Blackboard CWC '15 - issues, issues, issues

So it's been over two months & nine International matches since the Men In Blue won a game of cricket. Sometimes they came close, sometimes agonisingly close, sometimes threw it away, sometimes succumbed to pressure & sometimes never made a human chance out of it. No, before you assume that I'm here to throw my furnitures at the Indian cricket team regarding their recent heroics abroad, as much as I'm tempted but that's not the case. They escape today, marginally so.
My agenda today is a little far sighted, approximately three hundred & eighty two days away. It is the cricket World Cup 2015, to be hosted by Australia & New Zealand & to be defended by erm, us.
I'm writing this specifically to emphasize that "erm" there. And ofcourse, I have enough details to scare you guys a bit more if the boys haven't done enough already.

The pre & the present math : source of the scare 

© CFL 

What happens if you grab your goldfish out of the aquarium & put it on the desk for a minute? It starts trembling, crawling & waving it's fins desperately in need of the oxygen it's used to. That goldfish is Indian team, outside the subcontinent, on the bouncy green decks, facing an average to a good bowling lineup, exposing the familliar woes, out of sorts, moving in no direction. No kidding, the current set is brave, brave enough to overcome these but then my friend, you ought to say that the results are yet to show up. The overseas record since the last World Cup in 2011 has been well, shameful. Yes, big enough word but 4-0 (England), 4-0 (Australia), not making the finals of the CB Series, 2-0 (South Africa), 1-0 (South Africa) & now 3-0 (New Zealand), the list just keeps getting longer & longer & painfully longer. And you know what's worse? The schedule coming right up involving tours of England & Australia just threatens to add a bit more to the sorrow.

So brace yourselves, I intend to break down the issues neat & clean. If at all, we are to retain our glory, a serious postmortem is in order.

Opening woes : once resurrected, twice fatal 

We thought we had this in the bag, damn it.

But thanks for making our heaven drop right back to Earth & now inching towards hell, dearest Rohit & Dhawan. They batted like a dream, not putting a wrong foot forward, it was unreal to think that we found Viru & Gauti 2.0 so soon. Oh yes, too soon. Dhawan averaged 24.00 in the 3 ODIs vs South Africa & 6.00 in the 3 ODIs vs New Zealand till he was dropped on the fourth one to make way for Ambati Rayudu. Not to dwell on the results but it was his manner of dismissals that would make you frown. Cross seam deliveries at a genuinely quick 140+ pace, short of good length or banged in short. He pulled, it went to the keeper. He pulled, he mistimed it. He pulled, straight to the man on the boundary. Personally a fan of his, I was gutted. He was last person I wanted to put in the Raina-Yuvi category. Rohit on the other hand, threw it away mostly like a Rohit Sharma can do, fired up by verbal duels or a string of fishing outside off. So what do you do? Bring back Gambhir & Sehwag? Stick with these two? Make Virat open? Make Rahane open? Make it a combination of experience & youth? Drop Rohit back to the middle order & let Dhawan stay? More options the merrier? Not. Bringing back Gambhir doesn't seem like a bad idea after all. He has the experience, he has the anchor as long as he doesn't wish to poke. Him & Dhawan will do. The latter has some serious sorting out to do though. Or Che Pujara. He provides the solidity & consistency a Kane Williamson does for New Zealand. I'm not with Virat being made to open, although there is not much difference, the no.3 position has some blood-flesh relationship with him. Why not let the man have it?

Overdependence on the men in charge 

Just because they don't disappoint you 99.99% of the times, if you're banking on Captain & Vice-captain to win you every match, day in, day out, I'm sorry, that's called burdening. There are people who would blame it on Virat & Dhoni, saying that they got out at the wrong time. Maybe they did. But for heaven's sake, what are the nine other men doing? Is it just their responsibility to take you over the line all the time? No, it isn't. Virat Kohli & MS Dhoni are your trump cards, key players, they'll set it up, they'll finish it off but you ought to have another guy or two stepping up, supporting them. 

Swing 'em, eh?

I remember the cricket pundits nodding in approval when four succesive balls went past Md. Hafeez's bat in Bhuvaneshwar Kumar's debut match. It was fun to see him playing the Oh so close oh so close game with the top orders of the oppositions. He didn't have the pace but the accuracy was admirable. It's been a while since he has looked a bit ordinary. Be it Md. Shami bowling in tandem or whatever, too many down the leg, too many loose balls & barely any swing. On the other hand, Shami, having the pace, the ability to take wickets, does save the day more often or not but he's quite expensive as your leading bowler. All you can hope for is that these two too don't end up in the eventually swingless, ineffective list of the Kumars of Indian cricket. Varun Aaron, fresh off a prolonged injury break, I'd give him some time before I judge him. But he looks raw, pacey, lack of direction &  variations so far. So is Umesh Yadav where Ishwar Pandey & Rishi Dhawan are yet to be given chances to prove themselves. This 3rd option will cause some headache & if fit, Irfan Pathan is my man.

Oh, I forgot Ishant. Keeping him on the bench looks like good karma, we should stick to it for some time. (i.e forever)

Part time options, the lack of quality 

The fifth bowler. It's like you have to choose between candies, sugar & honey. Yuvraj Singh & to an extent Suresh Raina were the best we had. Had. When you see Virat Kohli bowl those nasty leg cutters & full tosses & no balls off the wrong foot with that ridiculous to the power ridiculous action of his, you know you don't have many choices. Seeing Ambati Rayudu bowl yesterday, it felt like even Virat would've been better. Rohit being the other option & all three being good enough to give away 20 an over, you have to pity Dhoni.

So what do you do? Keep your fingers crossed that Binny bowls as hardcore as he looks. For now.

Captaincy : Y u no attack? 

A captain is as good as his team. Yes, most certainly. Although a certain Tiger Pataudi would've disagreed with the cliche. To him "A bad captain can make a great team look ordinary." This is certainly not a great team but MS Dhoni the captain isn't great either. Why does your part timer bowl 3 overs at 7.25 & the allrounder you picked in the expense of an One Day veteran bowls just one when you are defending 278? When the best test lineup in the world is as cornered as it could be, why do you start the final session with your 5th bowler? Just because you lost two matches chasing, why choose to bat first when your bowlers are inable to pick wickets at the right time? Oh the questions are endless. To be honest, we all know that MS Dhoni does pull out a rabbit from his hat but overseas, if you cancel out the Champions' Trophy, I see the hat but where is the rabbit? You have to question his field sets, his decision to "back" non-firing players for longer than any captain should, his approach to win a match, his favoured team combinations with the luxury of two spinners on foreign tracks & ofcourse, his prized tactics. I think Gideon Haigh, the master of words has put it right. "Dhoni isn't a tactical commander, rather a supervisor. He leads by ineffectual experience."
( Reference : Here)

Mind you, this is about Dhoni the skipper & has nothing to do with Dhoni the batter.

There is a level till which one can tolerate, hoping for magic, luck & even fairy tales.
But that level has been crossed by far, don't you think? As a friend said, he has to be a very lucky person to be asked to lead the team with the dubious set of overseas records he carries with his ever so cool, ever so calm, ever so smiling persona.
He is the luckiest, no doubt. I cannot imagine another captain from any other country, continuing or being asked to continue with half the burden from Dhoni's records. But then, Indian cricket doesn't work that way.
Maybe we need to believe in some supernatural overhaul that takes away all the cool & calm and transforms Dhoni the defensive to Dhoni the aggressive overnight.

Or you could try out a Virat Kohli. Please, enough of that he's yet to mature shit. There was a smooth transition possible a half century ago with Tiger taking the responsibility from Nari contractor and if we have to believe the history books, there wasnt any outrage seeking maturity from a 21 year old.

There is a famous footballing philosophy saying, "You are old enough if you are good enough" He is good enough and with that he should be allowed to take the reigns from a captain who is struggling to turn the tides overseas. Why?

 I'd rather lose with the youth who learns from his mistakes.

Death bowling : well...

When it comes to the bowling department, we are still in the same phase wherein we are still looking at who our permanent bowlers are. We know the spinners and they look good and we know they are the ones who will carry on until the World Cup provided there are no injuries. Fas bowling, we are still not sure who our choices are and what individuals we are looking forward to. Back at home we talk about pace & bounce. We get bowlers who bowl quick but they end up giving more runs without even bowling at the slog. So we have to find a fair balance.

That was MS Dhoni in his press conference yeserday. There, you have your answers. We don't have the crop of fast bowlers to bowl you out anywhere, forget the death. Bowling is our main worry, as always, heading into an international tournamnet but giving away 80-100 runs in the last ten like they are now, is an alarming practice to be beheaded as soon as possible. Easier said than done & then batting has always been our aura. But it is time when batting marvels are unable to bail you out, there is just too much to do. It is time when our bowling is disappointing & disgracing our batting.

So what do you do? There is not one pleasing answer, unfortunately. You groom Shami, who looks the best bait so far, you hope Jadeja-Ashwin keep up the good work since the 2nd ODI & then you have a blank to fill in the form of your 3rd go to man. Bhuvaneshwar is sincerely, not cut out for death.

There are so many more problems, so many more issues to address, so many weaknesses, so many gaps.

There is slip fielding that make you pray that may Rahul Dravid gets out of the commentary box & take the field. There is the familliar issue of tackling short balls. There is overall deep fielding, in the form of Ashwin, Aron who needs to improve by far. There is Suresh Raina, whom you have to decide on. There is the lack of a genuine allrounder, you have to stress about. There is the toss factor, the pressure, the expectations & well, I will just stop and let you enjoy the depression.

It is easy to say, based on the present that Cricket World 2015 looks like a dream with thousand stairs leading up to it. We have to climb & climb hard, solving the issues, giving the answers & showing the results. Dare I say, it looks unlikely with every passing match we lose & ofcourse, the credit is mine for reverse jinxing if they make the finals after all.

But we can't just give up, can we? We are world champions. We bleed blue. We will fight.

Here's crossing my fingers & hoping for the best. 

[ I think I'll check for white hairs now that I'm done with the piece. You should too. ]

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The love that cricket is.

So the other afternoon, utterly bored in this Bangalore apartment of mine, I chose to finally unpack the bags & start reading The Taliban Cricket Club by Timeri N. Murari. While the concept & story of the book is as good a novel as it could be, here is a few lines I thought was worth sharing with ya'll knowledgable fellas.

"Cricket is a democracy of actions and reactions….the two warriors are pitted against each other and only one can win…..Think cricket as a theatre in which an action repeats itself over and over again until the character is defeated….. Cricket is theatre, its dance, its an opera. …It’s about individual conflict that takes place on a huge stage. But the two warriors also represent the ten other players…It’s a relationship between the one and many. The individual and the social, the leader and the follower, the individual and the universal."

What to say about cricket? Alluring an affair as it is ever. It is love that consumes you, drives you crazy, makes you sane & suddenly you realise how it's sitting right after oxygen & food in your life cycle. The manner in which it prevails as a team game as a sum of multiple individual showdowns. The one on ones are charming. The situation, the need, the aggression, the calculation, the dominance and the way it unfolds makes the culmination a supreme delicacy. Well in Harold Pinter's words, "I tend to think that cricket is the greatest thing that God ever created on earth - certainly greater than sex, although sex isn't too bad either."

Be it Sachin vs Steyn or Uthappa vs Amit Mishra. Don't laugh at me yet, I have point to prove that requires a comparison on the ridiculous side. The former was lauded as an epic battle, as we all are aware of, appreciated, acknowledged and admired by the bests. The latter didn’t have the build-up any close to the former & not many were aware of it either and yes, I confess, it didn't have a lot to the sing it’s praise. There were a few though, who were flattered by the flurry of strokes, bouncers and glares. The few in fact was quite considerable in number, because this is Ranji Trophy we are talking, the jaded, bruised domestic tournament of India, extremely non-glamourous, hidden behind the curtains of IPL etc, which rarely attracts crowd and there was even one time when the number of security guards outnumbered the crowd. Back to the battle or combat or blitzkrieg. It was a quarterfinal game in the Chinnasamy stadium, Bangalore. Karnataka vs Uttar Pradesh.

 I didn’t know what to expect from Uthappa who was just back from a considerably long injury lay off. He greeted the paltry crowd with a fine leg boundary. Samarth, who opened the innings, performed very well in his debut against Mumbai was pushed down with Uthappa opening with the very talented KL Rahul. The first blow of the day was delivered by Rajpoot who impressed the CSK in a talent hunt.  Amit Mishra was quick enough to land killer blows with two wickets in as many balls in the next over. The batting team seemed crumbling and the momentum was very much with the UP team. Just as you thought they will run through the line-up, Uthappa thought it was about time to prove some people wrong. He kept his cool & took the conflict to his heart.  The scoreboard read 15-3. One to the point boundary, one to the fine leg fence, one to the unarmed deep mid wicket. He dominated the bowlers with his aggression in an unlikely situation. The contest in which he took the centre stage. And there was a pattern. A short ball, a stare, a boo(paltry yet vocal crowd) and a lovely boundary. The conflict was still on. Next over, Mishra had the upper hand with a near edge, a streaky boundary and a short ball. A Sachinesque straight drive followed in the Rajpoot over and the scorecard read 59-3. Uthappa’s contribution was 47. He is known for his shotmaking. He played them all and grew in confidence with a late cut and a midwicket heave. There was a clear winner now. As it goes, Robin Uthappa played to his strengths, unfazed by the situation forcing the dominance and thus winning a crucial individual conflict for the other ten. Cricket is fascinating no? (Oh the match had an interesting scorecard as well)

If you did follow Ranji this year, surely there was a pattern in the results, unlike the recent past that would've caught your sight. Here is some thoughts on them : 

January 23, 2012. Rajasthan was lauded for winning the premier domestic first class tournament in India for the second time in as many years. The final was so Ranji Trophy esque. It was decided on the basis of first innings lead and the finalists had four wins out of seventeen games till finals.  Karnataka, Saurashtra , Baroda and Madhya Pradesh had more wins than one of the teams in final in which Rajasthan managed to hold on to the trophy with just three wins throughout the league and knock out stages.  Mumbai which had three wins in the league stage was kicked out by Tamil Nadu in the Semi Finals by guess what?- First innings lead. That was the state of Ranji trophy two years ago.

Fast forward to January 18, 2014. Bengal, Maharashtra, Punjab and Karnataka were gearing for the semi finals with eighteen outright wins to their distinction. There has been a massive turn around in accordance with the number of  results. More than half of the matches had produced results. To be accurate 59 out of 112 matches had either of the team winning outright and score stands as 52.67% . To shed more light, the figure for 2011-12 season was 38.6%.

With BCCI getting involved in the media for all bad reasons (Still not enough in my opinion) they deserve brownie points  for this hefty turn around. Credit where it’s due. Right after the 2011-12 Ranji Trophy, the technical committee headed by Sourav Ganguly advocated a heap of changes in the domestic structure such as overhauling Ranji trophy format, abolishing the Elite, plate systems, introducing finer points system to push teams to go for an outright win including some changes in the calendar. After approving the recommendations BCCI had appointed Sanjay Jagdale to supervise and produce true pitches. For some reason Anil Kumble replaced Sourav Ganguly as the chair person of technical committee and he introduced four day gaps this season(2013-14) which wasn’t the case earlier.  Though the first year after massive overhaul didn’t show much improvement, the following year(current season) has improved strikingly if not drastically.

PS: Regarding the leaked position paper and proposed changes in cricket governance do what Jarrord Kimber said. You might get an idea about that here, here and here.

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On the defence of David Moyes.

Finally I have decided to come out of my exile. I am going to write a bit more frequently because this insightful piece enlightened me. And there is another reason to start blogging again. I don’t have a job anymore. End of a nice or actually not so nice journey in the corporate world. I am now bruised with the sore experiences  but rather with well built thought process about my future. "Experience is the best teacher," as they say and you have to experience to know that experience is the best teacher.

Sorry for the prelude. So, the heart of this blog? Manchester United.  Again this is a reflection of the reactions I encounter in social media which is turning out to be the perceived real voice. I am not sure how much it matters to the 75k odd people gathering in the old Trafford every weekend because unlike the whiners in the social media they applaud, they sing, they encourage the team in tatters.  If I am right, the mighty crowd even left the stadium once abruptly and I am not entirely sure because I rarely got to watch a game thanks to my ex-job.  Anyway the ever excellent Andy Mitten sums( up the mood which actually matters. Its not that we guys who never get to watch the game in the stadium doesn’t matter. But unlike us, the reaction of the 75k odd people matters more because they are seen as the representatives of the millions of United hardcores all around the world. He says the fans sing his name and the away support is reckoned to be the loudest of all and also adds that they feel Moyes deserves time.

Now. If anything that has to acknowledged from this season, that is the might of the great Sir Alex Ferguson. The point here is Moyes deserves more time to be judged. He is no guy who was picked just for the sake of it. He has his reputation. He has successfully managed a top 7 club in the most competitive league in the world. He has the knack of identifying and supporting the youth from the academy. Oh the Busby way.

“There was an unanimous agreement- David Moyes was the man”

-Sir Alex Ferguson in his autobiography.

Handpicked and supported by the man himself. Can't we spare him for a season or two?

Again in this four months, this squad is the testament of the greatness of Fergie. The old man has to be blamed. He spoiled every one of us with his spell. We were never used of an ordinary season. And by the tradition he was given necessary buffering time to build three great teams. David Moyes deserves it. I don’t agree with the argument that Moyes is inheriting a champion team which wasn’t the case with the former. To a certain extent that is true. Probably the team is far better but if there is anyone who could make this team win against the oil and Russian money, that is him and he has gone. David Moyes is not Alex Ferguson and no one can ever be. This is not a dig at DM and certainly not. This is in the praise of Sir Alex and an attempt to make people realise filling the latter’s shoe isn’t that easy as you imagine. And  learn the art of patience. Before you doubt his skills, give him some time.

And here are my arguments why Moyes isn’t responsible for the downfall. People easily blame the tactics.

[Customary disclaimer- You need not accept your opinion and obviously you are entitled with yours. ]

He resorts to wing play(add some statistics about failed crosses). –

What else he can do with our Ozil still finding his feet in premier league and RvP down injured pushing Rooney -who used to be creative from middle dropping down deep -to play as striker ?

You want tiki taka? With one proper mid field anchor in Carrick injured , squad filler in Cleverley, Manchester United’s own talent in Anderson ?

To Moyes’ credit he identified the areas that needed improvement right away only to be failed by Mr. Edward Woodward. We are still signing a left back and a creative mid fielder.

He could have erred here and there but don’t put the entire blame to make him the scapegoat.

You haven’t seen Fergie using a stupid odd tactic in a must win game? You don’t rememeber when we played Rafael and Fabio in the middle? And who could forget the shock after seeing Park against City at Ethiad.

” He would have been sacked had it been football manager.”

“Moyes should be sacked already”

And friends, this isn’t football manager or Chelsea. We are Manchester United.

And if you just skimmed through it, the point of  the eight hundred words above is – David Moyes deserves time. Let us judge when we feel enough is enough. Four months is not enough! Behave like a Manchester United fan, you sillies. 

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