard for reputations, it thrives on present. Take these for example, man of match awards in first two games went to two Indian batsmen who do not play in the national T20 teams, the costliest player of IPL was turned in the costliest bowler not by Jayasuriya, Sachin or Duminy but by one Mr Abhishek Nayyar (half the cricketing world would have been trying to get the pronunciation of his name right when he was chopping of Freddie’s reputation) and in spite of the entry of all young and flambuoyant, the stars of RCB’s win were two players who were considered not so suitable for this format of the game. So what to expect for the next one month? Come backs, tumbling reputations, rising unknowns, few vintages still holding fort and others going into oblivion. But isn’t that what happens in every cricket competition? Yes. After all IPL is a game of cricket first, everything else is just an add-on.

Prasoon

In-form Daredevils shouldn’t lose sleep over depleted Kings XI Punjab

Prasoon — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 20:41:23 +0000

DD: Their performance in the last season was truly reflective of their captain’s batting – devastating on some days and absolutely miserable on others. Their strength of course lies in the batting as they boast of an opening pair which, arguably, is the best in the world today. This is followed by in form and equally explosive AB Devilliers and the latest Aussie sensation David Warner. Add to that a good mix of allrounders like Collingwood, Maharoof and Andrew McDonald and batting talents like Owais Shah and Dilshan and the line-up definitely looks formidable. Bowling is no less, with names like McGrath and Vettori supported by Nehra and Amit Mishra. On paper, the team looks one of the best, if not the best, in the competition. Then where is the problem? For starters, Sehwag’s batting is as volatile as the stock market. Second, he keeps his captaincy just like his batting – very simplistic. His reading of the game as a captain isn’t as good as Dhoni’s and he doesn’t really have the shrewdness and opportunism that a captain might need. The gap between their top players and others is wide; hence when the stars in the team collapse it permeates through the team. Looking at the foreign players McGrath and Devilliers look certain in the final 11. With all the hype around Warner, he is unlikely to be left out, though I would prefer a medium pace allrounder for that extra bowling option. Vettori is the most deserving candidate for the 4^th spot. Amit Mishra has done fairly ok as a spinner and hence team might take the liberty of using the 4^th spot of foreign player for a batsman, but I’ll stick to Vettori. It is hard to leave him out when the opposition is heavily reliant on Yuvraj’s batting prowess. The team won’t have anything to worry about even when the English players leave for WI series. With no dearth of talent and reputation of their players, it is only a careless attitude they need to be cautious against.

Strengths: Strong batting line-up, McGrath-Vettori combo in bowling attack

Weaknesses: Second rung players are almost non-existent. Sehwag’s form can disappear anytime

My pick of foreign players: Devilliers, McGrath, Vettori, Maharoof

Players to watch out for: Gambhir, Sehwag, Devilliers

KP: Probably the most flamboyant team, they emerged second during the league stage owing to some splendid performances by Marsh and Hopes. However, both are missing this year and so are Brett Lee and Sreesanth. Ravi Bopara will look to fill in Hopes’ shoes. Batting gaps can still be filled by likes of Sangkarra and Jayawardene but bowling is an area of concern. The only respectable names are Irfan Pathan and Piyush Chawla – but none of them can instill fear among the oppositions. In fact, Pathan has leaked runs like Mumbai rains whenever he has appeared for India in the recent past. The bowling worries don’t seem to have any solutions except that the available lot will have to considerably step up their performance. Yuvraj’s captaincy will be put to test with such limited options at hand. In the last season, matches were won on individual performances and Yuvraj, the captain was never called upon. But with most of those individuals missing this time, Yuvraj will have to work out how best to use his limited resources. The team is heavily dependent on its batting to win matches.

Strengths: Yuvraj’s record in T20, decent overall batting line-up

Weaknesses: One of the weakest bowling attacks in the tournament

My pick of foreign players: Sangkarra, Jayawardene, Bopara, Simon Katich

Players to watch out for: Yuvraj, Bopara, Sangkarra

Contests to look forward to: Yuvraj vs Vettori (if you can call that a contest)

My prediction: Delhi Daredevils should be the favourites for this one

Prasoon

Livewire at our hands – Preview of Chennai Super Kings vs Mumbai Indians

Prasoon — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 18:24:35 +0000

CSK: Being finalists in last season and one of the few teams to record a convincing win in their practice match, CSK looks all set for the second season. Unlike other teams it remains unaffected by injuries, absence of Pakistani players in IPL and unavailability of players due to national duty. Looking at the options at team’s disposal, Michael Hussey will be hardly missed. All-rounders, balanced line-up and Dhoni’s captaincy can be regarded as their strengths. Team with Flintoff, Oram and Albie Morkel has hardly anything to complain about their batting and bowling depth. Add Ntini and Muralitharan and it takes care of the bowling department. Hayden, Raina and Dhoni give enough reasons to feel good about the batting line-up. Since only four foreign players can be in the final eleven, the balance has to be worked out well. Given Albie Morkel and Flintoff’s good performances in the recent series, hard-hitting abilities and bowling advantages, they should easily make the cut. Hayden’s presence at the top of the order can inspire confidence in the team and fear amongst the opposition. Tough he hasn’t played any cricket since his last test match he will be eager to go, especially facing his arch-rival Zaheer Khan in his first match of the tournament. But the star of the batting line-up undoubtedly is Suresh Raina. He was in explosive form in both T20 and ODIs against New Zealand and carried the same in the practice game as well. Though Dhoni couldn’t show much of his batting prowess in T20 in NZ, his captaincy and inspiring presence is indispensable. Bowling line-up will have to depend more on Indian talent with only 1 slot left for a foreign player. It is a very tough choice between Ntini and Murali. With a pace-dominated bowling department, Murali should make the final eleven, especially if the experience of recent SA-Aus series is anything to go by regarding the utility of a spinner. Players like Gony, Balaji, Partiv Patel, Joginder Sharma, Badrinath, M Vijay will have to deliver.

Strengths: Allrounders, Raina, Captain Dhoni

Weaknesses: Few gaps in both batting and bowling

My pick of foreign players: Hayden, Flintoff, Albie Morkel, Muralitharan

Players to watch out for: Raina, Flintoff, Morkel

MI: No team’s performance and fortunes fluctuated as much as MI’s in the last season. They lost first 4 matches before winning 6 on the trot and then almost made it to the semi-finals but for a last ball defeat. They will be definitely itching to prove themselves this time. Thankfully, they have their full strength team. Swapping Nehra and Utthappa to bring in Shikhar Dhawan and Zaheer Khan seem smart moves, especially because they needed some strength in pace department after Pollock’s exit. The side looks well-balanced with batting line-up boasting of names like Jayasuriya, Tendulkar, Shikhar Dhawan, Duminy, Ashraful and Dwayne Bravo. Though bowling department, led by Zaheer and Harbhajan, looks manageable it does leave a few gaps to be filled. Having missed out on majority of the last season, Tendulkar will be keen on doing well. IPL is also his chance to prove a couple of things 1) Not playing in T20 for India is his choice and not compulsion 2) He can be a good captain as well. Regarding foreign players Jayasuriya, Duminy and Bravo should be clear choices. Fourth spot can go to Ashraful, Malinga or Fernando depending on whether the team needs an extra attacking batsman or needs to strengthen bowling department. The call will have to smartly taken based on opponent’s strengths and weaknesses. Or the spot may be up for grabs for England’s allrounder Graham Napier, who bowls medium fast and recently hit 152 in a T20 game with a world record 16 sixes in the innings. Performances of local players like Abhishek Nayyar and Dhawal Kulkarni will be important as oppositions might look to target them.

Strengths: Strong batting line-up

Weaknesses: Limited bowling alternatives

My pick of foreign players: Jayasuriya, Duminy, Bravo and Graham Napier

Players to watch out for: Duminy, Tendulkar and Harbhajan

Contests to look forward to: Zaheer and Bhajji vs Hayden (how can you miss this one)

My prediction: This one promises to be a livewire with anybody’s game. My hunch is MI might just pull it off purely because of recent form of its players

Prasoon

First upset of IPL 2 on the cards? – Preview of Rajasthan Royals vs Royal Challengers Bangalore

Prasoon — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 18:22:36 +0000

RCB: They yet again find themselves in the opening match of tournament, this time against defending champions RR. They surely start as underdogs after losing 10 of their 14 games last season. Though the team has tried to shed its ‘test squad’ status by bringing in players like Kevin Pietersen, Jesse Ryder and Robin Utthappa, it still lacks depth. RCB faces a peculiar problem. It now has a good pool of foreign players to choose from (however maximum 4 are allowed) but the same can’t be said about its local pool of players. Kevin Pietersen, being the captain, is certain to play. With Zaheer Khan no more with RCB, Dale Steyn is unlikely to be left out, especially after a successful series against Australia and the home advantage. That leaves only two spots for foreign players. My pick for these two slots will be Jesse Ryder and Ross Taylor. It would be a mistake to leave Ryder out after his tremendous form with both bat and ball against India. Kallis provides a good option with his all round capabilities and home advantage. But when it comes to T20, Ross Taylor is a much explosive batsman. It would be good strategy to have three explosive batsmen in top order and let Dravid keep wickets rather than going for a specialist wicket-keeper and leaving gaps in top order. With Ryder in the opening slot and Pietersen and Taylor in the middle the batting line-up will get much needed depth, which can be supported by Utthappa, Virat Kohli and Dravid. Pietersen, with his history with South Africa and recent controversies has more than a point to prove in South Africa, but coach Jennings will have to handle him a little carefully. Bowling still remains weak, with Steyn looking as the only strength. With all due respects to Kumble and Dravid, they’ll have to play more of a support role, despite all their experience and RCB being their home team.

Strengths: Pietersen, Ryder and Taylor

Weaknesses: Lack of depth in local talent. Weak bowling department

My pick of foreign players: Kevin Pietersen, Jesse Ryder, Ross Taylor and Dale Steyn

Players to watch out for: Jesse Ryder, Kevin Pietersen

RR: Being defending champions, they will look to carry on from where they left in the previous season. But in absence of Shane Watson and Sohail Tanvir, the team looks imbalanced and lacking firepower. Tyron Henderson and Morne Morkel will look to fill up their absence, but it will be difficult to repeat their performances of last year. The team will be highly dependent on Graeme Smith and Yusuf Pathan to fire and on Warne’s tactical moves to do well this time. With the home advantage, Smith will be even more devastating and Morkel and Henderson ought to be more comfortable than others. But RR has nothing more to boast about this time. I know, they started with the same status last year and emerged on top, but I think that was more because of surprise factor, quicker reading of the game by Warne and all its key players delivering together. However, now all the teams are better settled in than last year and have had time team to sort out weaknesses. RR has, on the other hand lost its key players, without gaining much. Moreover, Indian domestic players might not find South African pitches and conditions as comfortable as in India. Warne’s comments about the new find Kamran Khan sounded more like typical Australian mind games rather than promise of performance. The support players of last time like Ravindra Jadeja and Munaf Patel will have to put up a much better performance to give RR any real chance this time. Kaif’s return to India would have anyways told them that place in squad will be purely based on performance.

Strengths: Warne’s captaincy, Graeme Smith and other SA players, Pathan

Weaknesses: High dependence on few players, No Watson!

My pick for foreign players: Shane Warne, Graeme Smith, Morne Morkel, Tyron Henderson.

Players to watch out for: Graeme Smith, Tyron Henderson, Yusuf Pathan.

Contests to look forward to: Smith vs Steyn, Pietersen vs Warne

My Prediction: I think we are in for the first upset of IPL2 in the very first game

Prasoon

Time to move from Page 3 to Page 4

Prasoon — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 12:30:26 +0000

Page 3, I am sure, is one of the most read sections of the newspapers amongst us, if not the only read section. The pics are good to ogle at, juicy gossips, good time pass and at times just a good 10-15 minute break during a hard day of work. I must admit that I am no exception to the list of people enjoying these.

But the upcoming elections and my boredom with Page 3 made me move on to the political section of my newspaper, page 4. The contrast was hard to miss. The fashion in-things were replaced by white kurta pyjama, party pictures gave way to photographs of rallies, celebrity jibes made space for political mud-slinging and most importantly, from a female dominated Page 3 it became a male dominated Page 4.

The section also carried profiles of some of the candidates contesting from different constituencies in Mumbai. I decided to follow this section on a daily basis and get a better idea about those claiming to have solutions for country’s troubles. The contrast from Page 3 started to get overwhelmed by ironies. As a kid, I was taught that population increase and lack of education are amongst the two root causes of problems faced by our country. The candidate profiles suggested that most of them had more than two kids, hardly anyone was a postgraduate and out of thirteen candidates only four were graduates, the remaining got stuck at either SSC or HSC level. Suddenly they all started appearing to be a part of the problem rather than ones who could find solutions.

On the other hand, almost everyone (if not everyone) who reads this post will have a completely opposite profile compared to what I read. Seems “WE” are a part of the solution. And it is necessary to be aware of the problem, before we can get down to solving it.

It is high time we moved on from Page 3 to Page 4!

Prasoon

Things I don’t want to see as a cricket fan

Prasoon — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 10:25:53 +0000

As a cricket fan I am eagerly awaiting for IPL’s second season. After all the controversiees, players pulling out, multi-captain theory and launch of cheer-leading squads, hopefully we’ll get to see some good cricket and lots of action. Since cricket is on my mind I thought let me put down a few things I don’t want to see as a cricket fan.

Test cricket on Set max: I know the popularity of this form of the game is going down. But as I one of those who still enjoy watching test cricket, Set Max is the last channel I want to see it on. They may not be bad covering T20, especially with the additional glamour quotient they bring in, but when it comes to test cricket they can’t even put together a decent highlights package. Only Set Max can come up with a request for afternoon start to a test match. Next they’ll request matches in West Indies to be held from midnight to 9am, so that viewership timing is comfortable in India.

Charu Sharma as a cricket anchor: I think he is partly responsible for Set Max’s plight. He forgets whether it’s a test match or an ODI going on, shows more interest in Aa Dekhen Zara (Oh come on! even movie freaks weren’t interested in it) than in Sachin’s century and the most important question for him during the match show is who is Sanjay Manjrekar’s favourite singer. The only thing that probably goes in his favour is the channel doesn’t have a replacement.

Boria Majumdar: Who is he? Exactly! Apparently a Rhodes scholar, but his biggest claim to fame is writing a book on history of Indian cricket under Jagmohan Dalmiya’s aegis. Though Mr. Dalmiya has become history since then, Mr. Majumdar can be seen making guest appearances on news channels. So what’s the problem? You have to hear him speak to find that out. Even Rakhi Sawant’s yak-yak may start sounding music to your ears.

Politicians in cricket boards: Do I even need to say anything?

by Prasoon Agarwal