World Cup semis: The stories you definitely won't see

Mahinda Rajapaksa invites Queen Elizabeth II and John Key to chill out at the World Cup semi-final

Sri Lanka's President (& head of government), Mahinda Rajapaksa, has invited New Zealand's head of state Queen Elizabeth II and the head of government John Key to enjoy his hospitality during the World Cup semi-final at the Premadasa stadium as part of a diplomatic coup. The two island nations have been engaged in a 'cold war' since December 2006 after Murali was controversially run out even as he was walking to congratulate Sangakkara on his brilliant 100 at Christchurch.

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Nathan Guy warns team against any attempts to smoke weed before semi-final

New Zealand's Minister of Internal Affairs, Nathan Guy, has issued a strict warning to the New Zealand team ahead of the World Cup semi-final against Sri Lanka. Acknowledging that New Zealand cricketers had a past history, he indicated that the team was under surveillance. Smirking & refusing to comment when this reporter asked him if he knew what South Africa's batsmen were smoking during the quarter-final, he said "I don't know about that, but what they were doing was a phonetically similar 7 letter word ending with 'oking'".

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All set for mother of all semi-finals

Sri Lanka's media have lapped up the world's attention around the semi-final featuring Sri Lanka and New Zealand. Hordes of politicians, businessmen & celebrities have landed in Colombo. All hotels in and around Colombo have hung 'house-full' signboards and tickets are being traded in the black markets at premiums exceeding 500% of the list price.

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Will New Zealand finally break the World Cup jinx against Sri Lanka?

New Zealand's rugby fanatic media woke up on Saturday to the breaking news that their cricket team had finally got rid of their bogey side, South Africa. Their elation was tempered after the realization that the semi-final was against Sri Lanka, who they have never beaten in any knock-out game at an ICC event!

Labels: 2011, 2011 world cup, headline, new zealand, semi-final, sri lanka, world cup

Thus spake Jagadish @ 11:43 pm | Sledge/Read 23 sledge(s)
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2007: The year of the minnows?

For the first time in over five seasons, 2001/02 being the last time this happened, Mumbai will not feature in the semi-final stage of the Ranji Trophy. Saurashtra will join Delhi, Baroda & Uttar Pradesh in the semi-final lineup.

I've always felt that the Ranji Trophy really needed to be fine-tuned to ensure that states didn't have multiple teams representing the region (Baroda, Saurashtra & Gujarat; Vidarbha, Maharashtra & Mumbai; Andhra & Hyderabad) as well as a revamp required to exclude the likes of Services, Tripura, Himachal Pradesh, Saurashtra, Jammu & Kashmir and Goa purely on the basis of their past performance over the 70+ year history of the Ranji Trophy. So, Saurashtra's success is a surprise to me, and makes me eat humble pie.

Perhaps 2007 is the year of the 'minnow': Saurashtra reaching the semi-final of the Ranji Trophy (who knows, what'd happen next!), Tasmania reached the Pura Cup final, Durham fell short of eventual County Championship winners Sussex by just 4.5 points, Zimbabwe beat Australia at Twenty20 while Ireland & Bangladesh created major upsets at the World Cup.

Labels: australia, bangladesh, baroda, durham, india, ireland, minnows, mumbai, ranji trophy, saurashtra, semi-final, sussex, tasmania, twenty20 world cup, uttar pradesh, zimbabwe

Thus spake Jagadish @ 6:02 pm | Sledge/Read 0 sledge(s)
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