Not so Special, Dravid

A smiling Rohit knew he had nothing to lose. His team was about to accomplish what deemed impossible. Umpires were surrounded by Rajasthan Royals players who seemed unaware of equation which itself was surprising considering their coach is the very intelligent Rahul Dravid. However Dravid and co was not alone- there seemed to be a cloud all over with Ravi Shastri wondering aloud if a wide can save Royals. Finally when the Royals were cleared of their ignorance, Tare came with a clear message. He knew what to do. There was not much fuss. There was no need to fuss with him knowing, if Royals continue bowling filth like they have been doing that night, he had the game in his pocket. And Faulkner’s full toss onto the leg stump looked like a symbol of love and Tare gleefully accepted it tonking over square leg.

With Sachin happily giving away free hugs, Dravid did an odd thing. In fact it was very odd considering it was Dravid. He threw his cap away and he took it back. Now imagine if Virat had done this. “Nah mate. He isn’t mature enough. This is not acceptable for a cricketer” Or had Raina/Rohit done this they would have got cricketing lessons along with beahvioural lessons from media. Harsha would have been disappointed and tweeted (in small case. He is sick of Caps Lock for some reason) with words such as cricketers, role models blah blah and RTed his junior who would have tweeted the same, albeit in different words. But then it was Dravid. Believed to be overshadowed, not understanding that anyone would have been overshadowed by a cricketer of that calibre.

There was sympathy for the great man which was very stupid and evident in social media. Some were like Dravid overshadowed again! I was like What? WTF? How on earth? And then a few said Dravid didn’t deserve this. That made me giggle. If there is anyone who deserved this more, that is Dravid.

An usual disclaimer to start with. Rahul Dravid was a brilliant player and he will always be mentioned as one of the finest of all times there with Sachin, Ricky, Kallis – to name a few from his generation.  The Indian Team under Dravid did considerably well and he is known to be one of the poignant thinkers of the game and he proved his worth leading the 'underrated' Royals to unmatchable heights. Guess what? That begs to wonder what really happened in this IPL season.

When RR was all set for a playoff spot, what went wrong? Where the downfall started?  It all started with the Mumbai game at Motera. The team management had decided not to play Rahane, Tambe and Smith. Have you seen anyone dropping team’s top three players for three rookies? No I haven’t. That was weird. Considering what happened at Wankhade, it seems Royals wanted to avoid a playoff spot at any cost for Mumbai Indians. No, really. That is the best explanation I could manage.

As predictably Rahane and Tambe was back in the eleven for the next game but the momentum was then injected into Mumbai Indians at the cost of their own team's fortunes. Then again Smith wasn't back but you really cant question with Brad Hodge taking his place.  

By that time Smith wouldn’t have imagined he won’t get another game. Nor he would have known why he had to bat below Binny in all but one game he played. Let’s talk about Binny. The guy who was retained before auction and the guy who managed to retain his place in the playing eleven even averaging a mere 12.3 at a strike rate of 101.65.  Maybe he would have wondered too- why he wasn’t dropped by the team management which was known to show no bias. But why did he get that long a rope? Only god knows. Or maybe Dravid knows.

To add a few more, the constant shuffling of batting order especially openers- even after they found the right pair in Karun and Rahane- and not to forget Bhatia's promotion or the likes of  Ankit Sharma, Tewatia batting a position above Hodge. It was all mess. 

You could say the experimentation was one notch too high and Binny was backed more than what he deserved and finally you could only pity the players who were not aware/not sure of the equation prompting a big conference with umpires right in the middle of the match.

By the way, Good luck for the next season. Hope Smith plays and bats ahead of Binny at least in the next season. XD. 

(Disclaimer: I love Dravid as much you do, Just in case.....)

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Chinnaswamy Zindabaad!

From drizzling to sixer show to bowling scare, it was all the typical Bangalore at show on 13/05/2013 when RCB were matched up against the ‘always terrible’ Delhi Daredevils. The buzz around the Chinnasamy was unbelievable at around 3 pm itself that you would be forgiven for thinking it’s an evening game. 

The innumerable police force and the ‘full black’ gym boys aka the private security force was at full force making a mini traffic jam in Queen’s road on the pretext of working. They basically had nothing to do with an exception of only one instance when a bunch of kids ran near the gate when they assumed- after watching the police and security lining up on either side of the road-the players are about to arrive. When asked about it,

“Bhai, RCB would arrive now. They have to warm up no? And add net practice to that. They should be here by 3 30 or so” 

They little knew the team would arrive three hours later than they imagined and they were happy to get a close look of their favourite stars, with the most favourite being Gayle and ABDV, finally after a long wait. Not surprisingly their enthusiasm never dropped in that three hours and in fact it went up with every minute in anticipation which was very much visible in their answers to my questions.

Starting with “Jeetega bhai jeetega bhai RCB jeetega”, their most favourite player among Gayle, Virat and ABDV was Gayle because “Gayle can hit big sixes”. Hardly a surprise again and they never seemed to care about the fee paid for Yuvi  that ate the fund which would have accounted a reliable bench nor did they singled out any player for team’s terrible fortunes unlike the Social media. I was taken aback when they moved to the Chinnasamy bus stop after the team bus entered the stadium. I ran towards them and wondered aloud to know, “We were just here to get a glance at em and now we have to hurry back home so that we don’t miss the toss”. 

Oh the tales about unadultered bunch of real fans and thankfully there were different sets of people to entertain- Those lot who wanted to buy tickets, Those few who wanted to sell tickets, those vendors wanting to make everything out of this one odd day and finally those who were restless to get inside the stadium. The beauty of this, obviously, is the tales everyone had. The first set- those who wanted to buy tickets- were the best of the lot. They never cared to hide their desperation to get tickets running here and there with rubber banded hundred rupee notes.  All they did was to ask anyone and everyone if they were selling the ‘825’ tickets. They had little luck though. They rarely found sellers of the cheapest tickets in Chinnasamy. The luck was not with the few sellers as well as they were finding takers for costlier tickets. Maybe the franchise should consider revising the ticket structure which hardly made any sense.

There was no trouble whatsoever in getting into the stadium which took just five minutes from the gate to seat with four minutes going in Police/Watch dogs massaging- well, almost- you in the name of checking for things you are not supposed to take inside the stadium.  As I walked off the remaining one minute, I spent it cursing the stupid Bangalore weather which had a terrible sense of timing. If we had an Indian Premier League on weather, Bangalore would have been the unopposed ever existing champions. The game play of weather was that good. 

It went from no hint of any rain to drizzling to stopping for a while delaying the toss by just twenty minutes to drizzling again to raining to drizzling again and it was 8 40 pm when it decided to show some mercy on us. The stadium workers would have cursed rains as much as we did or even more than we did because they were the ultimate losers having to take covers on and off. 

The toss was just fun watching Virat looking upto KP which had the same effect of watching Parthiv and Gayle together.  Nothing was audible and I deciphered KP is quite lanky.

Aaaaar Ceeee Beeeeiii slowly became Weee want sixxx as Gayle took the strike. Gayle being a good man responded tonking Shami over midwicket.  Having let Duminy escape in the first over Gayle was not prepared to waste the second opportunity. Sending one ball to second tier, he hit a four. Just as the crowd believed he hits six whenever asked for, he saw his stumps fly coming down the wicket trying to smash Shukla. Jersey number 18 was the next. He looked as troubled as ‘Ashwin against Maxwell’. Just as the example there was only winner out there as Virat failed again. However as a sequel to Ashwin Maxwell tale, Yuvi looked as comfortable as Maxwell treating every other bowler as his Ashwin.

One interesting thing is the crowd never really seemed to worry with falling wickets. The cheer for the next batsman was increasing with every wicket till ABDV got out. Because Sachin Rana was the next batsman. ABDV was welcomed with the loudest cheer and he made sweetest sound with his bat. The sound of ball hitting his bat was as gorgeous as the man himself. Abraham Benjamin de Villers is all about love. He is kind of a super hero who never disappoints anyone. He appreciated the crowd whenever possible- thumbs up, clap, oh that beautiful smile- and the crowd didn’t hold back its love for the man. If you ask me, the most loved, most appreciated and undoubtedly the most gorgeous player in Chinnasamy is him. I hope I can express my love for ABDV someday.

The crowd erupted with Aaaaai Beeeee Deeeeeeee and it seemed everyone in the crowd is leading a troubless life with unbelievable joy dancing on their faces. And then their love was bowled ending up in a faint Aar Cee B chant. To be honest, no one in the stadium thought we would celebrate Diwali in a while. Every six of Yuvi was greeted like a Diwali. The Yuvraj Singh trademark bat swing was back with crowd going crazy from Aaaaaar Ceee Beeeeee to Yuviiiiiiiiii Yuviiiiiiii to Singh is King.

RCB started defending its total with no one daring to predict the outcome of the result after what Smith and Faulkner did. With every over the crowd lost a substantial part of its nail and nothing was left to bite during the final five usually nightmare overs. For a change, RCB managed to do the impossible- Defending a total.

Virat Kohli’s celebration after victory means full paisa vasool for the umm 25 percent empty Chinnasamy crowd. Walking off the steps, where Vada Pav and the not so tasty Veg -not a biryani- was forty rupees less than it cost during the game, wondered how worse would have been the situation for RCB had it not been for DD. Thank you Delhi  Dardevils for being utter shit and helping us save our grace every single time. 

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Dear fellow RCB devotees...

With the first leg of T20 overkill done and dusted in Bangladesh, the second one, Internationally acclaimed domestic T20 cricket aka the IPL is all set to begin in UAE. So here comes the multizillion dollar question,

"What should one expect from the Royal Challengers of Bangalore this time around?"

A few frowns, a few sighs & more than a few outrages with my inner club cricket goddess self later I can tell you, well let's not expect a lot. For the impatient, qualifying for the playoffs looks like quite a big ask. Before I jump to my predictions, let's have a look at the cutlery we have been offered by Dr. Mallya, with love.

Oh Yuvi, oh..

Is it too soon to address ourselves as disgruntled fans? Because I'm pretty clueless about our marquee signing. Even more so, after four very painful hours of twenty-twenty cricket contested between India & Sri Lanka at the World T20 Finals. Even more more so after seeing our-supposed-to-be-the-trumpcard-of-the-season eating twenty one balls, Virat Kohli's patience & the cup. Even more more more so after visualizing him having a tournament like that for RCB in my mental HD.

I nearly got a coronary but let's just stop there.

Who is Yuvraj singh to us? Inside each of us, we have a special place for him. The man who won us two world cups and countless matches. The man who showed us what a comeback means. The man who gave us memories, the man who inspired a generation. But the fairytale ends here. A fairytale on general notions not certainly on cricketing ones. Or rather not acceptable on cricketing terms. He has forgotten consistency which was once his element in contributing to the team when he was most needed - 352 runs, 15 wickets, Man of the tournament  in WC 2011 and a couple of unbelievable knocks, 148 runs, a wicket in T20 WC 2007.  However, things for him have been pretty quiet or rather poor for a considerably long time now. A below par ODI run or his ever terrible IPL run doesn't bode well with our expectations. Well, what's next? Forget the terrible 21 ball 11 against Sri Lanka in the final. I am sure you would have forgotten the nervy chase against WI in the group stages. Now let's hope he continues his decent, if not good, run in T20Is scoring 401 runs at an average of 30.84 in 17 matches. When everyone wrote him off, he staged an unthinkable comeback. Comebacks are always alluring but to make it happen again and again makes it even more sweet. We haven't seen your last. We want to believe.

We believe in you. Your cricket. Your abilities.

Let's have some drumrolls. Can we say, Come on Yuvi!

It's not all gloomy. It's partially the best fireworks you could buy in the Diwali market.

#TEAMBEASTMODE

There is nothing much to say about Virat Kohli & AB de Villiers. Is there? These two are exceptional players, both of them are likely among of the greatest players in this generation. Their grace and their exploits are so outrageous that it seems like the other nations will ask authorities to drop them for level playing field. The joke is, it is not even an over exaggeration here.

© Royal Challengers Bangalore

We also have a Superman who re-invented himself from the fourth season of IPL who has been the showcase of power hitting since then. The SuperMan or rather WHAT-HE-EATS-MAN we are talking about is from Jamaica and he is called Christopher Henry Gayle - The only one to have scored 11 T20 centuries & also holding the record of scoring maximum number of sixes in the same format. Having scored over 600 runs in the last three seasons - being the only man to do so in the history of IPL, we can put our expectations on the big man to do for the fourth straight season.

Bowling, I don't even..

RCB, popularly Royal Chokers, are suitable for the tag –‘South Africa of IPL’. While the choking part holds up, the thing is RCB never had a great team unlike South Africa. They would probably top the ‘swag’ table with the likes of Virat Kohli, Chris Gayle and AB de Villiers but that isn’t everything with rest of the team reduce to mere fillers in the team sheet more often than not. Always top heavy-with the above three scoring nearly 70% of team runs last season-they never had a bowler capable of running through the batting line-up let alone a bowling attack. The sad story here is team management doing little to mend the glorious errors of predecessors ending up increasing the weight of already heavy top order.

DON'T ASK ABOUT OUR BOWLING, DO YOU UNDERSTAND?

When you look at the depth SRH possess - Steyn, Mishra, Sammy, Irfan, Rasool, Karan Sharma, Ishant - in bowling we are nowhere near. But considering Vinays and Mithuns and Arvinds of past seasons, we have a far better attack with an able leader- Lankier than the scariest Johnoson he strikes at a better rate than Dale Steyn, possessing an average that would make Malinga jealous. Mitchell Starc With a T20 average and strike rate of 15.34 and 13.1, the leader of the pack, will be the bowler to watch in this season. In Varun Aaron we have a lot of hope and pace and we should ensure our prayers make Ashok Dinda bowl better than what he is used to. There are many chances that our prayers will be answered considering who is presiding the bowling department- Allan Donald.


But to be honest, it's all old rum in new bottle, making the best use of the resources.

Well, where is the spin? In flat and dry tracks of UAE and India?

Only God knows.

So then...

Daniel Vettori, the coach or mentor, whose main task was to find a good spinner in auctions, failed miserably picking a burned out Muralitharan and a 33 year old Jakati with one good IPL season. While Muralitharan managed to pick three wickets at an average of 59.00, owner of the worst figures in RCB, Jakati didn’t manage to get a game for CSK last season. Now Vettori has no choice but to extract something with a rookie in Yuzvendra Chahal or expect 2011 WC magic in Yuvraj Singh.The chances of RCB lies on how much Virat Kohli, the captain, can push the bowlers and the team. We all know what he is capable of. He almost defended low scores in Asia cup, with equally poor bowling attack, which we would never have imagined if not for him. The shrewd bowling changes were only let down by fielding efforts which were a huge factor last season of IPL even. No one better than Virat knows how it is to drop a catch, the game and a playoff spot.
Though bowling and fielding is built on heaps of hope and only that, batting department is probably the best in the league. In Virat, ABDV and Gayle you have three best batsmen in this format. With these three taking up all the scoring burden usually, the new additions Parthiv Patel, capable of splitting powerplay field, and Yuvraj-we know what he is capable of - add more steel to the batting.


The arrival of Parthiv Patel is of huge importance here as it helps in more than one way. First of all- Ab de Villiers could be relieved from keeping duties thus adding a tremendous fielder to the outfield and then a settled batting order. In Parthiv there is a good support to the ever explosive Gayle to give solid starts to batting through to ensure the dynamic hitters- Virat Kohli, ABDV and Yuvraj- a platform.


Apart from all this, at the end of the day, qualifying for playoffs depends on how Yuvraj Singh expresses himself with the ball. Slow left arm is a gold mine in T20s and if he could get his bowling form back we’ve got another reliable wicket taking bowler in addition to Starc.

Best XI..


What would be the best eleven look like? You can't trust the team management to put one. After they made Dan Christian play a game or two. Maybe Virat Kohli and co. have a syndrome of going for reputation rather than form. Nothing could explain why Murali played that many games. They will come up entirely with a different, odd or if you can say, stupid, line up. Cursing the team management again, this is the best XI we could propose-


Gayle, Parthiv Patel, Virat Kohli, Ab de Villiers, Yuvraj Singh, Vijay Zol, Ravi Rampaul, Mitchell Starc, Shadab Jakati, Asoke Dinda, Varun Aaron.

Ladies & Gentlemen..

Let's not expect too much. Too many heartbreaks in a short span of time is pretty bad for our cricketing health. Let's hope for the best, cross our No.18 jerseys, offer the purest prayer to our Gods. Let's believe we might if we can seems too far away. Let's have faith in the modern day demi gods. Let's do it.


After all, you never know what is on the cards in this game of cricket. Do you?

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