Archive for the ‘World Cup’ Category
INDIA ARE THE WORLD CUP CHAMPS
WE ARE BLOODY WORLD CHAMPIONS OF CRICKET IN ODIS AND TESTS.
WE ARE WORLD CHAMPIONS.
KINGS OF THE WORLD. MOVE AWAY FOLKS, THIS IS OURS. THE WORLD CUP IS OURS. A TIGHT SLAP TO THOSE WHO HAVE BEEN DOUBTING THE INTEGRITY OF INDIAN CRICKET, THIS IS PROUD MOMENT FOR THE ENTIRE COUNTRY.ALL INDIANS ACROSS THE GLOBE, INDIA, USA ALL OVER COUNTRY.
WORLD CUP FOR SACHIN TENDULKAR.
WORLD CUP FOR EVERY INDIAN. EVERY PROUD INDIAN. IT HAS TO BE A MOMENT WE AS ENTIRE NATION HAS TO BE PROUD OF.
INDIA WOULD NEVER REJOICE LIKE IT WOULD TODAY,
INDIA ARE THE WORLD CUP CHAMPIONS. WORLD CUP CHAMPS.
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.
India through to the finals
What a feeling it is. To be in the world cup finals beating Pakistan for the 5th time in the world cup. Its just difficult to digest. Goosebumps in the tummy. Butterflies flew all around, screaming and abusing was a bit low key thanks to being in the foren country.
The tension to see in the finals after 8 long years and this time go one step further to lift the cup of glory in homeland was unpalpable. All superstitions were followed. Unmoved at times when things went right for India and when runs were leaked, when wickets didnt fall. Reeling Munna and Bhajji when they leaked runs. Blowing off Kamran Akamal when he showed his stupid poker face on screen during keeping and batting was all done.
Facebooking and watching cricket has been the trend this world cup. Update the status message on FB, update stats on FB, update number crunching there and put on some superstitions like Cmonnnnnnnnnnnnnn and to see a wicket tumble moments after that was all fun. Dont have the luxury to watch on TV on any channel, so have to rely on the ISP and host of live streaming sites to watch the action LIVE.
It all happened on a day remarkable for Indian cricket, what a day it has been. Reaching 3rd world cup final, 2nd in 8 years and almost with the same group as it was in 2003. Sachin, Sehwag, Yuvraj, Zaheer, Harbhajan, Nehra are the survivors of that match India lost in Wanderers to rampaging Ponting and co. This time its a step to go further. Win the world cup in Mumbai, the hometown of Sachin Tendulkar, country’s greatest sports icon and perhaps the best ever batsmen to play cricket in all times.
Thanks to Pakistan to turn up in India despite the hot and cold diplomatic relations, thanks to them for making the match living all the hype it had before this game even began. Thanks for them to provide us yet another opportunity to savior this victory. Beating Australia, Pakistan in the route to finals is amazing. The contests with this 2 countries have always been intense, thrilling and top quality. And Pakistan did go out in a proud fashion, forget what Misbah did in final overs, they have done their nation proud with almost flawless and mostly controversy less performance in the world cup. None expected them to come this far given what happened in past year in their build up to the world cup, so Afridi must be a proud man given how his men have delivered.
Sachin Tendulkar has played all 5 victorious games against Pakistan in World cups and he has been man of the match in 3 of them. He has scored 54, 31, 45, 98 and 85 in this 5 games. He has played with great Kapil Dev to Azhar to Jadeja, Mongia, Venkatesh Prasad and the great trio of Dravid, Ganguly and Kumble. Not to forget Javagal Srinath.
India won its first semi final at home. Previously it had lost its 2 semi finals, both chasing in 1987 to England and pretty controversially in 1996 to SL. This time India defended a 260 and won.
The biggest turning point of the game was the dismissal of Gambhir in the 20th over which led to a mini-collapse in the 25th – 30 th over and a score of 350 became 260. Sehwag in his super assault on Umar Gul had set India on another huge total, but once he was out and the rest just went in the shell. Gambhir has been erractic this tournament. he has thrown away his wicket in almost every game. Something not expected from man of his stature.
Tendulkar was cratchy, scratchy and whatever, but his 85 set India to cross 250 and that proved to be the difference in the end. MSD is excelling in captaincy, but his batting is concern.
What was too heartening to see was only 5 bowlers were used and everybody took 2 wkts each. Zahee was little bit off color, but he was made up by super Nehra and surprisingly Munaf. Ashvin;s dropping was a debatable issue, but I still feel he will be a key man in the final and he should replace Munaf in the XI. Nehra got his rythm back in the 2nd spell and at helped him in the super final spell when he just gave few and got Riaz.
It was a day when the bowling and fielding excelled yet again and the batting was iffy.
In the end Younis and Misbah combined together to stall the stanis chase and its likely that this guys wont be part of the LoI set up in the future. Misbah is test captain, but then who knows what happen in Pak cricket. The others — Shafiq, Hafeez and UKumal didnt quite turnup to play long innings that could have won their team this game. Yet they came this far and thats applaudable.
For a change there was no sledging this time and there was no “war cry” on the ground at least. Expecting Pak to react to this loss graciously back their home and not call for the people’s head who featured in this tournament. They’ve got some very good positives in form of Riaz, Shafiq etc and once they are given chances they could come up as well finished product.
But for now lets savior the superb Indian victory and rally behind them to trounce the cheats of the world to avenge the painful defeats of 2007 and 1996. Lets burn the Lanka this time in Mumbai 8 months before the Dusshera festival.
Players and captains seen last
This are the set of players that wont be seen anymore in the international cricket post this world cup:
Pakistan:
Shoaib Akhtar
Misbah Ul Haq ((at least ODIs))
Younis Khan (at least ODIs)
New Zealand
Scott Styris
Jacob Oram
Possibly Daniel Vettori from ODIs
Sri Lanka
Chuck
Mahela (he promised he would look to the future post world cup)
England
KP
Collingwood
Andrew Strauss
Ian Bell
Captains in following countries have changed hands:
1. South Africa
2. New Zealand
3. Australia
4. Possibly England
5. Possibly Pakistan
India vs Pakistan Preview
Finally, the big day is here.
India vs Pakistan in a World Cup semi final.
Doesnt get bigger than this. All talks of pressure, mind games, history, cricket diplomacy, Punjabiyat, bhaichara and all would vanish in the thin air once the 2 captains walk out for the toss and the national anthems are played. After that all and sundry shall pave the way for 22 players who shall slug it out in the middle for the glory moment of the day.
Doesnt matter what Misbah said or what Rehman Malik said and backtracked. Doesnt matter what MMS and Gilani shall eat or drink or pee after the game or during the game. WHat shall matter is the battle between the bat and the ball.
4 previous wins are good to hold the psychological edge but only till the start of the game. The chaos, reputations, processes, areas, pre match talks, campaigns thus far would all cease to be important for the heroes of the 2 countries.
India’s batting vs Pakistan bowling. Its a contest that has been billed as such.
Its more of the team which handles the pressure the BEST, the team which holds the NERVE BEST, the team which wins small chunks of plays in the entire 100 overs of the day shall prevail in the end. And its going to be INDIA who shall be expected to do this in Mohali, their best modern day ground.
Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir and Yuvraj Singh are the key men for Indian batting. Kohli, Raina and MS shall look to carry forth the work done by the top 4. Zaheer Khan would be the key for the bowling. But it shall depend more on who is the support cast for Zak. Will Harbhajan turn up? Would Ashvin fox the stanis ? Especially Kamran, Hafeez and Shafiq ?
Who shall tbe the 2nd seamer? Munaf or Neehra ?
Neehara should the one who should get a look in before Munaf now.
What shall Pakistan do ? Will they get in Shoaib or continue to operate with Umar Gul and Riaz? How many catches would Kakkumal drop? How shall Afridi, the bowler do? He has got pretty ordinary record against India and so has Umar Gul. Would they field Junaid Khan who had a word or 2 to say on Sachin?
Its all about who handles the pressure on Wednesday better. But before that the skies should remain clear.
The predictions are:
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Wed Mar 30
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| 09:00 GMT | 14:30 Local 05:00 EDT | 04:00 CDT | 02:00 PDT |
India v Pakistan at Mohali, ICC Cricket World Cup, 2nd Semi-Final |  17 – 30° C 
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Not sure how ToI or NDTV has reported rain showers.
But here could be the possible lineups:
India :
1. Tendulkar
2. Sehwag
3. Gambhir
4. Yuvraj
5. Dhoni
6. Kohli
7. Raina
8. Ashvin
9. Harbhajan
10. Neehra
11. Zaheer
Pakistan:
1. Kakmal
2. Hafeez
3. Shafiq
4. Younis
5. Umarkamal
6. Misbah
7. Afridi
8. Rehman
9. Razzaq
10. Gul
11. Riaz / Akhtar
Will Gambhir raise his game against Pakistan? Will MS find form against Pakistan and will Yuvraj continue his golden run in this world cup ?
And moreover shall we avenge 2007 and 1996 ? All answered tomorrow in PCA ground @ 230 PM IST
A fact on team defeating Kiwis in semifinal of a world cup
The team beating New Zealand in the semi-final has not won a world cup on 2 previous occasions. 1999 – Pakistan beat NZ and lost in the final to Australia. 8 years later SL beat NZ and lost to Australia in the final.
4 years on may be it would be SL again who would lose to the team beating Australia.
By the way its going, it seems a comfortable typical Lankan win unless they choke worse than what Saffers did. Saffers should have been the worthy semi-finalists to halt the Lankan run at home. They choked and got kicked out,
A look at Stani batting
A look at the Pakistan batting.
Highest score : 317 / 7 vs Kenya in the first game of the world cup campaign
Lowest score : 184 vs Canada
Highest Individual score : 83 by Misbah Ul Haq
Number of 100s: 0
Number of 50s : 9
Scores : 317/7, 277/7, 184, 192, 164/3, 178/6, 113/0
Only 2 scores of over 200. In the last 3 wins they have chased after their bowlers dismissed teams for low scores (Zimbabwe game exception as it was rain affected). Last 200 score came good month ago. Since then havent crossed 200.
Opening Partnerships : 11, 28, 16, 17, 5, 12, 112*
Hafeez and Shehzad havent been able to fire together as opening pair and except the game of WI, the Akamal and Hafeez pair hasnt fired either. So the team looks soft a bit on the top.
The number 3 has got some runs for Pakistan though in form of Kamran Akamal before and now Asad Shafiq in last 2 games (124).
The middle order of Younis, Misbah, Umar Akamal and Afridi has been inconsistent too. Umar is their top scorer of the tournament with 211 runs and a match winning 47 vs Australia as his highest point. Younis Khan hit 2 50s in the start of the tournament and since then hasnt fired the way given his experience and usability.
Misbah yesterday said that getting 20s and 30s in a winning cause is better than scoring a 50 and 100 in a losing cause. Well said mate, but he hasnt got firing in last few games:
his scorelines read 0, 7 , 37, DNB,DNB, 83.
Shahid Afridi, best said now is a tailender who can bat a bit in wild fashion.
Hafeez has been more of a bowler than a batsman in this tournament given his form. He struck form only in the quarter final, but then the quality of bowling was debatable.
From the above stats its clear that Pakistan batting has been a bit brittle and they are prone to collapses as ever in last 2 years. They had a mini collapse against Australia in mid-overs, against Canada and also against Sri Lanka.
The men India needs to be wary of :
1. Kamran Akamal : He has tendency to fire big against India.
2. Younis Khan : His past against India
3. Asad Shafiq : He is the man who has looked in form in past 2 games.
and.
4. Umar Akamal : Too unpredictable, dunno which side of him would turn up.
In form batsmen for Pakistan — not many.
Bowling : Afridi for his faster uns that skids through to the stumps or traps lbw. Umar Gul for his exploits with old ball.
And since the last game between this 2 sides, a lot has happened and Pakistan side has gone through a major change in terms of people playing. Imran farhat, Butt, Malik, Amin, Amir, Ajmal are no longer part of playing XI.
How SL would make it to the final
How’z it going to be an All Asian final this Saturday ?
India or Pakistan shall play cricket and the winner will go through to the final.
And SL : “we keep our heads down and make sure we cover all the bases we have to cover”.
Thats how Lankans would cross over to make it to the finals. When and if they win the semis in Colombo, their captain shall again cry, “why do we need to cover our final base in Mumbai? As co-host we should cover our final base in our home base to lay the base for upcoming slingers, cheaters and non-walkers”
Statements, statements and more statements.
John Wright
In the run up to the World Cup 2011, the Kiwis had chance to play in all 3 host countries. SL in Aug, BD in Oct and India in Dec.
They fared poorly here. 1 victory in 11 games means a below below par run up to the world cup. None gave the chance to the team in this world cup. And when they lost to Aus and SL those critics were vindicated. And for much part of the game against SA, those critics wrote off Kiwis.
But they turned around in this world cup. They have reached semis and just a win away from being in the finals for the first time. Only a small matter of thumping Lankan mongrels and cheats.
Everybody’s talking about Jacob Oram, Danny, Jesse, Nathan McCullum, but spare a thought for the man who is responsible for all this. The man who has known the Indian conditions for 5 years, the man who knows what it takes to succeed as coach. The man who kick started the Indian ascendancy to the top good 10 years back. The man who alongside Saurav Ganguly changed the mindset, attitude of cricket in the country. The man who coached the team through some memorable away, home wins in Tests and ODIs.
That humble man is doing his job without any spotlight, staying in the background, quiet and almost unnoticed.
Take a bow gentlemen for John Wright. He is a master coach behind this super thumping of Saffers in quarters by Kiwis.
WATERBOY’s world cup
Waterboy does it. The man who was dropped on grounds of poor form, inept attitude and fitness has showed it to the world he belonged to the top spot. What a world cup he is having.
And now that SL are through to the semis and would make it to the finals too, the WATERBOY shall account for that humiliation and taunts in Lankan tour in July – August 2010.
Cant wait to see revenge of 1996 and 2007 being taken in our own Mumbai next weekend. But before that small matter of getting past Pakistan.
Yuvi wants the world cup for himself, his team and moreover to the nation of 1 billion plus NOW.
Switch Hit 