No authoritative performances in the league stage

A month after taking a shot at the semi-final line up for the 2011 World Cup, it is now obvious that that either India or Australia will make it to the semi-final. That quarter-final will be played 1 day after the 8th anniversary of an inconsequential World Cup game, the last time these 2 teams met at the World Cup.

The oddest part about the first round was that none of the major teams actually stamped their authority on the league stage. Australia was expected to blow away opponents with their bowling, but the only teams to suffer the wrath of Australia's 'quick gun Murugan' attack were Zimbabwe & New Zealand. Sri Lanka, Kenya, Canada & Pakistan were largely untroubled. Pakistan outwitted Sri Lanka and Australia, nearly slipped up against Canada and got thrashed by New Zealand. New Zealand got thrashed by Australia and Sri Lanka, but thrashed Pakistan in-turn.

India and England tried their best to give Group B a lot of close games, and looked thoroughly unconvincing. While England did win against #3 ranked South Africa, India's wins came against teams ranked #8 and #9. South Africa were commanding overall, but had a brain fade against England. They've been celebrating the last over win against India as evidence that they've finally got rid of the 'chokers' tag. Sadly though, that win came in an inconsequential game. They will need to do this in a knock-out game to prove that their debutant players don't get the choker tag along with the national cap! West Indies and Bangladesh were generally incompetent but did show some promise.

Sri Lanka and Pakistan did enough to suggest that the best way to catch Australia unawares was on a slow turning wicket. I don't particularly care if Ricky Ponting thinks such wickets are essentially 'rolled mud'. Since this is an ICC event, and the ICC has control over everything that happens at the ground, I assume that the pitches are prepared by the ICC's team. If that's the case, Ponting can't complain about anything.

If the pitches are prepared by the hosting country's curator(s), then you have to question if that's fair. For a World Cup event, home advantage should be limited to playing in familiar surroundings, getting a lot of crowd support, being able to include replacement players at really short notice, etc.

I don't know if Ponting will be playing during the 2015 World Cup, but I'd be interested to see how he reacts if the Sri Lankan captain says they were playing on a trampoline after seeing balls whiz past their heads at Perth. He wouldn't like it, would he?

As for the semi-final lineup, it does seem from the Australia-New Zealand and New Zealand-Zimbabwe matches at Ahmedabad (venue for Australia v India) that the side batting first can be blown away. Mirpur (Pakistan v West Indies & New Zealand v South Africa) definitely assists spinners. Colombo (Premadasa) also shows that spin will rule. So, I wouldn't be surprised if the semi-final lineup was Australia v Pakistan and South Africa v Sri Lanka.

In other news, Shoaib Akhtar said bye bye to international cricket after a mercurial career that included 100 mph deliveries, drugs, ball tampering, fighting with a teammate, faking injury, etc.

Labels: 2011, 2011 world cup, akhtar, prediction, retire, shoaib akhtar, world cup

Thus spake Jagadish @ 11:53 pm | Sledge/Read 16 sledge(s)
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Brett Lee retires, BCCI asks for a rule change

Yesterday, Brett Lee announced his retirement from test cricket, to focus on playing limited overs cricket (ODIs and T20 games). There's nothing novel about such an announcement. He's just following in the footsteps of others like Flintoff, Oram, Styris and Vaas. You could argue though that given Vaas hasn't been picked in any ODI or T20 game by Sri Lanka for over 6 months after he retired from tests, he is unlikely to make it to the 2011 World Cup as a Sri Lankan player.

I had pointed out when Flintoff, Oram, Styris and Vaas retired that cricket boards run a huge risk of many marquee names, especially quick bowlers and all-rounders, quitting test cricket. Will they wake up now and figure out how to optimally schedule tests, ODIs, T20 games, ICC events, bilateral & multi-lateral ODI series and T20 leagues like the IPL, Champions League, KFC Big Bash, Twenty20 Cup, etc.?

Lee's decision to retire was widely expected. He hasn't played a test since the series loss to South Africa at home. He didn't manage to last out the ODIs against India. He hasn't played a T20 game for Australia since August 2009.

Yesterday, Sachin Tendulkar became the first man to score a double-century in a ODI game, with Belinda Clark having been the first to reach the mark in a limited overs international. The logical question is if other cricketers will now start scoring 200s for fun.

It only took one effort of 400+ (Australia, at the Wanderers in 2006) and in the next 4 years, we've had 9 instances. It is quite likely that Sachin Tendulkar's achievement of scoring 200 will also fall in the next 1 year. After all, it wasn't too long ago that Herschelle Gibbs made 175 in 111 balls and Tillakaratne Dilshan made 160 in 124 balls.

In an unexpected development, it is learnt that the BCCI has approached the ICC with a proposal to limit the number of batsmen in an ODI innings to 7. While publicly, the BCCI claims to have done so to protect the ODI game and to reduce the imbalance between bat & ball, sources in the BCCI told this blogger that the main reason was the abject failure of India's bowlers after South Africa recovered from 180/7 (Jaipur) and 134/7 (Jaipur).

A few other occurences in the recent past have convinced the BCCI that getting the likes of Ashish Nehra, Sreesanth and Ishant Sharma to bowl well to tail-enders is really not worth the trouble. The better option is to ensure that they don't even bowl to #8-#11., thereby insuring against last-minute carnage by the batsmen.

Labels: 2006 champions trophy, bcci, icc, lee, retire, rules, tendulkar, test cricket

Thus spake Jagadish @ 12:27 am | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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Could retainerships in Twenty20 leagues prevent premature retirements?

A couple of weeks ago, Andrew Flintoff announced his retirement from test cricket. He was followed by Chaminda Vaas. These retirements come as no surprise considering the physical strain associated with being quick/fast-medium bowlers. If Flintoff plays the remaining 3 Ashes tests, he would end up with 80 tests. The sad part is that he missed a whopping 63 tests. At 143 tests, he'd have been in the top 5 most-capped test cricketers of all time (behind Steve Waugh, Tendulkar, Border & Warne).

Last year, Scott Styris retired from tests. Earlier this year, Jacob Oram threatened to follow his teammate.

The irony is that the same cricketers who extoll the virtues of test cricket, call it the ultimate form of the game, rate their test cricket achievements as being the pinnacle compared to those in other forms of the game, etc. invariably end up retiring from test cricket. Can you point out anyone who has quit ODIs to continue playing tests? So do we all get this lip-service?

Cricket boards really run the risk of many more quality players quitting test cricket. Is it possible for everyone to have the cake and eat it to? Can T20 leagues & international cricket co-exist without antagonizing everyone involved? Is it necessarily a zero-sum game?

Let's make a few assumptions here - some could be wrong of course!

• Cricket administrators (cricket boards & organizers of T20 leagues) are telling the truth when they say test cricket needs to thrive.
  
• Cricket boards want to exercise maximum control over their players.
  
• Players believe that test cricket is the supreme form of the game.
  
• Players want to maximize their earning potential while they're still able to exhibit their skills well.
  
• Sponsors want the best players to be part of the event (not necessarily play) so that they can be used as great marketing vehicles.
  
• Cricket boards don't get anything from the IPL (or indeed any of the other proposed T20 leagues) when their contracted players participate in the tournament. So, a cricket board's first reaction to such a tournament is either that they won't allow their contracted players, or the players can participate for a ridiculously short period of time.
  
• The player's concerns are to not get injured, to play quality cricket, to earn as much as they can and to be able to fulfill their national commitments & contractual obligations with their cricket board.
  
• The T20 tournament organizer's primary concern is that the best players should be available for the maximum possible period of time, and play well enough in order to make the tournament a great success.
  
• Players are paid only on the basis of the number of games they play in T20 leagues.
  
• The money that cricketers earn from the IPL (or other leagues) is far in excess of what they have been earning so far.

Given all these assumptions, how do we best balance the self-interests of the players and the administrators? The combination of the last two factors hugely influences a player's decision to quit playing test cricket and free up that time to play more and more Twenty20, including at events like the IPL, Champions League, etc. Adam Gilchrist was largely spot-on in the talk he gave as part of the 2009 Cowdrey Spirit of Cricket Lecture (transcript & video) when he said:

An acceptance that professional players will increasingly make pragmatic decisions about their careers, which may involve playing less Test cricket or even perhaps, none at all. That the arrival of rich, franchised based competitions like the IPL will hasten this trend and reduce the primacy of playing for your country or provincial team. That a young first class cricketer in Bangladesh or the West Indies may have an entirely different set of playing priorities and goals to those youngsters playing in England or Australia. goals to those youngsters playing in England or Australia. That Cricket Administrators must adapt to these realities with clever programming of international fixtures to dove-tail off these competitions and if necessary radically change, even jettison the Future Tours Program in order to achieve this.

Let's leave aside for a moment the reality that Gilchrist contradicted himself in that statement. If the FTP was jettisoned, this would directly result in the likes of Bangladesh, West Indies & Zimbabwe playing less cricket against the 'stronger' (cricketing & economic factors) teams like Australia, South Africa, India & England. That would imply a reduction in the quality of cricket they're exposed to as well as revenue for boards. Do you seriously expect a cricketer from West Indies to say "No thanks, I'd rather play a test against Bangladesh because I'm so much in love with my administration"? Of course not! He's going to take the first opportunity available to throw away the WICB contract and play in one of the T20 leagues. So actually, by jettisoning the FTP, you could be increasing the risk that "a young first class cricketer in Bangladesh or the West Indies may have an entirely different set of playing priorities and goals to those youngsters playing in England or Australia". Having digressed, we now go back to the question - how to best balance the self-interests of the players and the administrators? Would a retainership-based payment structure work? What if the IPL (or other T20 leagues) split up the player's payment on a 60-40 basis, whereby 60% of the money they get is based on the number of games they play? But the remaining 40% is actually given to their cricket board. The cricket board could reduce the payment made to the player if he skips commitments (training, other contractual obligations, international games, etc.) because he gave a higher preference to playing in the T20 tournament. That 60-40 split is just a number. It could have been 50-50 or even 70-30, but the split-up needs to provide sufficient incentives & disincentives. Players who are not contracted to their boards would receive a pro-rata amount based on the number of games they played along with other contractual obligations fulfilled. This gives cricket boards enough incentive to release players for the tournament, knowing fully well that they will get something out of it if the players don't honour their side of the bargain. Players have an incentive to balance playing T20 leagues and international cricket. They don't fall under the 'daily wage worker' category, because really speaking when you're paid on a pro-rata basis, that is what you are! The tournament organizers & sponsors benefit since they know that cricket boards and players are both committed to the event because they both stand to gain. What are the potential problems associated with such a model? Manipulative boards (and there're plenty in that category) could reduce the payments on the basis of flimsy arguments. Players could opt out of board contracts, thereby removing the boards from the equation altogether and destabilizing international cricket. Tournament organizers & sponsors could offer incentives for players to give up their existing board contracts.

It may still be an option worth considering. If the model can prevent even one star player from quitting test cricket, I'd reckon it has done its job.

Labels: ashes, ashes 2009, burnout, champions league, colin cowdrey lecture, fatigue, flintoff, future tours programme, gilchrist, indian premier league, lord's, mcc, retire, spirit of cricket, twenty20, vaas

Thus spake Jagadish @ 11:35 pm | Sledge/Read 1 sledge(s)
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BCCI & TEN Sports, ICC "Hall of fame" and Michael Vaughan retires

Sometime last week, the BCCI announced that India would play a tri-series in Sri Lanka, with New Zealand being the third team. The announcement came a few days after India were thrashed at the Super Eight stage of the Twenty20 World Cup leading a lot of folks, including the coach Gary Kirsten, to proclaim that fatigue was one of the main reasons for the pathetic showing.

Maybe the BCCI was making a point - "You chaps can keep bleating about burnout. Until you actually collectively start pulling out of series, we'll keep milking you for what it's worth". So doesn't this previously unscheduled 4-match ODI series present a wonderful opportunity for players like the skipper Dhoni, Ishant, Gambhir and Yuvraj to excuse themselves from this tour?

Maybe there's a commercial angle that doesn't seem so obvious here. This would be the 3rd consecutive unscheduled series (or hastily arranged series) that is being played in a country where TEN Sports has the telecast rights for the Indian TV audience. The first was the ODI series in Sri Lanka and the second is the on-going 4-match ODI series in West Indies.

It does seem too much of a coincidence. But perhaps not when you realize that TEN Sports was in fact launched in India by none other than Lalit Modi and his MEN distributed the channel for a few years.

TEN Sports is partly owned by Zee, and the BCCI has basically not been on talking terms with Zee (Subhash Chandra) ever since he took the BCCI to court over the BCCI's allotment of TV rights 4-5 years ago when Zee Sports first won the rights only for the BCCI to move the goalposts when ESPN-Star bleated.

Now, after the BCCI announced an amnesty scheme for those affiliated with the ICL, maybe the BCCI and Zee Sports are becoming friends again. Maybe, like I predicted a year ago, the ICL would be wound-up and the quid pro-quo would involve TV rights, IPL team ownership, etc.

So maybe the new-found bonhomie explains why the BCCI is scheduling matches in these countries/regions. After all, surely the BCCI would have earned more revenue (gate proceeds, in-stadia advertising, etc.) if the games had been played in India.

Now, moving on to the ICC. At the start of the year, the ICC announced that it was creating a "Hall of fame" and the first list would have 55 players.

That '55' number sounds so arbitrary. Why wasn't it 50, surely a more 'round' number? Or did the ICC think they'd create 5 teams of 11 players each from the first batch of inductees? Given that the only wicket-keepers they've picked are Knott, Marsh and Walcott (who only kept wickets in 15 out of the 44 tests he played in), there's no way they could have got 5 playing XIs.

Ok, so that 55 is just a number picked out of the someone's nose. What was the criteria for picking these players? Test records? ODI records? Contribution to the advancement of cricket [especially applicable for those who played in the first 2-3 decades of test cricket perhaps]? Domestic cricket records? Gut-feel? Only those who'd retired before a specific date? There're a few players who really make me wonder about the criteria.

Barry Richards is universally considered to be among the best batsmen who never got to showcase his wares long enough in test cricket (4 tests at a batting average of 72 against a bowling 'attack' of Garth McKenzie, Ashley Mallett and John Gleeson). Watching this video of him batting convinces me that the perception about him isn't wrong. Yet, the hard facts are that he only played 7 innings.

Was David Gower such a good player? Obviously he was a very attractive batsman to watch, and was good enough to make bowlers look ridiculous. But he didn't do it often enough, and most certainly not when the bowling was of decent quality (averaging 33 against West Indies, for example).

Javed Miandad retired from international cricket multiple times, the last occasion being after Pakistan were knocked out of the 1996 World Cup. Martin Crowe played his last international cricket game 3-4 months before Miandad retired. So clearly 1995 doesn't seem to be the cut-off year. Perhaps it is 1996. Why 1996?

Surely, if David Gower finds a place on the basis of him being lovely to watch, Crowe must be a shoo-in, especially considering he averaged 45 against West Indies, 50 against Pakistan and 48 against Australia!

As noted in multiple tweets, Michael Vaughan retired from all forms of professional cricket yesterday, 11 months after he quit as captain. Exactly 3 years ago, I wrote about how he was only 32 and nearly retired because of his wonky knee.

Vaughan was a very pleasing batsman to watch, especially in 2002 and early 2003 when he was consistently dismantling India's and Australia's bowlers. However, the runs pretty much dried up after that series, and the most he averaged in a year after 2002 was 47.6 in 2007. It certainly wasn't for lack of opportunity, since between 2003 and 2008, he played at least 9 tests every year, including against West Indies, Bangladesh and Zimbabwe.

The reality is that Vaughan under-achieved as a batsman. On that front, I'd rank him alongside Stephen Fleming, VVS Laxman, Sourav Ganguly and Damien Martyn (until 2-3 years ago, Mahela Jayawardene would have also been included in this list). TV commentary, newspaper columns, reality TV adjudication, etc. beckon and I hope he does well in his new roles.

Labels: ashes, ashes 2009, bcci, book cricket, england, hall of fame, icc, lalit modi, retire, ten sports, tv rights, vaughan

Thus spake Jagadish @ 11:23 pm | Sledge/Read 6 sledge(s)
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Gunther glares at Andre Nel retirement press conference

In perhaps not too surprising a move, Andre Nel has announced his retirement from international cricket and will be joining Surrey from this English cricket season. He isn't actually joining them as an overseas player. Since he is South African, and since South Africa has a trade agreement with the European Union (see "Kolpak Ruling" text), he is eligible to ply his trade in the UK and not be treated as an immigrant/foreign worker.

Naturally, this suits Surrey, because now they can actually sign up some other player as an overseas player. The surprising bit though is that as per the ECB rules, players are eligible to be picked as 'Kolpak players' only if they have quit domestic cricket in their country and haven't played first-class cricket in the previous 12 months. In the case of Nel, the latter isn't true, since he's been playing the current domestic season in South Africa. As recently as 3 weeks ago, he was playing for Gauteng. I guess this means the ECB has agreed for an exception on that clause.

The reason I reckon the retirement news isn't too surprising is because he hasn't been picked for South Africa for over a year now, and the likes of the Morkels & Steyn have firmly established themselves as the next-generation quicks.

Andre Nel did a pretty decent job for South Africa, typically bowling first change or second change, and still picking up 123 wickets at an average of ~ 32 and strike rate of 62.

However, it isn't just his bowling that we'll recall. I'm fairly sure he's probably the only cricketer to claim that his alter ego plays cricket, by the name of Gunther. Sounds crazy isn't it?

He was first in the news when he bounced & hit Donald in a domestic game and burst into tears for felling his idol. He's not spent too much time away from the headlines since then.

I daresay he's made a lot of entertaining viewing over the years, with his odd bowling style, his glaring & eye-balling, his antics, constant chattering, etc. At times, he made Dennis Lillee look like Javagal Srinath when it came to body language. The risk with the antics though is that sometimes you're the pigeon, and sometimes you're the statue.

Labels: book cricket, england, kolpak, nel, retire, south africa, surrey

Thus spake Jagadish @ 10:13 pm | Sledge/Read 1 sledge(s)
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Steve Bucknor to retire from international umpiring

Steve Bucknor, who has umpired the most internationals (305) and as on date, the only one to have umpired 100+ tests, will be retiring from international umpiring in March.

In an interview to the Jamaica Gleaner, he said that his last test would be the 3rd test between Australia & South Africa while his last ODI would involve England & West Indies.

Now it's a lot more easier to make sense of Ricky Ponting excusing himself from the IPL. Notice that he wrote in his column "I have made the decision I will not play in the Indian Premier League Twenty20 competition this year." He didn't write "I will not feature in the Indian Premier League". Hence, it is perhaps not too outlandish to believe that as part of his training to move into a parallel career in umpiring, as we exclusively revealed here last month, Ricky will be doing umpiring duties during this season's IPL.

Steve Bucknor had been a reasonably ok umpire for a few years (ignoring his reluctance to seek the help of the TV umpire on India's tour of South Africa in 1992/3), despite his tendency to play havoc with TV broadcasters & producers by ensuring there was a minute's delay between the appeal and his decision. Nowadays though, so much money has been invested that we don't even get to hear the appeal, because we've got switched to an ad break!

But in the last 4-5 years, Bucknor's umpiring had deteriorated significantly. I never thought he was biased. But I was convinced he was incompetent. Instances posted on this blog - 2004 Aus v Ind, 2005 Eng v RSA, 2005 Pak v Ind, 2007 World Cup final & (very obviously!) 2008 Ind v Aus at Sydney.

The ICC has a real problem on its hands - a paucity of good umpires, cramped scheduling and a reluctance to use technology appropriately. Oddly enough, Bucknor hasn't ever umpired a T20 international!

Labels: bucknor, retire, umpires, west indies

Thus spake Jagadish @ 11:46 pm | Sledge/Read 1 sledge(s)
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Hayden announces retirement

A few hours ago, as we noted on Twitter, Matthew Hayden announced his retirement from all representative cricket, including book cricket. You can also see the video of his press conference.

As has been made obvious far too often on this blog, Hayden ranks pretty high in our list of "must-hate" cricketers. So that pretty much guarantees we aren't going to waste too much time in nostalgia.

Is it good riddance? Naah, we'll miss the verbal diarrhea for sure!

Labels: australia, book cricket, hayden, retire

Thus spake Jagadish @ 11:25 am | Sledge/Read 11 sledge(s)
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Anil Kumble retires

It was a piece of news that I'd been dreading for the last couple of days. Anil Kumble was clearly not going to play at Nagpur, given that he was coming back from one injury and ended up suffering another. The final test was beginning four days after the Kotla one ended, which meant time to recover was almost non-existent. His days as a test cricketer were also coming to an end, and playing the series against England was highly unlikely since for today's Indian cricketers, the satisfaction is when you retire after winning against Australia or Pakistan, compared to doing so after an England series.

So in a sense, I was quite prepared for the retirement announcement when it came, late on day five of the test. Yet, that didn't prevent me from choking up, shedding a tear or two, and feeling quite emotional. I didn't quite feel this emotional when the news of Sourav Ganguly's retirement trickled in.

For starters, Ganguly's been a regular for 12 years. But Kumble has been part of the furniture for nearly two decades. Two decades accounts for 80% of the time that I've followed cricket with any degree of seriousness. Also, I'd always felt that Ganguly would be the first to go. It's not as though Kumble had a couple of years more left in him, but it is much more easier to replace someone with 7000 test runs than someone with 600 test wickets! Think about it - 600 wickets is about the same as 12,000 runs (if you assume that a 5 wicket haul is about the same as a century) while 7,000 runs is like 350 wickets. They're both tough acts to replace, but match winning bowlers (& especially spinners) are harder to come by because pitches are so much more flatter nowadays.

To me, as a cricket fan, the emotional bonding with Anil has been different from what it was for Sourav. Although both had similar traits (enormous pride, refusal to take a step back, relentlessly aggressive, incorrectly tagged with labels such as "can't spin" or "can't play bouncy stuff", both made spectacular comebacks, both did a wonderful job of helping/grooming youngsters, etc.), they were as different as chalk and cheese. I don't think Anil Kumble has ever turned up in the match referee's room charged for an offense that he committed. In contrast, match referees would, especially when Ganguly was captain, block a half-hour slot in their calendars marked 'Code of conduct hearing with Indian captain at the end of the game' as soon as they had confirmation that he was leading the side.

In any case, this isn't the forum to analyze and contrast Ganguly & Kumble. Let me stick to Kumble.

Anil, you've been an inspiration to an entire generation of cricketers in India. You've symbolized the adage of giving 100% and playing for the team, regardless of fitness, form or match situation. When Harbhajan was picked as the main spinner for the 2001 series, I've seen you at the nets, arm in sling, mentoring him. Yet, when he was continuously picked as the first-choice spinner, you manage to reinvent your bowling almost completely, to ensure that even if the average went up marginally (27 to 29), the strike rate reduced (70 to 65). Yet, there're a few folks (admittedly myopic Aussies) who bizarrely rate Stuart MacGill higher.

The batting has improved by leaps and bounds in the recent past. There was the test century at The Oval. Later, at Sydney, during the final stages, you were the only one holding up the fort. At Adelaide, there was another superb effort to help the side go past 500. As for the fielding, maybe now we'll have to look for a specialist gully fielder, or agree with Gavaskar's frequent rant and stop putting in a fielder there!

As a result of you not having featured in ODIs consistently from 2003 or so, people with short memories have probably forgotten that you are in the top 10 ODI wicket takers list too. Whenever the opposition batsmen had taken a special liking to the medium paced stuff doled out, the captain would always throw you the ball by the 10th over, expecting you to take wickets and control the flow of runs. He'd also need you to take wickets between the 20th and the 40th over. Oh, and he would also need you around during the slog!

Let's just say the captaincy wasn't quite your cuppa, and I disagreed with appointing you ahead of Dhoni.

It's been a privilege watching you play. I really hope the BCCI doesn't waste a wonderful opportunity to ensure that the leg-spin successors (Mishra, Chawla, etc.) continue to gain from your gyaan.

Previous posts on Kumble: 50+ caught Dravid bowled Kumble dismissals, 1000 first-class wickets, India v Pakistan at Eden, 2004 - a year of plenty, going past Kapil's 434, ODI future, Can he go past 500?, 7/48 on day one & 400 test wickets.

As for the game per se, I think the turning point was the defensive declaration on day two. India should have declared at 550. When it became apparent that there was no declaration at that time, my jaw dropped. Those extra 50 runs were actually quite meaningless. The pitch wasn't helping the bowlers at all, so India could have actually bowled another hour at Australia's batsmen. Instead of ending the day at 50/0, they could have been 2 down. Defensive declarations seem to be a favourite with Indian captains, at least in the recent past, - Sydney 2004 and Oval 2007 come to mind.

All of Australia's batsmen have now scored runs. That's not a good scenario for India who're still missing out on runs from Dravid. Australia's bowlers still haven't got their act together while India's were totally ineffective at Delhi. The pitch has had a significant role to play - it was totally flat. If 22 wickets fall over the course of 5 days, 5 on the last day & 8 being the most wickets to fall in a day's play, then there's a serious problem with it. Nice 'retirement gift' from the curator!

The Nagpur test is at a new stadium. With new stadiums, pitches can behave unpredictably - either assist spin because of being underprepared, or assist batsmen throughout because of being overprepared. If it's the latter, I wouldn't be surprised if Australia sneak in a win.

To end on a statistical note, Laxman became the 5th player to score a double century and a fifty without being dismissed. So far, Anil Kumble and Shane Warne are the only ones to take 500 wickets and score 2000 runs in tests, and Kumble is the only one to take 500 wickets and score a test century! Kumble is #2 on the list of most balls bowled in internationals and has conceded the most runs.

Labels: aus v ind 2008, book cricket, india, kumble, retire

Thus spake Jagadish @ 10:00 pm | Sledge/Read 2 sledge(s)
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Sourav Ganguly's YouTube moments

In commemoration of Sourav Ganguly, who retired yesterday, here are some memorable 'dada' video clips from YouTube.

1999:
Shoaib Akhtar dents Bengal's pride - I happened to volunteer to edit the Cricinfo headlines section, and used that rather provocative headline, when Akhtar's short ball hit Ganguly in the rib cage, resulting in Ganguly retiring hurt temporarily. There was a lot of 'interesting' feedback (by Bongs) to Cricinfo's editorial team after that headline went up!

Teeing off against Sri Lanka at Taunton during the 1999 World Cup.

2002:
Providing a blazing start in the 2002 NatWest Series final after which he forgot to keep his shirt on.

Turned down an offer of bad light and mounted (along with Tendulkar) a thrilling assault on some very tired England bowlers.

In the company of Sehwag, he totally destroyed England at the ICC Knock-Out in Sri Lanka.

2003: A highly motivating century at Brisbane.

2004: A sensational assault in the first one-dayer at Karachi.

2005: Worried about turning up at the match referee's room again, so he makes it clear to Mohammad Yousuf that he doesn't want that situation to come up.

2006: Scintillating comeback which ended up helping India win a test in South Africa.

2007: First international century at his home ground. First test double hundred at Bangalore.

2008:
Edged and 'caught' by Michael Clarke at Sydney.

A match-winning 87 against South Africa.

Off the field:
Looking very out of place while dancing in a commercial.

Appearing in a commercial asking for everyone to support the Indian team.

---

Oh, and by the way, I will be at the test cricket tomorrow!

Labels: aus v ind 2008, ganguly, retire, video, youtube

Thus spake Jagadish @ 11:18 pm | Sledge/Read 7 sledge(s)
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Breaking news: Sourav Ganguly announces retirement

News trickling in just now - Sourav Ganguly has announced his retirement. He will be quitting after the test series against Australia.

It is unclear if he will be retiring from all forms of cricket, including book cricket. Remember, he captained the Kolkata Knight Riders in the IPL last year. Will he play in the 2009 edition?

The retirement, in my opinion, is poorly timed. The announcement means that he will definitely be picked for all four tests. It puts immense pressure on him, and the team. Just think back to Steve Waugh's farewell series against India in 2003/04. I'm fairly sure that Waugh's decision to announce his retirement before the series definitely impacted Australia's performances.

The other reason it is poorly timed is that it basically ensures that the likes of Kaif, Badrinath, Raina or Yuvraj have no hope of playing the series, barring injury affecting the rest of the middle-order.

Almost exactly a month ago, he declared that he had two more years of cricket left in him. So what has changed now in the meantime, especially considering he was picked for the first two tests?

There's so much you can write about him - being picked in 1992, a comeback in 1996, becoming India's best batsman in ODIs for 3-4 years (despite the presence of Tendulkar), his captaincy, the fact that the Indian team drastically improved its away performances when he was captain, driving opponents nuts with his own version of 'mental disintegration', the shirtless celebration at Lord's while continously mouthing obscenities, his repeat visits to the match referee room, the brilliant knock at Brisbane, his spat with Greg Chappell, being picked as an all-rounder, being picked for the tour of Pakistan in 2006, his batting in South Africa during his 2006 comeback, his double hundred late last year, his brilliant 80-odd against South Africa a few months ago, and so much more!

Will we hear of another retirement when the series ends?

Sourav, thanks for the memories.

Labels: aus v ind 2008, book cricket, breaking news, ganguly, india, retire

Thus spake Jagadish @ 5:04 pm | Sledge/Read 4 sledge(s)
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Graeme Hick will retire at the end of the season

Graeme Hick, who was part of Zimbabwe's 1983 World Cup squad, has announced that he will retire from county cricket at the end of this season. Commentators and fans in England will continue to tear their hair apart wondering why on earth he was a failure in tests, perhaps completely forgetting that he was (along with Fairbrother & Stewart) one of England's best ODI batsmen in the 1990s. Perhaps that gives you an indication of the lack of respect for the shorter form of the game.

In 2006, he had hinted that he could retire in 2007. In 2005, he scored his 127th first-class hundred, which took him past WG Grace. Remarkably, Worcestershire is the only county that he has played for!

Some trivia: In 1983/84, he played for Zimbabwe in series against visiting under-23 teams from India & West Indies. The Indian squad had Azharuddin, Maninder, Sidhu, Prabhakar, Srikkanth, L Sivaramakrishnan, Lalchand Rajput & Sadanand Viswanath with Shastri as the captain. The West Indies squad included Phil Simmons and Walsh.

Labels: england, hick, retire

Thus spake Jagadish @ 5:52 pm | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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Mushtaq Ahmed retires from county cricket after his right arm goes on strike

For the past few years, the only competitive cricket Mushtaq Ahmed had been playing was while representing Sussex, the 2007 County Championship winners, in England's domestic tournaments. Hence, his retirement from county cricket also potentially means an end to his cricket career. It is unlikely that he will play in Pakistan's domestic tournaments for two reasons: his knee trouble is obviously troubling him, and he signed up for the ICL. Nevertheless, the book cricket league can use his skills!

The Sussex CCC press release says

Taking 598 wickets in all competitions and bowling over 26,000 overs, Mushtaq has bowled his way in to the record books and has become an integral part of the Sussex community.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but that amounts to a wicket every 43 overs. In my opinion, that is quite a pathetic strike rate (260+ balls per wicket). Admittedly it includes bowling in limited overs games where you could go 2-3 games without a wicket despite bowling 10 overs each time. Even then, a strike rate of 260 is abysmal. I know its probably unfair to compare it with test bowling strike rates, but Mushy would be at #2 in the all-time worst strike rate list! Funnily enough, #1 is Asoka de Silva, a very ordinary umpire who was in the wilderness for the past couple of years but is now #1 in the ICC's Elite Panel of umpires (#1 since the list is in alphabetical order!)

But there seems to be something fundamentally totally wrong about that stat. Mushy's been playing for Sussex since 2003. Over 6 years, if he's bowled 26000 overs, it works out to 4300+ overs per season. That is one heck of a bowling effort! In the previous 3 seasons, for which I was able to dig up information on Cricinfo, he had bowled 1894 overs in first-class cricket, 334 overs in List A games & 70 overs in T20 games, amounting to a total of 2298 overs in those forms of the game across 3 seasons. How could he have bowled 4300 overs a season!?

Then I suspected something. Could it have been 'over 26000 balls' instead of 'over 26000 overs'? That seemed a possibility, since it would have worked out to a strike rate of 40 or so. It was confirmed from CricketArchive's listing of Mushtaq Ahmed's bowling statistics for each team he represented in first-class, List A and Twenty20 games. He had bowled 26503 balls for Sussex, taking 598 wickets for them (strike rate of 44.32, avg. of 25.37).

Needless to say, this was a stupid gaffe from Sussex! Even worse, every single news agency and website used the numbers without any sort of thought about whether it made sense!

I didn't see too much of him, but whatever I did, convinced me that he would definitely be in my list of top 10 spinners over the last 15 years. He ends up with over 1400 first-class wickets.

He was Pakistan's assistant coach during the 2007 World Cup.

Labels: book cricket, england, mushtaq ahmed, pakistan, retire, statistic, sussex

Thus spake Jagadish @ 11:50 am | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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Harmison retires from retirement

As it is, I've never really thought too highly about Steve Harmison mainly because of his inconsistency and the way he constantly came up with excuses for his abysmal performances. Before the Boxing Day test during the last Ashes, he announced his retirement from one-day international cricket. Yesterday, he announced that he was back in the reckoning!

Given his background, I'm very eager to see how long this 'returned from retirement' phase lasts. Assuming that the 2008 ICC Champions Trophy does take place in Pakistan, England's limited overs series in the next 6 months are in Pakistan, Antigua (Twenty20 for $20 million) and India (7 ODIs). If he's still playing all forms of the game even then, I will be very surprised.

In any case, returning from retirements isn't a new occurence. Khaled Mahmud retired from retirement twice!

Shahid Afridi first said he was retiring from test cricket. Then he clarified that it was a 2 week retirement.

Sanath Jayasuriya took a little bit longer than Afridi to come out of retirement.

We, Cricket 24x7, also plead guilty to the same offence. We were merely trying to emulate Imran Khan, who must surely be the 'King of retirement reversals'.

Labels: england, harmison, retire

Thus spake Jagadish @ 10:52 am | Sledge/Read 2 sledge(s)
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Stuart MacGill retires from international cricket

Stuart MacGill, who really ought to have changed his name to 'Stuart Long Hop MacGill' a long time ago, has retired from international cricket. One week or so ago, he had bowled a lot of tripe in the first test at Jamaica.

I've never really had a good opinion about him, and it isn't based just on his 'performance' when India toured Australia in 2003/04. I've watched him play against other opposition, and pretty much had the same conclusion: Quite over-rated. Maybe Warne and Kumble's accuracy resulted in me sub-consciously having a much higher bar on the number of long-hops that leg-spinners were allowed to bowl, but I frequently saw MacGill bowl far too many. It's a pity that he didn't play in the recent India-Australia series, for while India would have given him as many wickets as Hogg got, he wouldn't have played the crucial knock at Sydney that Hogg did.

Funny how none of the Aussie commentators point out that nearly 16% of MacGill's wickets were against Bangladesh. They always do so when it comes to Murali. MacGill also did well against England and South Africa, but that's something you came to expect!

Potentially the only time I had any sort of appreciation for an act of his was when he announced that he would not be touring Zimbabwe in 2004 over moral grounds.

Cricinfo ends its report about his retirement with:

While the end was not as he had hoped, MacGill will be remembered as an example of Australia's incredible depth during the Waugh and Ponting eras, and as one the best contemporary spinners.

In my opinion, MacGill was perhaps the 7th (or at best 6th) best spinner in the last 15 years: Warne, Murali, Kumble, Saqlain Mushtaq, Daniel Vettori, Mushtaq Ahmed, MacGill and Harbhajan being my list.

Labels: australia, macgill, retire

Thus spake Jagadish @ 9:01 am | Sledge/Read 3 sledge(s)
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Jason Gillespie retires to play in the ICL

Jason Gillespie today announced his retirement from first-class cricket in Australia. He will be signing up for the Indian Cricket League.

Gillespie was dropped from the Ashes-losing Australian side in 2005, but he made a mini-comeback when he was picked against Bangladesh. He then scored a double century against them at Chittagong, on his birthday, which is very likely to remain the highest score by a nightwatchman for a very long time!

While he did pick up 8 cheap wickets in the series, he was never recalled to the side.

Here's the stat question: Is Gillespie's 201 the second highest score made by a batsman in his last test? I know for a fact that Ponsford scored over 250 in his last test.

Labels: australia, book cricket, gillespie, indian cricket league, retire, statistic, twenty20

Thus spake Jagadish @ 1:32 pm | Sledge/Read 2 sledge(s)
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Crisis time for cricket?

It doesn't seem like a great time to be a cricket administrator, especially if you aren't an Indian cricket administrator. I'd say this is a pretty testing time for cricket and I really hope the powers-that-be recognize it and fix the real problems.

New Zealand cricket could really do with some help. Shane Bond's NZ Cricket contract was terminated since he wanted to play in the Indian Cricket League. Scott Styris retired from test cricket to focus on playing limited overs cricket. He'd only played 8 tests in the last 3 years, compared to 49 ODIs and 13 Twenty20 games in that same period. I just don't understand exactly how playing 3 tests a year stressed him out. Most other players play between 8 and 12 tests a year on an average! Stephen Fleming may retire from test cricket less than a year after retiring from ODIs after the 2007 World Cup. A whole bunch of Pakistani cricketers, including Mohammad Sami and Naved-ul-Hasan Rana, have joined the ICL.

Update on 14 Feb: Stephen Fleming has confirmed that he will retire after New Zealand's upcoming test series against England.

The Indian Cricket League isn't the only reason why players are retiring. The Indian Premier League (website) is also likely to result in several cricketers in the twilight of their careers retiring to earn a lot of money for a few weeks of effort. Adam Gilchrist is possibly only the first of a long list. Australia's star players are at loggerheads with their cricket board over potential sponsor clashes in the Indian Premier League. Simon Taufel is indicating that he may not renew his umpiring contract with the ICC. Given the umpiring cock-ups we've seen recently and the number of umpires available/eligible, this is a huge problem for the ICC. I'm fairly sure quite a few English county sides are worried as well, since the star overseas players they have signed up, at huge costs, would miss a few weeks of their county commitments to play in the IPL. There was a suggestion by an administrator (possibly from the IPL committee) that the ICC's Future Tours Programme (FTP) could be changed to accomodate IPL tournaments.

But is it fair to assume that the BCCI is the only one which will be sitting pretty? I'm not so sure about it. As various commentators have observed, given the amount of money the franchise owners have pumped in, they will eventually demand that their players be more frequently available to them. Even if they agree to priority being given for international cricket commitments, the owners could insist that the players join the teams late and play IPL games instead of playing in warm-up games. Alternately, they could insist that players play for their IPL sides when they're rested or in-between tours. Will the IPL cannibalize the BCCI's domestic cricket tournaments? Eventually, could the IPL cannibalize international cricket per se to the extent that players will opt for the IPL over an international tour?

So what are the problems here?

• Availability of players: The IPL may insist, eventually when it is successful, that players need to spend more time playing their league rather than international cricket. Can cricket boards make it very clear to the IPL and the franchisees that their contracted players will be available only if they are fit and there are no international or domestic commitments? They may allow players who are dropped to participate in the IPL. Hence this implies that the board's international commitments and domestic cricket tournaments take precedence over the IPL tournaments.
  
• Players retiring to play in the IPL: Once a player retires from international cricket, they are no longer contracted to the cricket board. Hence the board cannot bar a player from playing in the IPL. At most, if the player is still playing domestic cricket, then his state association can do something about it.
  
• Umpires causing the same problems as players: Like Taufel is possibly hinting, he could join the IPL at the expense of his international umpiring career. Also, umpires could opt to umpire IPL games rather than tests or ODIs.
  
• Player/Umpire contracts being terminated since they want to be part of the ICL: This potentially results in a dwindling player/umpire pool for the cricket board since the current ICC policy is that the ICL is an unauthorized tournament.

Labels: australia, bcci, bond, book cricket, fleming, icc, india, indian cricket league, indian premier league, ipl 2008, new zealand, retire, stephen fleming, styris, taufel, twenty20, umpires

Thus spake Jagadish @ 6:00 pm | Sledge/Read 4 sledge(s)
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Sanath Jayasuriya retires from tests, for now

Sanath Jayasuriya, dropped from the test side in 2005 first retired from test cricket in March 2006.

A couple of months later, he promptly reneged on his promise.

Confirming a report in The Sunday Times in November, Jayasuriya has now announced his retirement from tests, on the same day that he smacked James Anderson for six consecutive boundaries in an over.

18.1 Anderson to Jayasuriya, FOUR, wide and overpitched, dismissively thumped in the air over extra cover
18.2 Anderson to Jayasuriya, FOUR, dropped horrible one-day slash, the ball flies high to first slip, Bell gets both hands to it above his head but can't cling on ... that was travelling and Jayasuriya was saved by the fact he hit it so hard
18.3 Anderson to Jayasuriya, FOUR, square drive for four to add to Anderson's annoyance
18.4 Anderson to Jayasuriya, FOUR, pulled through square leg, a much better shot, genuine and timed
18.5 Anderson to Jayasuriya, FOUR, as is that, thumped high over extra cover to bring up his fifty off 62 balls
18.6 Anderson to Jayasuriya, FOUR, he can ... steered down to the vacant third man area, well placed and Anderson shakes his head in disbelief ... he could have had a wicket and instead he has 24 off the over.

Previous instances blogged about here: Lara v Kaneria, Afridi v Harbhajan and Sarwan v Munaf. The last batsman to hit all six balls of a six ball over for four was Chris Gayle.

*Yawn*: In other cricketing news, Murali took his 61st five wicket haul and 709th test wicket to go past Shane Warne.

Labels: book cricket, jayasuriya, murali, retire, warne

Thus spake Jagadish @ 6:16 pm | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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Darren Lehmann retires

Darren Lehmann announced his retirement from first-class cricket today.

He is one of two chaps to have hit the winning runs in a World Cup final, and most likely the only one to have authored the final act in two finals. He hit the winning runs in 1999 and caught Zaheer Khan, India's last wicket, in 2003.

Lehmann has not played international cricket since February 2005. He was named Cricketer of the Year in 2004. In 2003, he was banned for five games after screaming out a racist comment which was heard by the Sri Lankan team.

The fact that he announced his retirement from 'first-class cricket' indicates to me that he will, in all likelihood, join the Indian Cricket League or the Indian Premier League or the Universal Book Cricket League.

Labels: australia, book cricket, indian cricket league, indian premier league, lehmann, retire, twenty20

Thus spake Jagadish @ 7:18 pm | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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The Dravid imbroglio

The selection committee's decision to drop Rahul Dravid for the first two one-dayers against Pakistan was totally on expected lines. But what is bizarre is the fact that they still consider him to have been 'rested'. He had been 'rested' for the last one-dayer against Australia, despite having had a 3 week break after the England one-dayers since he opted out of the Twenty20 World Cup and despite batting a total of 89 minutes in the one-day series against Australia.

The honourable thing for him, and indeed the BCCI administrators (including selectors), was to have decided that he was no longer going to be part of the equation for ODIs. At the risk of flogging a dead horse, I repeat. I have always felt that it is high time Tendulkar and Dravid stopped playing one-day cricket. If this needs to be done in a phased manner, then at most only one or two of the troika should play each ODI.

Ganguly, despite his at-times bizarre batting methods, is far more likely to single-handedly win a ODI than a test match. Dravid is far more likely to single-handedly win a test than a ODI. Tendulkar is capable of both, but given he is pig-headed about opening the batting when there are at least 4 other batsmen (Ganguly, Uthappa, Gambhir, Sehwag who should be doing the job, it is high time he was presented with a fait accompli - drop down the order or exit ODIs. I hope he chooses the latter option.

I've seen a lot of articles arguing about how stupid it is for the BCCI to pick Sehwag despite him having played only a handful of Twenty20 games recently and not having done anything of note (barring a 60 against England in the Twenty20 World Cup). But at least the BCCI is being consistent. Dravid has been sent back to domestic cricket where he will get to play 2-3 4-day games for Karnataka to prove that he is good enough to find a spot in the Indian ODI XI. Go figure!

Rahul Bhattacharya's comment piece on Dravid's omission is lovely because it argues that Dravid is only human, warts and all. Adding on to his theme on Dravid's selflessness, let me point out that Dravid agreed to don the wicket-keeping gloves in 2002 when with the likes of Sehwag, Yuvraj and Kaif nearly having nearly established themselves in the team, he was faced with a situation where he would have been left out. So, along with helping the balance of the team, he ensured that he was a certain pick for ODIs.

It is a testament to his mental strength and cricketing ability that he batted at many positions, doing fairly well in most of the roles he played, and ending up with 10,000 ODI runs. That doesn't necessarily make him selfless, but it certainly makes him great, in my book!

Labels: dravid, ganguly, india, odi, retire, tendulkar, twenty20, twenty20 world cup

Thus spake Jagadish @ 4:08 pm | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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Five runs penalty for Pakistan, again!

One of Inzamam's first acts on returning to the Pakistan team for his farewell test was to accidentally palm the ball onto the helmet behind Kamran Akmal, thereby costing Pakistan five runs.

38.4 Mohammad Asif to Prince, no run, outside off, and he gets the edge at last, falls short of Inzamam at slip, Akmal may have reached that if he had dived, the ball comes off Inzamam's hand, rolls away and into the helmet, 5 penalty runs given

The significance of this is that it was a rather uneventful act in comparison to the last time he/his team were involved in an act which cost five runs.

Delicious irony and coincidence, considering this happened just one day before Darrell Hair withdrew his allegations of racial discrimination by the ICC.

Labels: ball tampering, forfeit, hair, inzamam, oval 2006, pakistan, retire

Thus spake Jagadish @ 2:46 pm | Sledge/Read 2 sledge(s)
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