IPL should be here soon…

Sachin is such a perfect creation, that it is easy to miss how ad-friendly he has grown, something he was bad at earlier. This is the perfect ad. And Sachin inspires.

Gilly hangs loose. And is just himself in this ad.

Sanga! The most stylish man in cricket currently?

The impish smile and the raised eyebrows ‘Kahan khel rahein hai hum?’ … Gautam Gambhir should be used much more in commercials.

The dignified Mr. Kumble. Doesn’t it fill you with pride that you are from the same country as this great gentleman? I am an unabashed fan.

Wasn’t EVERYONE waiting for the Dada IPL ad? The ‘Dada-ne bhi aap ko miss kiya’ lives up to the image, the man. There’ll never be another.

Oh Warney you rockstar!

Where’s Dhoni? Can we have a word or two in Tamil, please?

Wriddhiman Saha

.. is lucky that he got to play a test here. Is limited, but can only improve. And is plucky, the way he batted in the second. Is not really test-class, but I liked his application in the second innings.

It’s circumstances. People forget. Amidst all this Karthick brouhaha, remember this old Karthik innings?

This can break the best of them. I hope, for his sake, that he gets up. Steyn was brilliant, and none but the best could have taken him on in that spell. And Saha is a good player, but far from being the best.

However, the next best wicketkeeper-bat we have after Dhoni (and temperament over talent please, here) is Parthiv Patel. And he is still so very young !

Mukesh Ambani and Liverpool

(Click Here)

Mukesh Ambani is one smart, smart man. And a proper businessman above everything else.

Owning an IPL team (and he indeed owns Mumbai Indians, the costliest of them all – with Sachin, Jayasuriya, Duminy etc) makes sense because much of the ad revenue goes directly to the owners; plus the Reliance guys have historically have had great clout with the who’s who of India… and owning the biggest IPL team is a major positive in that regard.

What does owning Liverpool give him? Nothing. Can he make money out of Liverpool? He cannot through running the club, the money will have to be ploughed back to the club. Through the eventual sale? Naah, I don’t think Ambani will think that turning around the club and reaping a profit by sale would be worth it because a) the day-to-day hassle would be immense; and b) The glory day of club buy-and-sell is gone. It is not a regulated market like the American sports. The prices will just keep on rising…

Mukesh Ambani isn’t a football buff like Abramovich, so the club will not be a millionaire’s plaything. The Ambanis are not Russian Oligarchs. They are businessmen. And thus, owning a football club does not make financial sense to him at all.

Unfounded rumour, IMHO. False.

Subrata Roy Sahara, however, I am not so sure about.

The Royals, all around the world

(Click here)

I quote Cricinfo:

….Rajasthan Royals leading the innovation as they joined forces with Hampshire, Cape Cobras and Trinidad and Tobago to form a worldwide Twenty20 brand….

This might be big. Congratulations to whoever had thought this up.

EPL FF

There are nearly 2 and a half million who play this game. And I was in the top 400 for a while. I am a serious FF player.

And after this season, I will write some basic beginner tips for getting into the top 10K everytime. If you listen to me, that is.

Jacques Kallis

Your best batsman (and one of the best in the world) can bowl at 90mph, and has got 250+ wickets.

Who needs flamboyance? Here’s the best cricketer of our generation. Repeat, the best cricketer of our generation.

Mark Boucher

Well done, Mark Boucher. Who’da thunk?

Test 1: Day 3: Second session: 12:25 PM:
Morkel bowls, Sehwag edges, Boucher holds. Morkel screams, Graeme Smith screams. The umpire is about to ponder…. and Boucher shakes his head, and then his hands. It is a bump catch, one that was difficult to establish even after replays.

But Boucher owned up. Doughy, cussed, gritty Boucher owned up. Boucher, one of my all-time favourites, owned up. We’ll miss him when he’s gone.

Adebayor

Question: With RVP a regular injury worry, wasn’t it ideal that Arsenal had Adebayor in its ranks still?

Answer:Arsenal, one would agree, would have been better served for the last month or so with Adebayor, but one would agree that Arsenal would not have had the form they were in during the first part of the season without the 4-3-3, in which Adebayor does not work (or rather in Arsenal’s 4-3-3 with a creative midfielder, unlike the Man City one, with the primary creative source a withdrawn striker). And could you have kept Adebayor on the bench for the season?
And RVP is not always injured in the way Dean Ashton was always injured or Darren Anderton was, or even Eduardo… of course that is unless one suggests he has a tendency of breaking his foot. he has had horrible luck with injuries, something that can certainly change. It wasn’t a hamstring or a ligament or something. He’s never had recurring injuries.

This series

… will actually be quite an advertisement to Test-match cricket.

I have already seen three awesome sessions, one in the second morning, with Zaheer having an engrossing battle with the settled Kallis and Amla; one in the second afternoon, with Amit Mishra bowling exceptionally well (but without reward) to Amla and whoever was batting with him; and one in the third morning with Dale Steyn bowling exceptionally well to the Indians.
Dale Steyn is without doubts the most exciting bowled in world cricket. Fast, intelligent, aggressive, disciplined; he has all the tricks bar steepling bounce, and knows how to use them.

Hope this continues.

p.s: I am blessed to be in a job where I work the first session from home, and can mute the sound and keep watching the match while responding to emails.

Subramaniam Badrinath

This has been one of the more absorbing side-stories of Indian Cricket in the last half-decade. Badrinath performs, Badrinath tops the overall runs column in Ranji trophy, Badrinath is selected for the Indian XVI, but Badrinath never gets a chance in the final XI.

Young upstarts come in and pass him by. Young upstarts who had performed well at the domestic scene, who had tracked the same path as Badrinath has. Young upstarts somehow manage a shot at international cricket, fail and are back at the Ranjis, back to the stage where Badrinath still reigns. Some youngsters make it and are doing brilliantly now. Men like Gambhir. Some youngsters do reasonably well, and are waiting for their shot at full-time glory. Men like Vijay.

Badrinath waited for his shot. His chance to fail, as he himself so miserably, pleadingly put it a while back. But that one shot, it never came. He was the Praveen Amre of the 2000s, always in the XVI but never in the XI. And nobody was doubting the potential, mind. Nobody was doubting the ability or the gumption. It was just that either there were others, or that he was just plain unlucky.

It’s not about what the repercussions of his performances will be. However well he does, his career would not glow through time in the statistic-driven world of cricketing greatness. However badly he does, his Ranji deeds would remain special in the statistic-driven world of cricketing greatness. It’s about wanting something very badly, as all of us have had sometimes, and at last having that one shot at glory.

I can imagine Badrinath, early morning in practice, focusing, concentrating, willing himself on for that one shot. I can imagine the devils of the mind. Nobody who has not contemplated failure would define his one chance as ‘a chance to fail’.

If you are a follower of the human drama that is cricket, you would, like me, be rooting for Badrinath today (but hopefully tomorrow). He is the representative of so many of us who have been working, running the extra mile, taking the extra step for that one shot at glory. His shot at glory is right here in front of him.

I wish and hope he gives it his best shot.