Lanka dahan on Saturday in Mumbai

Its time to face the Lankans in the final of the world cup in our own country. Sri Lanka, the old warhorses who play all their games at home and then come to Mumbai to play the final and claim the trophy as if its  their own without any fight. Just cos Murali is retiring, they want to lift that trophy and touch it. Get off folks.

You are in India, the land where you lost last 2 series 1-5 and 1-3. And in the last ODI you played here against India, you were so shit scared of the rising ball, that your captain got the pitch in Kotla banned for a good year.  2 victories and 8 losses in last 10 completed games is a very proud record isnt it.  I remember Sangakara making a lot of noise when they travelled to Mumbai to play NZ. And now they are saying they know the pitch well, the conditions well just cos they played one game there and Malinga played 2 IPL seasons there.

What a logic.

Sachin Tendulkar grew up playing cricket in Wankhede all his life. Most of them who play for India have played in Wankhede before in either a IPL game or ODI or a Test match.  Zaheer Khan plays his domestic cricket in Wankhede (whenever).  So do they expect on back of just 1 league game in Mumbai and Malinga’s 2 IPL seasons, they have a better idea of the pitch and ground?  Cmon get real.

They have a shaky middle order with guys like Masarweera, Mathews, Chamaras (whom their own fans mock as Sir Kapu or Lord Silva), those who have not yet been tested to full. A team which rides on the top 3 is never going to succeed if they lose the 3 in cheap. Game against Pakistan is a testimony.  Even the game against Kiwis is a testimony. Plus India has played SL too often, so they know the way Lankans play their game. Spin heavy attack isnt going to work against India in India. 

They are pressing Murali beyond a point to play the final cos they know without him they cant win a single game. Test matches are examples of that.

The key to beat SL is get rid of Dilshan, Tharanga and Sangananga and they are exposed, bared in the mid sun, unable to lift their game.  They have also called Randiv back and also Vaas back cos they feel Angelo I  m Not out Always Mathews and Muttiah Murali are unfit. Randiv, the same man who looked poor man’s no – bowler might not play as they have not yet applied for replacements. They are making Murali bowl on half a leg, even if he is not fit. 

SL fans are obsessed with India and they want SL to win against India to shut the f** up the BCCI. The anger and disgust feelings of Indian victory in SF is visible on SLCricket.com. They badly wanted Stanis to win cos they feel they can beat them in India.

Unfortunately they still run into rampant India who would want to win one more game emphatically and crown themselves as world champions. Besides the revenge of 1996 SF is also on cards. I just want to see how would they react to the loss in the finals.  They blamed squash ball for Gilly’s 2007 final 100 and they kept calling for rematch as they felt it was cheating. Cheaters calling the world cheaters cos this time they were on the receiving end.  Think about those 1000s of wickets their bowlers have got who had suspect actions or those who have bent arms beyond 15 degrees and yet got away. Think about those buffoon umpires all this years who’ve given numerous horrendous decisions on fields.

Move over, Sreesanth incarnates himself as Indie commando

Updated : If Sreesanth had his way he would have a sword or a gun in his hand instead of a white ball and he would have hit the opposition players with the sword or gun if he would have got hit for runs or ran behind umpire with gun in hand if he did not react positively to his appeal. That he would have actually hit the umpire with the bullet from the gun or his hands would really have caught the real sword instead of a wooden sword, something which is available in North India after every Dusshera Ravan dahan celebration, is another thing!!!

And if Sreesanth had more power as an Indie Commando, he would have asked for a horse and he would have demanded he would bowl sitting on horse or a mule (complementing himself since he is also an ass) and with sword / gun in left hand and a ball in one. And after delivering the ball, he would turn the horse to umpire or the batsman and run behind them if a) ump did not react positively to his appeal b) batsmen hit him for a 6 and a 4, showing them the gun (plastic) and sword(wooden)…..

Thank God, Ijaz Butt would now feel relieved he has got a brother (or son) across the border who is equal to him in terms of mental wisdom, cricketing knowledge and behavior in the public.

Mahela Jayawardhena would be the lead Indie commando in the IPL-4.  And guys like Ravinder Jadeja, Sreesanth (lunatic and clinically insane endorsed by MS) would also be part of it. Indie commandos. As in “Independent Indian cricket team” with “elite fighting squad”.  

Couldnt get funnier than this. Imagine Sreesanth making a fool of himself while doing his traditional antics and foolishness as an Indie commando or Mahela Jayawardhena shouting something to his team mates as a Sri Lankan Indie commando.

Kochi owners are just making further fun of themselves and also attaching ridicule on the legends like Laxman, Murali, Sir Ravinder Jadeja and of course “Aiblee filim” Sreesanth. Just imagine Ravinder Jadeja and Sreesanth dressed up as Indie commandos. Laughing stock!!!

World Cup Team Previews –1 : Sri Lanka

Starting a new series from today till the start of the world cup, where in I shall put my 2 or 3 Sri Lankan paise on every team that matters in World Cup campaign. In short, analyse every team and run down their chances in the world cup or run up their chances. 

Starting with the romantics’ favorites and one of the world cup co-hosts Sri Lanka. 

SL is set to play 5 of its 6 games in its home ground and none of them at SSC. And they would have to play all 6 games to have a chance to go to the next round this time. Unlike 1996 when they qualified to QF on back of the 2 forfeited games and that helped them reach out as champions in the end. 

No volatile war situation and security concerns now for them. 

They are grouped in group A with Australia, Pakistan, New Zealand and minnows Canada, Kenya.  They shall murder Canada and Kenya ruthlessly. So they have to beat just 2 of the rest 3 teams to go ahead to the Quarters. Pakistan and NZ would be the ones to lose out to the spin quartets of  SL. If Sangakara would have his way he would pack his team with all spinners and just one fast bowler in Malinga if he is fit.

Their first game is vs Canada, which they hope would score 450+ runs and bowl the Canadians out by 70 odd and win by 380 runs. Quite possible. 

They next play Pakistan and they would fancy chances against a team who has yet to have a captain named for the world cup. Although its going to be Shahid Afridi, but Butt thinks he is not in the news for long time now, so he has to create some drama and he is doing just that. 

SL team:

Sanga, Jayawardhena, Dilshan, Kapugedara, Angelo, Muralitharan, Malinga, Fernando, Herath, Mendis, Kulasekara, Perreira, Silva, Samaraweera and Tharanga.

Opening pair

Dilshan and Tharanga would open the batting in most games unless Sangakara has a brain freeze and he promotes his chaddi buddy Mahila to the top. 

Middle Order

Sangakara, Jayawardhena, Kapugedara, Silva / Samarweera would form the middle order. 

Fast bowlers:

Malinga, Perreira would be sureshot starters.  Mathews, if fit  could be the 3rd seamer.

Spin:

King of spin Murali would be sure starter in all games lest he is injured and he would be partnered by one of Bow Wow Mendis or Colored Herath.

Chances:

They would maul Canada, Kenya. They might succumb to unpredictable Pakistanis and might get past the Kiwis too given they have been pathetic in the subcontinental ODIs.  It would be tough to beat Australia, though they would be looking forth to avenge 1-2 defeat in the home series. 

The only game they play outside SL is the league game against Kiwis in India.  3 of their games are at R Premdasa stadium, 1 in Hambanatotatata and 1 in Wankhede, Mumbai. Yes Wankhede is in Mumbai.

They can go to QF, but with the form they have been in 2008, 2009 and 2010 they look impossible to go beyond that stage. 

And if they dont do that, this would be the end of Kumar Sangakara as the captain of Sri Lanka. And a respite for us of his character rants. 

Lets see how much character stock Sangakara has gathered in 2 months when he was quiet and didnt play any cricket. Oh no he was playing with his balls, only in the bed room.

SL without Murali

There were a lot of retirements from the Test cricket this year. Like Ryan Sidebottom, Shane Bond and all. Biggest of them was Muttaih Muralitharan of Sri Lanka. When he was around, SL were invincibles at home and continued to lamb abroad. Now with him no more bagging the whites, they are still continuing to play Test cricket and finding it difficult to win a test match cos they dont have the luxury to take 20 wikats anymore.

Evidence: they failed to bowl out India and West Indies in subsequent 5 Test matches after Murali retired. So much pissed off was Sangakara, that he called this tests as worst of his life. He’d be making runs in tons and thousands on flat pancake pitches in Lanka, but those runs wont count as they wont get him 20 wickets required to win the test match. Next year end they are slotted to tour SA by year end and SA have great chance to end the irritating habit of losing Boxing Day tests in Durban.

So why is SL even planning to play Test cricket? They dont have the bowlers to take 20 wkts and to hide this inefficiency the likes of Paravarariritana, Sangakara, Samarweera and of course the baap of them all Jayawardhena continue to make runs and bat longer. Much like gully cricket when a rowdy team refused to declare and continued to bully the lesser teams or touring teams in the home “gully”.

2010 they played 6 tests and won just 1. They did not play against BD as they refused to tour SL every 2nd or 3rd month.

Now they are planning a test series against Pakistan. However hopeless Pakistan might be against other teams, but when it comes to SL, some of their bowlers — known or debutants manage to get heapfuul of wickets.

Wasim Akram took 2 hattricks in Tests, all against SL in back to back tests.

Shane Shillingford reported for suspect action in Chuckali’s land

Ah well, the f**k irony is Shane Shillingford who troubled Lankans with his spin bowling in the Galle Test has been reported for suspect action.

And all this in a land where the biggest chuck and suspected action bowler bowled on and on for taking 800 wickets and other chucker is a reverted retard umpire in the ICC panel.

Flat Pitches and Mahelanagakara Rants

Mahela Jaywardhena feels that the SSC pitch was good to bat on and due to the weaker bowling attacks on both sides, the run glutton continued on SSC.

He feels batting on such tracks is challenging and its not boring.

Well he is right. He has got 11 of his 28 hundreds on this ground which is more than Sir Don had on MCG.  No modern day greats of last 50 years have had such an “awesome” record on a single ground. The question is that most of the batting and bowling records on a single grounds are on the name of Sri Lankans. In bowling it would be Sir Muttiah Muralitharan and in batting it would be either rat Sangakara or Sir Mahela Jayawardhene.

The same stuff does not translate in that many victories as expected for the Sri Lankans in the recent years. Of course they have 61 wins to 69 losses, but 23 of them are against Zim and BD, so they have 38 wins in 28 years of their Test Cricket.

Ok enough rants about them.

The point is they don’t feel embarrassed on lifeless pitches like in SSC. Mahela is famous for batting big on lifeless pitches. He made 275 in another rubbish pitch at Motera last year, the only Test SL did not lose in that series.

Most of the bloggers feel that its not just SL who make lifeless pitches. Pakistan made them too when they used to have cricket played in their country. India have a couple of them in Ahmedabad and Bangalore.  SL have them everywhere. WI have it in Antigua, England have it at Lord’s and Cardiff.  But none of the batsmen from the countries except SL enjoy or justify the boring pitches which are full of runs and nothing for bowlers. We don’t see curators defending their creation every where blaming the bowling attacks.

Mahela has an expert view on everything. Yesterday there was a column in cricinfo where he said that India is not playing like a # 1 team. Sangakara is repeatedly ranting on need for “Fair FTP”. Murali feels Randiv and Mendis bowled well on SSC track (each of them went over 150 runs). I mean cmon have the guts to call spade a spade. Say that the SL pitches are killing the Test cricket. You don’t have to say that batting on such pitches is fun or challenging.  And as SP pointed out, the exhilaration showed by Mahelangakara at SSC was as if they have hit 200s on a pitch like 2006 series when none except Rahul Dravid crossed 50s in Wset Indies.

And in India no spinner is half as good as Anil Kumble even if we combine the prowess of Bhajji, IPL Ojha and Amit Mishra. Mishra got a chance and he has made a 100 in 150 balls.  Ojha is 2/78, his best figures in the series. Whats more Sehwag is more economical than this 2 supposed new gen spinners. 

Galle Test Day 3

Indians managed to sniff out some early wickets on a helpful pitch, thanks to the efforts from A Mithun and Ishant Sharma. However the Sri Lankans are still going strong with no signs of declaration whatsoever.  Samarweera, Lady Jaywardhena and P Jaywardhena went quite early than expected, but then its turn of Malinga and Herath to bat on and on.

SL might have murali have some runs in his belt too. Who knows he might even get a single wicket or not. Sehwag might spoil his swansong or even anybody from the top 7 can do so. 

Malinga has got a  50. Herath has already got it. Chanaka and Muttiah would have it too. 600 should be apt score for them to score in a rain truncated game.  They are now batting since day 1 and we are in session number 8 of the Test.

A lot of blame has to go to the Indian spin attack too which is just insipid and lacklusture as Sri Lankan desire to win. IPL Ojha has gone for 100 and Harbhajan is following suit. Ishant bowled bad on day 1, but made great amends on day 3. He needs confidence and time, something which Srikanth is not ready to give him. He should have been playing in England on the A tour, instead he was sitting home and some Ganpathys and etc were representing Indian bowling in England.

Poor Amit Mishra had a poor tour game, IPL Ojha had 8 wickets in that game, he is finding wickets hard to come by in the games that matter. He is other example of cricketers who give  their best shot in IPL and not so good shot when playing for country.  Raina, Sharma being the other members of the IPL glorious club.

Post Anil Kumble, the Indian spin bowling looks bleak and Harbhajan is now at best a stock restrictive bowler who doesnot find wickets any more. 

SL are showing no signs of declaration whatsoever.  But we hardly expect them too. They have been showing churlish buffoonery every time they step to play Test cricket, thus killing its spirit and soul every time they play. 

Malinga is fast approaching his 100. What a comeback it would be for him in Tests after 3 years.

Sangakara is having a sheepish grin and he is practicing a speech in post match conference full of character words and assertive stuff to feed his articulate image in the media.

No wonder that major batting records in Tests do belong to Sri Lanka and most of them are at home ending in dull lame boring yawning draws.

Top 10 Test partnerships (for any wicket)

Correct as of January 23, 2010:

Runs	Wicket	Batting partners	Batting team	Fielding team	Venue	Season
624	3rd	Mahela Jayawardene and Kumar Sangakkara	Sri Lanka	South Africa	Colombo	2006
576	2nd	Roshan Mahanama and Sanath Jayasuriya	Sri Lanka	India	Colombo	1997
467	3rd	Andrew Jones and Martin Crowe	New Zealand	Sri Lanka	Wellington	1990/91
451	2nd	Donald Bradman and W H Ponsford	Australia	England	Sydney	1934
451	3rd	Mudassar Nazar and Javed Miandad	Pakistan	India	Hyderabad, Pakistan	1982/83
446	2nd	Conrad Hunte and Gary Sobers	West Indies	Pakistan	The Oval	1957/58
438	2nd	Marvan Atapattu and Kumar Sangakkara	Sri Lanka	Zimbabwe	Bulawayo	2004
437	4th	Mahela Jayawardene and Thilan Samaraweera	Sri Lanka	Pakistan	Karachi	2008/09
429*	3rd	Jacques Rudolph and Boeta Dippenaar	South Africa	Bangladesh	Chittagong	2003
415	1st	Graeme Smith and Neil McKenzie	South Africa	Bangladesh	Chittagong	2008

Sanga favors UDRS

Kumar Sangakara has been making a lot of noise on UDRS. He is disappointed, disgusted and a heck lot of emotions have come out of his daily dose of rants on the usage of UDRS in the upcoming Test series vs India.  No doubt he is a buoyant supporter of this flawed technology due to the fact that he thinks UDRS won his team 2-1 in 2008 and lost 0-2 in 2009 in India.

Many close decisions went against India and they were the differences in what were 26 wkts to Mendis and 6 wkts to Mendis. 29 decisions went against India and 3 went in their favor, that’s a huge difference.  BCCI and Indians are not big supporters of UDRS. Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and MSD have publicly put foot down on the UDRS thingy.

Question is why does Sangakara root too wildly for this technology.  Simple reason : he does not have 20 wicket taking bowlers left in his kitty.  Murali is not a force, they dropped Mendis and Suraj Randiv would probably make his debut(or he has made).  Fast bowlers except Malinga are not a threat to India anymore, unless the batsmen self destruct.

So UDRS would only be the tool Sangakara would rely on getting half hearted appeals in his team’s favor and try to win a series or prevent a loss.

IMO Sri Lanka are going to go to the 1990s when they batted and batted and batted for 3 days in row to rewrite batting and partnership records and save the series. As a result they are yet to win a test series in India, Australia and South Africa.

They are the most negative Test playing nation in the world and this series wont be any different.

Those who would rip me apart for this statement, just have a look at the score card of the infamous Test match when SL scored 6/952 when Blabba Queen debuted and Vaas made 61.

No UDRS and MM means SL cant win

When UDRS is on SL wins….

When UDRS is off SL gives away 499 + runs and loses the series. 

Murali is now thing of past and Mendis is dropped. Who are those bowlers who are gonna take 20 Indian wickets ? 

Mind you this 20 do not include Raina, Jadeja or Sharma — the self destructors. But this contain the troika of ST, RD and VVS added by VS and GG adding to 42999 test runs and 125 test hundreds.

You’ve got to fix UDRS before seeing it used more frequently and across wider audience. 29 to 3 was the score when 2008 series was played and the difference b/w score of 1-2 to India and 2-1 to India. 

This time SL dont look good to win even a single Test. Expect some 1997 like draws where Mahela, Sanga and Samyweera will try to go for runathons. SImple. They dont have bowlers to take 20.

End of road for Murali

So its all over. Career of much debated bowler Murali is all set to end in few days time. At least in Tests.  He would be eyeing 800 wikats against India, that is US.  Murali was the lone SL bowler who bowled endlessly from one end all over the years and seemed to be non stop. But he is a human after all and in 2009 he started to diminish in his aura and wickets stopped coming.   If SL had their way, they would have had Murali bowl all 90 overs in a day in the test matches in their own backyard. Not to forget that he has bowled most deliveries in Test cricket. A debate would always continue on the topic how many of those deliveries which took 792 wikats were legal ones or how many of them were illegal ones which still got him wikats and a place at the top of bowling charts to end up as most prolific wikat taker.

He has left behind the likes of Shane Warne, Anil Kumble, Glenn McGrath, Wasim Akram, Richard Hadlee and West Indian greats Marshall, Walsh, Ambrose, Holding and Garner in wikats tally.  He had his share of cheap wickets against hapless Zimbabweans and Bangladeshis.

176 wikats in 25 against this 2 teams. Warne had 17 in 3 against this 2.

Exclude 176 and his record comes down to 616 from 107.  As good as 5.7 wikats a Test match.  Most of those wikats came on super boring pitches of SL aided by run machines Sanga, Mahela, Attapattu and Samarweera who kept on going and going and going for days together.  And then Murali would come and bamboozle the visiting teams. England, SA, West Indies, NZ, BD and Zim sank without a fight. Aussies and Indians did put some fight and Pakistan surprisingly until 2009 won.

Murali when toured SA or Ind or Aus was not among wikats.  He has a poor record in this countries. He did not tour SA since 2002. And in the meantime he travelled Zim 2 times (2005) and BD 3 times.  He took 9 wikats 2 times and almost had perfect 10 once.

He won SL test matches with 5 wikat hauls as good as Sehwag sixes or Ijaz Butt u-turns.  How many of those victories were memorable or hard earned ? Very few. Did he win in India or Australia or South Africa ? No. How many times did he dismiss Rahul Dravid, Ricky Ponting, Jacques Kallis and Sachin Tendulkar in his career ? Don’t forget Brian Lara whom he got many times but was hammered mercilessly every time he faced the legend.

Who were his victims ? The poor players of spin in Lankan conditions when the batsmen would bat long for 3 days and then unleash Murali’s illegal deliveries on them.  SL won 44 Tests when Murali played.  Drew a lot more and lost a little less.

He had an illegal action, he bowled illegal deliveries, he had Jaggu Dalmiya installed at ICC to have the rule changed to accommodate his illegal bowling, had a strong character (the only one with real character) captain in Arjuna who fought for him.  All this ensured Murali would continue to bowl his illegal deliveries at batsmen at behest of an optical illusion of bent arm.

Whats his legacy ? Chuckers are now assured that sooner or later they would be allowed to play, thanks to a faulty 15 degree rule made by ICC to benefit and accommodate illegal bowlers like Murali, Shoaib Akhtar, Shabbir Ahmed and Lasith Malinga.

For me like many others he would forever remain a Chucker and an illegal bowler who by means of strong headed captains and administrators found a way out to bowl despite having illegal action.