Some things never change

Its a dream for any aspiring cricketer to play for Team India and Its a dream for every Team India player to play in  World Cup and no dream is bigger than defeating arch rivals Australia and Pakistan in knock out stages of  the World Cup. This Indian team has done it all. When a nation grows then its friends and rivals both change. And  because of this reason only that India-Australia match heat is comparable to India-Pakistan match heat. For an young aspiring Indian, victory over Australia is more significant than victory over Pakistan but loss to Pakistan is comparable to a crime that can not be washed even if you take 100 dips in holy Ganges. Its party emotional and partly because of a the confidence of growing middle class of India. India loves to compete and defeat Australia on the one hand while it loves to always defeat Pakistan on other hand. The last 10 years has made this huge change in the mindset of Indians and this reflects in the Buddha like posture of Dhoni. The bunch of jokers have become world beaters and as they say Rome was not built in a day, the same is true for team India. Sachin has remained a great agent of this transformation and all the players starting from Ganguly, Dravid, Prasad, Kumble, Srinath, Laxman etc  have played their parts. Dhoni and others are just culmination of the process started by Sachin decades back. Its a fitting tribute to Sachin and we all owe it to Sachin.

There are two things that can unite this nation. War is one and Sachin is second. It has been sheer pleasure to experience Indian wins against Pakistan in 1992, 1996, 1999, 2003 and yesterday. 1992 World Cup was a gone case for India still we defeated Pakistan despite escapades from Miandad. 1996 win was a sweet one as it propelled us to Semi Final against Sri Lanka and we failed miserably in that Semi. 1999 World Cup match against Pakistan was similar to 1992. 2003 World Cup match was the grandest match ever played by India against Pakistan till then. It was the match that added another story in the Legend of Sachin. Akhtar was silenced forever. Anwar and Akaram were retired forever. Yesterday match was very much

one sided and Pakistan managed to fight only till 35 overs of Pakistan inning. I was expecting that the match would go till 49th or final over but 260 was too much for Pakistanis. Pakistan team also deserves some claps as no body gave them any chance before this world Cup yet they managed to destroy Australia, Sri Lanka and West Indies. Afridi looks like a man on mission but you can not win a cricket epic if your team does not perform. Yunis Khan, Razzak looked miserable yesterday and Mohammad Hafiz shot was suicidal.

Sri Lanka is more formidable foe than Pakistan and they have enviable top and middle order batsmen, and bowlers. Greatest bowler Muralidharan will play his last match so this final is destined to become a clash of legends, Sachin on one hand and Murali on  other. May the best team wins. Amen.

P.S. Somethings never change. Sun rises in east, India defeats Pakistan in world Cup, capital of Singapore is Singapore etc etc..

Cometh the hour, cometh the team

And India knocked out mighty Australians from its legendary campaign. It is a sort of coup d'etat and now the onus is on India to win the Cup. I have been following world cup since 1992 and i have only seen India loosing matches against Australia. I have faint memories of 1992 defeat by 1 run but 1996 World Cup defeat of 16 runs still gives me bad odor. That was the last time when Sachin massacred the mighty Australians by scoring 90 runs of 84 balls although India lost the match by 16 runs but it was a match to remember. Since 1996 India had been not able to give fight to Australians and was defeated convincingly in 1999 and 2003 World Cup matches. The World Cup final of 2003 will always make Indians cry specially to those Indians who were students during that time. I was in 2nd year of my engineering and i can easily remember that many of us were not able to eat on that day and it took almost a week to come back to normality.                

It was a more difficult match for India at Ahmadabad than for Australia. Australia has won the World Cup three times on a trot and in total 4 times in last 24 years so the hunger to win the cup was not the same for them. Things are different for India, here winning world cup means you are adding yourself to a very limited set of immortals of Indian cricket. The Neo-Indians desperately need a world champion tag and no sport is better placed to provide that than cricket. Australia started well and match was well balanced until the coming of David Hussey to the crease. Ponting was magnificent and  his century had shades of 2003 World Cup final hundred. Indian bowlers gave 10-20 extra runs in the end but still 260 was a gettable total. Sachin and Sehwag started well, Sachin was not at his best but he managed to give a decent start to India. Gambhir, Kohli played well in middle and Yuvraj-Raina brought India home just after the dangerous wicket of Dhoni "The Helicopter". It was great to see the awesome hug of Yuvraj and Raina in the end. It was a revenge of 2003 world cup final and just like all bad things come to end similarly India managed to shrug of the tag of losers against Australia. This is a new beginning of Indian cricket and Dhoni and team should not loose the golden opportunity to write the history. History remembers the winners. No one will remember who was Man of the tournament in 2003 World Cup but people will always remember the defeat of 2003 world cup final against Australia.

                                        Team looks very good to me. Dhoni, Harbhajan and Munaaf have still not performed and lets hope that they have saved their best for the last two matches. Its the time to bring the cup home. Its the cup that can join or break more than a billion hearts. Lets pray for the former. Amen.

Knock them out

World Cup 2011 is reaching its most exciting phase after filtering off superb team of Ireland. Ireland came to this World Cup without a serious fan in India but after a month they have more fans in this subcontinent than the entire population of little island known as Ireland. This World Cup has been more democratic than any other World  Cup played after 1999 and has more close matches than in any World Cup. The teams that have qualified for  Quarter Finals are the expected ones but i still think that Bangladesh and Ireland are unfortunate. They should have been in the Quarter Finals in place of England and West Indies. No offense to England but frankly speaking they do not deserve any a place in QF. I must say that they have played well in patches and they emit the same vigor (although in small proportion) as emitted by Australia not so long back. Pakistan and Sri Lanka have  looked pretty well and are strong favorites to win the Cup apart from South Africa. India and Australia are not too far behind. Indian team has played in extremes and they have dominated almost all the matches more than 50% of the  time but their death bowlers and death batsmen have let them down. Ideally they should have been playing New Zealand instead of Australia in QF if they had batted few balls more against England and South Africa.
                   Sachin, Zaheer, Sehwag and Yuvraj have performed exceedingly well for India. Kohli and Gambhir have performed well in pieces. The other half a dozen players have yet to find their form. India can not win the cup if  half of its team does not perform. I still believe that India can win the cup but now my favorites are Sri Lanka, Pakistan and South Africa. Lets see what happens in Ahmadabad. May the best team win. Amen.

On a serious note, I offer my prayers and condolences to the people of Japan who are fighting hard to survive and to do things that they do best. May God give you courage to solve out things. You are the light of Asia and beyond.