A view of the future?

Yes, long time no post. But hey, there were one-dayers on! Those are never interesting to write about.

Except when you watch these little skirmishes within the structure of the game.

Like Kevin Pietersen (27, batting avg. > 50 in tests and one-dayers) facing Piyush Chawla (18, 15 wickets from 9 games, including Pietersen twice in successive games). You immediately know this is a 'rivalry' we should be seeing for the next 8-10 years at least.

Ditto when he bowls to Ian Bell or Alastair Cook. The case is the same when Stuart Broad or Monty Panesar bowl to Yuvraj Singh or Dhoni or Dinesh Karthik.

It is in fact sad that Yuvraj is being referred to in the future tense. It has been seven years since he made his international debut. By now, he should have got a permanent slot in the test middle order, by capitalizing on the absence of Tendulkar and Ganguly during last year. Instead, he toured West Indies and made 104 runs in 7 innings.

Akash Chopra must probably be cursing himself and the selectors for spotting him only when there're tough series against Pakistan and Australia coming up. He's in the India 'A' squad which plays South Africa's 'A' team at home. One-day discards Mohammad Kaif and Suresh Raina are in that squad as well.

What would the Indian team in England give for Yuvraj, Kaif, Dinesh Karthik, Raina, Rohit Sharma and Uthappa manning the in-field? I've never seen such poor catching by an Indian team. I'd never expect a team consisting of Ganguly, Dravid, Munaf and Powar to be athletic. The least I thought they'd do is to at least hold the catches that come their way! That isn't the case.

So the best option is have Ganguly, Munaf, etc. 'injure' themselves every now and then so that Uthappa and Rohit Sharma can at least improve the standard of fielding. Alternately, have Powar and Munaf bowl in tandem so that the fielding damage only happens during one section of the innings!

Labels: catching, fielding, future, pietersen, piyush chawla, sloth