India perk up at Perth

Life is all about ups and downs, twists and turns. To me life is about cricket. If Sydney was the nadir, Perth certainly has to be the zenith. This is is not just an example of how things can go high and low but also how fast it can go. Best thing is that the victory is in the recent memory and will help a long way in forgetting the Sydney defeat. To put things into perspective, India couldn't bat the last 2 sessions at Sydney and lost the Test after loosing heavily at Melbourne. Scoreline read 2-0, with next Test at Perth. Perth is branded as having the bounciest Pitch in the world. Australia thought they could comfortably trouble India with their pace batteries of Shuan Tait and Brett Lee. Thanks to the acrimonious Sydney Test, it was not just Cricket that had to be handled, Harbhajan Singh's case, Brad Hogg's case, patch up meeting with Ponting but also decision on continuing the tour itself. Everybody(includes me) had written India off, Kumble was expected to return to India after the Test Series getting whitewashed 4-0. So, no ordinary human being or Team can get away from this situation unscathed let alone bouncing back to win it. Anil Kumble and his Indian Team has done exactly that. Beating Australia at Perth to end their 16 match winning streak 'yet again'. Also ending their 4 year unbeaten streak at home ground. Incedentally India beat them at Adelaide on 16^th December 2003. Now the series is still alive, Australia leading 2-1 and India having a chance to draw it if they win the final test at Adelaide. Border-Gavaskar Trophy is already with Australia even if India manages to draw the series because they had snatched it from India in the previous series played in India in 2004 by winning 2-1.

Sunil Gavaskar has rated this Indian win as the best of wins he has seen or was part of India in the last 40 years. The beauty of this victory was that everybody contributed and it was perfect team effort. Teams do get united in the face of crisis. Not one batsmen scored a hundred, not one bowler took 5 wickets in an innings. It was all about partnerships Dravid-Tendulkar, Jaffer-Sehwag, Laxman-Dhoni and Laxman-RP Singh. Bowling-wise it was all contribution from rookies and not much from dependable Kumble. Pathan's spell with new ball to dismiss both openers on both the innings, Inshanth Sharma's hostile spell to Ricky Ponting, RP Singh's swing were the stand out performances. We can say India has not just defeated Australia but out-swung Australia. Dravid who was struggling overall ended up being the topscorer for the match. Laxman continued his love for Australian attack and scored his 1000^th test run in Australia too.

I had vowed to not follow cricket again. But it is never easy to get rid of an decade old addiction in a few days. I gave it my best attempt by not checking the scorecard on internet for the first 3 days (of Perth Test). But my friends used to keep pricking me with score updates. Today afternoon, after completing our 2nd Trimister MBA Exams. People (other than me) got desperate to know the scores. Somebody said Australia are 7 down at Tea. What?I couldn't believe it. By the time I could digest the score and situation, Australia lost the last recognised batsmen Micheal Clarke soon after Tea Break. I could now sense an Indian win. So badly wanted to witness the winning moment live. Had lunch quickly and went with my classmate to his house. Australians by then made sure that I could watch something by the time I reached his house by surviving for about an hour as they call "delaying the inevitable". I reached his home expecting to see the post match ceremony. But what I could see was Australia needed just under 100 runs to win with 2 wickets still in hand, Stuart Clarke was comfortably piercing the wide spread out field set by Indians or Kumble. Fast bowlers were bowling short length with the new ball. Now I was tempted to curse Kumble on his captaincy, also lack of help from former captains like Dravid, Ganguly and Sachin. Indians were definitely panicking at that moment. But when you have played under 40 + degree celsius for the whole day and just one spinner to take up the work load. Also the mental pressure of being in an unusual situation of winning a Test in Australia. Out of tiredness, I must realise that the bowling length is bound to get shorter.

I must admire Kumble for the way he has carried himself overall. He made some good team changes by dropping distracted Yuvraj, bringing in Sehwag thereby restoring the batting order. He won the toss, took a brave decision to bat trusting his batsmen to face the new ball from the fastest bowlers on a fresh Perth Wicket. He got his 600th wicket too during the course of the match. But what is more admirable is what he has done between Sydney and Perth. He has proved that he is definitely one of the few Gentlemen cricket is left with. Despite being at the receiving end from Australians sledging and cheating, he dropped the charges on Bard Hogg. The whole world including Australia has taken notice when he said "Only one team played with the true spirit of the game" after loosing at Sydney. Because if it has come from a man of stature of Anil Kumble, it has to be true. Fresh from reading on Leadership for HR Exams today, I can say that Kumble has demonstrated the characteristics of a Great Leader. He took personal responsibility for the defeats, didn't blame anybody. But to lift the spirits of the team that had just been battered was truly inspirational. As the saying goes "Tough times do not last, but tough men do".

How to advertise my blog or webpage?

I am still writing these blogs for myself and very few of my few close friends who share same thoughts as me. So I am not intending to advertise it. Not that as soon as I intend to advertise, it will become popular. Still, it is not bad to just explore as to how to advertise my blog.

If the target audience are friends, then blog can be advertised by
1) Adding it in my orkut and facebook profile. People (including me) do keenly visit the profiles of others in orkut. They go through the profile, photos and scrapbook carefully. To help them explore further my web/blog homepage would be a very useful link. So, this should advertise the blog to most of the target audience.
2) Adding a link with the signature of every outgoing email. People add Name, Designation, Phone Number and Address as email signatures. Adding blog as signature will remind the receiver of my blog every time he receives the message. Then there are good chances that he will open the link. This will even cater to audience who are not in orkut but use emails. Only those who access internet can read my blog and everybody who access internet do check their email.
3) Write comments on my friends' blogs. This will drive my friends who are regular viewers of my friend's blogs into my blog. Even better would be to request my blogging friends to add my blog's links in their "Blogs I read" list. This will target the friends who write and read blogs.

Having said all these, these tactics will only get them to view my blog only for the first time. Ultimately, blog is just an image of me. If my friends like me, they will like my blog. If I am popular my blog will be popular. If they like to listen to what I say orally, they will read what I have written. If I have more number of friends, I will have more number of viewers. Not vice-versa.

If the target audience are the people who are interested in the topics I write.
1) Leave comments on websites that are already popular on those topics. If my blog specializes in Test cricket, then commenting on Mukul Kesavan's blogs would be the best idea.
2) Be part of some user groups, keep posting questions and answers there. Example - If I am an MBA aspirant or an MBA grad, then posting in pagalguy would help. If I post on product reviews in my blog, they it will good to become a member of mouthshut, write a few reviews there.
3) List the blog to a popular blog directory under an appropriate category like blogpane. There will be enough idle people like me who hunt for blogs.
4) The highest level is to go for Search Engine Optimization (SEO), to simply put, get my blog listed in the first page of Search Engine results when users searches for certain keywords. I have heard of this jargon or concept recently and still figuring out how to do this.

These are again the ways to get users to visit the site first time. To keep them hooked on to my site, the originality and exclusivity of contents, frequency of postings and clear way of communication would be very important. Then I need not work on advertising my site, others will do it for me by "word of mouth" or e-equivalent of it.

Cricket is Dead

Look who is saying this! Yes it is me. Keshava Ram. One who has followed each and every Test Match India has played over a decade since Rahul Dravid made his Debut. Cricket should have been dead during the turn of new millennium itself, but I was immature to give importance to match-fixing then. Cricket has reborn since then and there has been no instance of match-fixing (atleast hasn't come to light) since then. The timing of the post should make it obvious that it is the Sydney Test I am referring to. Yes, not only that, many more reasons too.

Overdose - Too much is too bad! This cannot fit to cricket better. There is an overdose of matches. Too many one-day matches - matches at neutral venues, triangular tournaments, quadrangular tournaments, asia cup, super-series, ICC champions trophy and even long world cup (super 8 not 6). Advent of Twenty20 as an international format. It has just begun and already it is making so much of noise. Within few years, I am afraid it is surely going to be big enough to kill cricket completely. Cricket is going to converge into baseball. ICC has a 6 year future tour program within which period all teams play against every other team both home and away. 30 years back we had just 1 form of the game and 7 teams now we have 3 forms and more than 10 teams. Simple Permutation and Combination should suggest by what proportion the number of matches played have increased. A regular player spends 30% of the days or 100 days in a year playing just international cricket. Let alone domestic cricket, tour matches, charity matches, practice sessions and traveling. Spare a through to the players, they would also like to lead a normal life for a few days with their loved ones. Commercial interests are killing the hen called cricket that used to lay them golden eggs everyday.

Beyond Big 5 - This generation of Indian viewers are blessed with the Big 5. It is obvious who those big 5s are, still for the sake of completeness they are Sachin, Rahul, Sourav, Laxman and Anil in no particular order. All of them are around 35 and have only a couple of years at the maximum left for them. As of now there seem to be nobody to replace them. Likes of Yuvraj, Dhoni, Karthik, Sehwag, Gambhir and Uttappa may give us an odd T20 win but wouldn't challenge top teams over a sustained period. We don't seem to have any succession planning in place. With our present system, it is unlikely that we would be able to spot such prodigies let alone grooming players to become one of them. International players don't find time to play domestic matches, domestic matches are played anywhere but in Test Grounds. The pitches are anything but lively for fast bowlers. India 'A' tours aren't commercially viable and so there aren't many such tours happening. So, there is very little chance for future players to get exposure. And players who look promising in domestic level struggle when to come to international level as they find the level much higher.

Global Imbalance - The difference between the No. 1 team Australia and rest of the teams are getting wider. They won the 2007 world cup without any sweat. They whitewashed the No.2 team in the Ashes 5-0. They seem well on their way to whitewashing their toughest opponent of the Decade, India. We have England, India, South Africa and Pakistan alternatively claiming the No. 2 spot. New Zealand and West Indies have settled at No. 7 and No. 8 respectively. Unfortunately Zimbabwe and Bangladesh still play Test Cricket to keep the gap between top and bottom wide. Like India, the Teams vying for No. 2 spots have their share of problems. Srilanka won't have bowling resources to bowl oppositions twice after Murali. England struggle to keep their best players fit. Pakistan team is also struggling but their issues are highly complicated. Australians on the other hand are getting better and better. The replacements that they find perform better than their predecessors. Hussey for Bevan, Ponting for Steve Waugh, Stuart Clark for McGrath, Jacques for Langer and Gilchrist for Healy. Warne is the only person whom they wouldn't be able to replace. They have just won 16th successive Test match, only nature can stop that sequence.

Unwelcome changes proposed - The former greats are proposing some changes to even forms of games that aren't supposed to be changed. Boycott has said that Test Cricket is boring. Somebody shot-back saying who made it boring?, Pointing at Boycott who is known for his slow batting. The changes he likes to bring about are Day-night tests over 4 days instead of 5. Boycott just mentioned those changes probably when a journalist pestered him to suggest one. That is not the problem, actual problem is that Cricket Boards have taken his suggestions too seriously. And they are indeed planning to make those changes starting with Australian Domestic matches.

Anti-Asian - Asia has 4 strong teams out of 9. Asian countries have the biggest fan following considering that Cricket is religion there and also they are the most populous of nations. Their cricket boards are the richest and contribute the highest to the ICC revenues. Yet it is those cricketers who have been at the receiving end with umpires and match referees. Murali has been accused of chucking and critics still don't keep shut even after umpteen tests have proved it otherwise. Pakistan has been accused of ball-tampering during the infamous Oval Test. India has also been accused of ball tampering in South Africa. Umpires like Steve Bucknor, Billy Doctrove and Darryl Hair have given numerous decisions against Asian teams that changed the fortunes of the games. Match referees punish dissent shown (if at all) only by Asians and excuse the others. Mike Slater's incident in Mumbai went scot-free. Australians and Englishmen well known for sledging have been allowed to continue their ungentlemanly practice. Although the grounds in England and Australia look beautiful, orderly and modern, they still don't offer a "level playing field" to the oppositions.

Winning is everything - I don't believe in that. But competing fairly is. Australians might have won the Sydney Test match, but they lost their reputation. Their own countrymen to be honest aren't proud of what Ponting and his men did. This Australian team isn't going to get the goodwill that the Champion West Indian Team of 70s and 80s got. It is important to understand that it is after all just a game. For viewers it is just leisure and entertainment.

So, this Sydney Test Match is a turning point to me as a cricket follower. I am going to "hang up my boots" without Testing my patience and hoping things will get better. I will start concentrating on Chess both as a player and follower from now on.
I have good history of getting over addictions or bad habbits. I have successfully quit orkuting, biting nails, tracking stock prices, chewing gums and eating chocolates. Now I am hopeful of being able to get out of longest of addictions, cricket.

Happy New Year 2008

Yet another year has passed so quickly and I am now into the first hour of the New Year 2008. I went to sleep but wasn't able to catch it. Thanks to my afternoon nap. So got up from the bed and am writing the resolutions (in random order) for the new year.

1) Socialize - In the first minute of the New Year, my hostel friend told me on a serious note "You need to be outgoing. Outgoing doesn't mean going to parties. It means pro-actively meeting people and establishing your identity with them positively. It is particularly important to you as you are taking up a career in Marketing". I agreed with him and assured him that I will more social with some conviction. This is not the first time somebody is telling me. But I haven't really taken a serious effort.

2) Get up get going - Do as many activities as possible. Participate in class discussions, contests and events. Don't just sit alone and browse in the hostel. Don't procrastinate. Others might do that but they can somehow do things well at the last moment. Laziness bug has bitten me and I need to find a quick yet permanent cure for that.

3) Acquire knowledge and skills by doing rather than reading. Reading anything that too only once does not help one in understanding it thoroughly or remembering things for long. Whatever expertise I have gained so far has always been by doing, analyzing, discussing and researching. I use my free time in reading newspapers, internet and books. Instead I could work on projects. Or after reading an article instead of quickly switching over to next one, I could spare a moment to ask questions like why or why not and find answers myself. Not only do I need to get a general knowledge on all I read but also in-depth knowledge on my areas of interest like E-commerce, ERP and Marketing.

4) Be health conscious - Practice Yoga daily. I have been practicing it over last one year. I am proud of this but has been irregular over last 3 months. I need to do the aasanas slowly while concentrating more on breathing. Continue the regular diet, avoid temptations to go out and eat spicy food or chocolates. Shouldn't eat snacks in place of Lunch and Dinner. Early to bed and early to rise. I have become weak and lost 5 kg last year. Need to get fitter and put on some weight not around my stomach though ;-)

5) Cricket - Neglect one-day and twenty20 cricket completely. I won't have time for them. If at all required restrict to Test Cricket. India plays a whopping 19 matches this year. There must be a match or two in Mumbai against South Africa or Australia or England and hope to go to the stadium to see that. Cricket should just be a hobby and not a priority. This will be the tougher resolution to follow than even socializing. Need to follow not just the matches played on the field and collect statistics but also need to understand the cricketing system. Find out the Australian and English domestic system and analyse how different are they from the Indian one.

6) Stocks - My keenness to earn, save and multiply money has declined since my easy earnings at Japan. So I have been sleeping on the stocks that I bought more than 2 years back. They have done well but a periodic review of the portfolio would have been better. Warren Buffet might say that you should buy a stock and be ready to hold it comfortably even if the stock is not traded in the exchange for 5 years. But I am no Warren Buffet to have a vision about my investment for 5 years. My analysis and forecasting is good enough for at the most one year. Having said about periodic review, the review has to be annual or when a major economic or industry or company news occurs. And it should never get to the extent of daily price monitoring.

7) Mumbai - There are so many places yet to explored in the city and hill station nearby. Haven't traveled much in Metro train or BEST buses. This year will give the best opportunity for this. Need to make good use of this opportunity.

8) MBA - Having dreamt of doing MBA during last 4 years and now that the dream has come true. The journey doesn't end there. That is just the beginning. I need to concentrate on lectures in the class atleast when I attend, anyway I don't sleep, no point in just being physically present there. Project work needs to be completed at least 1 week before the deadline. Start preparing for final placements right away. Decide carefully on the industry and profile to take up. Work on being salable to companies, Have learnt this lesson the hard way for summer placements.

Management education has taught me that goals should be SMART. Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time bound. Management is not just about planning it also about Organising, Actuating and Controlling. Meaning don't just leave this after blogging. Need to execute this. Now it is time to stick to resolution no 4 by going to sleep.

India still has a chance to win at MCG

At the end of day 3 of the Boxing Day Test the equation is simple, India needs close to 500 runs to win with 10 wickets in hand. Going by the history of Test Cricket, no team has ever won chasing 500 in the 4th innings. Only thrice have teams won chasing 400. Hostile Australian fast bowling backed by superb fielding and unsettled Indian batting order all makes Australia favourites to win the match tomorrow itself.

But I am thinking positively (for a change) and that Impossible task of chasing 500 is possible. I am taking inspiration from India's Test wins against Australia so far this decade. All of them looked absolutely impossible.
1) Kolkata - India were following on trailing Australia by 274 runs. It took India Laxman's 281, Dravid's 180 and Harbajan's 13 wickets that included a hat-rick for the impossible to happen.
2) Chennai - At the end of day 1 Australia were 300 odd for 3 and Hayden completed 200. It took Sachin's 126, Laxman's twin 60s and Harbhajan's 15 wickets to turn the tide in India's favour.
3) Adelaide - Australia 400/5 on day 1. India 84/4 on tea on day 2 chasing Australia's 556 in 1st innings. It then took Dravid's 300 in the match, Laxman's 148 and Agarkar's quick 6 second innings wickets.
4) Mumbai - India bowled out for 100 in the first innings. Australia needed just 107 to win in 4th innings. It took shrewd captaincy from Dravid and tight spell from spin triplet led by Murli Karthik to script an impossible victory.

India trailed Australia in the first innings in all of those matches except the for the one in Chennai. It took a few great individual performances, record breaking partnerships and complete team work to win.

Looking at how some of the recent 4th innings totals have been chased
1) West Indies bt Australia at Antigua in 2003 chasing 418.
2) Australia bt South Africa chasing 280 odd off 75 overs loosing just 2 wickets.
3) West Indies came within 60 runs of chasing 460 set by England in the 3rd Test of 2007 series in England.
4) Sri lanka led by Sangakkara's 192 fell short by just 96 runs chasing Australia's 500. Had umpire not given the wrong decision, who knows Sri Lanka might as well have won.
5) At Perth last year England were in with a chance of chasing 550 against Australia by being 300/3 at the end of 4th day.
6) Zimbabwe batted 2 days led by Andy Flowers 232* to save the match against India at Nagpur.
7) Atherton's 185* saved England the J,burg test against South Africa having to bat 2 days to save the test.
8) Jacques Rudolph's unbeaten century saved South Africa the Brisbane Test having to bat a day and half. That was the last time Australia didn't win a Test 17 tests ago.

Pitches have improved considerably in the recent past and they do last 5 days without becoming a mine-field on the 5th day. This Melbourne Pitch is still good for batting and India has the batting resources. Australia's bowlers are not experienced and will be severely tested when the batting looks settled. Absence of a quality spinner should work in India's favour. You need a spinner or two to bowl tight long spells especially in the second innings.

Indian batsmen need to play their natural game and score runs. They need to overcome nervousness of playing in the 4th innings that too against Australia. They should look for singles and use the bad balls by putting them away for runs. They will also need help from the umpires. They shouldn't get the same treatment that they got in 1st innings. There will be several tough spells which will have to negotiated. Once the bowlers tire there will be plenty of runs to be made. Australians no doubt will set attaching fields and there will be plenty of gaps to score runs. Thought of playing for a draw should never come in. If they can bat out 2 days, they can as well score 500 to win. In form batsmen like Sachin, Saurav and Laxman needs to put their hands up and score big runs. Others will have to support them. India needs 2 or 3 big partnerships. Kumble needs to keep telling his batsmen to be positive as he did during the successful 4th innings chase at Delhi.

Before the series began, I had doubts about the Indian bowling lineup. I think, they did a great job in the 1st test. They bowled with lot of fire and energy. With little more discipline and help from fielders, they are on the way to capture 20 wickets. They seem to enjoy the fact that Australian batsmen like to go after their bowling which kind of challenges them and also gives the bowlers a chance to get them out. They gave Australian tail enders an opportunity to bat which they didn't get in the previous series. India needs to stick with the 2 spinner approach throughout the series.

Australia are favourites to win it but India has a chance to make a match of it. I would like to see India ending tomorrow's day at around 300 for 3.

Highlights of Day1 of Boxing Day Test 2007

What a fantastic way to begin the most anticipated series, The Border-Gavaskar Series between India and Australia starting Boxing Day at the historic MCG. Australia got 337 and India got 9 wickets. That leaves the first day honours even though India has a slight advantage. But to an Indian fan this is a huge satisfaction, to stay in the game at the end of Day 1 overseas that too Australia.

For India its captain Kumble has led from the front taking 5 wickets. He rates this as his best bowling spell overseas. For Australia Hayden scored 124 (100 of just 120 balls), he too rates his hundred as the best of his career. To rate this as their best achievements from players of the stature and experience of Kumble and Hayden shows what a massive day this has been and how important this contest is for the respective teams.

The turning point to me of the day was Zaheer Khan castling Ponting's off-stump. That was a peach of a delivery, bowled from an angle, pitching on good length, swings just away to beat Pointing outside edge and hit the top of off-stump. The best fast bowlers have a very simple strategy, just bowl such that the ball pitches and hits the top of off-stump. This though is a very effective strategy because at that length the batsmen is unsure as to whether to play it off the front foot or back foot. The line is such that the batsmen has to play at it. If he misses it he will get out bowled or lbw or if he gets an outside edge it will carry to waiting hands and slips.

On his personal front, it is a very special day for Saurav Ganguly who is playing his 100th test match. Lord's and MCG are Mecca and Madina of cricket. He is the most privileged one to play his first test at the former and 100th test at the latter. He scored a 100 on the first occasion, could he score a 100 on this occasion? He made his ODI debut too here 15 years back. He is the 7th Indian to play 100 tests and 3 of them (Sachin, Rahul and Anil) are playing alongside him in this match. When Laxman will play his 100th match, hopefully India will have 5 centurions in same team, 4 in the middle order. He has scored a few hundreds with the bat in Tests, ODIs and First Class matches but it will he this hundred (matches) that he will value the most.

Regarding the selection, I am happy that a spinner was picked ahead of the medium pacer. Kumble very much realises that Australian batsmen are susceptible to quality spin bowling and are very comfortable with medium pace. Only Kumble and Harbhajan of the Indian bowlers have troubled Australia consistently in the recent past. But the shuffling of the settled batting order was what I didn't like. I am not against selection of Yuvraj Singh, but the fact that Dravid is made to open and Laxman has to bat at No 3. Harsha Bogle in his column for espnstar wrote "If you want to pick a junior minister in the cabinet, you don’t move the home minister to finance, the finance minister to external affairs so that the junior man can take home!". I feel sorry for Dravid here, he is in his worst phase of his career, struggling with the bat, quit captaincy, lost his one day place and now lost his favourite Test Batting position. No doubt he has the skill and technique to bat at any position and he is ready to make any sacrifices for the team.

At this stage India have their noses ahead but a Test win is still far off. To me Australians are still favourites to win this opening encounter.

Indian Playing X1 for Boxing Day Test

Thinking about selecting the team for 1st Test against Australia starting Boxing Day makes me realise how difficult yet thankless the job of Indian Selector is. Dilip Vengsarkar certainly deserves a better deal for taking revolutionary decisions like inclusion of Ganguly in South Africa, asking Kumble to captain the test team, making Karthik as opener, giving new ball to R.P.Singh, sticking to the tried, tested and guaranteed middle order in spite of relentless pressure from Yuvraj Singh.

Let me start the selection with a few easy and uncontroversial ones. List is in Chronological order of walking into the batting crease
1. Jaffer - Best Opener for India over the last 2 years. Showed good form with a stroking 200 against Pakistan.
2. Rahul Dravid - He missed only 1 match since he has made his debut. Not in the best of form rather has just completed his worst (by his own high standards) year at office. Has got class and technique and is just a 100 away from striking form again. His selection into the team is beyond doubt but his batting position.
3. Tendulkar - Was he ever dropped ever since he has started playing? The decision whether to play him or not is left to himself. He on in part is raring to go.
4. Ganguly - Best Indian batsmen over last one year right from the first innings since he has come back. He is at his best form of his life.
5. Laxman - Remember, We are playing against Australia. We are not here to please Australians by dropping him.
6. Dhoni - Hasn't done any mistake with the gloves. Cheers up the dressing room. Batting and that too aggressively is a bonus. One who is touted to take over captaincy can learn the nuances by being a sincere deputy to Kumble.
7. Kumble. Full Stop
8. Zaheer Khan - India's strike bowler after Srinath's retirement. Worked extremely hard to earn a place back in the Team. Hasn't put a wrong foot since his return. Architect of India's triumph in England.
9. R.P. Singh - Good controlled bowler. Has his name registered at Lord's for his 5-wicket haul. Excellent new ball partner to Zaheer Khan. Both of them lack the pace to trouble Australian batsmen, but who else has? Swing and control is what is expected of them. It is important that they don't carry any injury during the entire series.

Pareto's 80-20 principle holds very well here. Selecting 80% of the 11 is only 20% of the effort but the remaining 20% will take 80% effort. I am yet to select Jaffer's opening partner and the 4th bowler.
Again starting off with an easier debate i.e. on 4th bowling option. My argument is that it has to be a spinner.
* The pitch at MCG is expected to be good for batting and will assist the spinners after 3 days. Stuart Clark has expressed his disappointment at this.
* Shane Warne last year picked up 5 wickets on day 1 against England to bring up his tally to 700. Suggesting that spin works at MVG.
* Australians are expected to bat big and long. A second spinner comes in handy then to share Kumble's workload.
* Only twice have Indian fast bowlers (Zaheer Khan and Agarkar) taken 5 wickets in an innings in at least last 20 tests against Australia. We don't have a 3rd fast bowler who looks like challenging that record. Australians were never troubled by Indian fast bowling but by Spinners.
* With Sreesanth unfit, Pathan looks the next best option. But being yet another left arm medium pace bowler, there wouldn't be any new variety to bowling attack. His batting would be useful isn't a valid argument when his bowling is useless. Ishant Sharma lacks any sort to discipline to play at Test Level, let alone against Australia. I was agitated at seeing him bowl at Bengaluru. I don't know Pankaj Singh, if he is quality bowler, I would have known.

I said we need a spinner, that doesn't mean that it has to be Harbhajan. He might have excellent record against Australia at home but that was few years back. Present Harbhajan is no longer the Turbonator, he is now a listless unidimensional off-spinner. Murali Karthik would have been good but only Harbhajan has flown to Australia and I am forced to select him.

Coming to the batsmen and Jaffer's opening partner. The possible options are Sehwag, Yuvraj and Karthik. Let me discuss of them one by one.
1) Sehwag - Till a year ago he was India's best batsmen along with Dravid for 3 years. He had one bad series in South Africa. Because of his poor one-day form he was dropped from Test Side. India had found a good opener in Karthik and never got a chance back. His style of game suits only Test Cricket. Attaching close in fielders, bowlers bowling to get his wicket rather than containing runs, new ball coming on to the bat etc suits well for him. His record over 5 years in various forms clearly suggests that. When he scores he scores them quickly, converts starts into huge scores. I wouldn't criticize the way he plays as the same method earned him huge successes in the past. Now he is low on confidence and form. So doesn't merit a selection. Selectors might hope/pray that he will come out well. But we can't expect such gambles to pay off against Australia.

2) Yuvraj Singh - He is one player who is causing head-aches to selectors, other settled middle order batsmen and me. Following arguments favour his selection. Is in form of his life; Likes ball to come on to the bat as it does in Australia; Strikes and Times the ball well; Brilliant fielder. Scores runs quickly and can be very good when counter-attacking; Provides a decent part time bowling option. But the big question is, where do one fit him? Only one opening slot is free. To select him we need to promote(?) Dravid to open and Laxman to No 3. Dravid hasn't been very successful as opener, still he as a team man has agreed to open. But I wouldn't open with him, because No 3 is his slot he has earned scoring about 7000 runs at that position. He is too good a batsmen to risk at opening slot. I wouldn't make such drastic changes in a long settled batting line up. So, if Yuvraj is to be selected he needs to open which he has never done successfully. That means he will have to sit-out and wait for his turn when any other batsmen gets injured. I would be very happy to have such a good batsmen sitting in the bench. Injury to a major batsman wouldn't be a problem then. This is a good problem to have for the team. Hussey got a break into Australian Team after age of 30 and 15000 first class runs.

3) Karthik - He had one bad series against Pakistan but otherwise he was top run scorer in England, had a good match in Cape Town, scored a hundred against Bangladesh. Dynamic fielder, back up wicket keeper and great team player. Has got India to a few solid starts with Jaffer. So I would give him a chance for 4 innings at least. That concludes the Team Selection.

Parthiv Patel and Aakash Chopra can also be considered. We have good number of options for batting but limited in bowling department. Is any pace foundation listening?

Kumble - I am proud of you!

I am extremely happy about Indian Cricket Team winning the first Test against Pakistan at Delhi. They have proved that they are stronger team in the match by driving home the advantage on 4th day. Till then they have been constantly giving back the advantage to the opposition whenever they used to get it. Anyway, I would like to focus on the man who captained the Indian Team and led from the front, deservingly winning the Man of the Match award - Anil Kumble.

He has been my hero ever since he has been playing for India. We (Kumble and I) have a few things in common. Our ancestors are from the same place i.e. Kumble in Kasargod District of Kerala. This explains where he derived his surname from. He was a Mechanical Engineer from RVCE, Bangalore. Even I aspired to be a Mechanical Engineer but circumstances forced me to be a Computer Engineer from SJCE, Mysore. Javagal Srinath was the alumnus of my college. We share similar personal traits like being humble, honest, maintaining a low key, quiet or being anything but flamboyant or flashy or swashbuckling, one who tries to control only what one can do than what others can do for us, dedicated to work, let the performance do the talking. The magnitude of successes that we achieved may be different. One who bears all the pains and still doesn't react. Because of this we were considered pushovers or walkovers. Bowling wise, I liked to be a Leg-spinner while Kumble might still aspire to bowl genuine leg-spin!

Kumble was never considered as captaincy material. He has played under captains who were younger than him or who had less experience than him. He never openly sought captaincy, nor played any politics to get the post. He has always stayed clear of all controversies. Sachin, Rahul, Sourav and even Sehwag have all become captains ahead of him. He has cooperated and gave his 100% (or more) under all of them. After Rahul resigned and Sachin refused Dhoni was tipped to be Team India's new captain. But better sense prevailed with the selectors and chose the right man Anil Kumble to be India's 30th Test Captain. What a gesture that can be to the 37 year old man who has played 118 matches, taken 570 wickets and scored 2000 odd runs.

I have seen a one-day match when he led India against England at Chennai in 2002. Of course India won that match. After putting England to bat, he attached right from word go. Once a few wickets fell, he never let the hook off, having men within the 30 yard circle even after the field restriction was over. Made the right bowling changes and restricted England to around 200. Till then I never belieeved that a captain can make so much difference to the unit. He kept all the men on their toes throughout. The team mates respect him so much for what he is. Unfortunately, it was only a stop-gap arrangement when Ganguly was injured.

A few highlights on Kumble
* Only living cricket to have a street or circle on his name. We have Anil Kumble Circle at the end of famous Mahatma Gandhi Road in Bangalore.
* Only second bowler to take all 10 wickets in an innings of a Test Match
* 3rd highest wicket taker in Test History and by far the highest Indian wicket taker.
* Biggest Match winner for India,
- India has won 41 tests which Kumble has played.
- Kumble has taken close to 300 wickets in those tests (half the wickets in third of his matches)
- 10 "Man of the Match" Awards, joint highest for India with Sachin Tendulkar.
* Loves Big Occasions
- Got his 100th, 300th and 400th wicket at his home ground Bangalore
- Got 9 wickets in his 100th Test at Ahmedabad to help his Team win the match and series against Sri Lanka. He won the Man of the Match and Man of the Series
- Won his first match as captain and also the Man of the Match award for taking 7 wickets
* Best bowling effort by an Indian in One-day (6-12) and Tests(10-74)
* Leading wicket taker for India in Tests (570) and ODIs (334)
* Only centurion in the whole of 3 test tour to England which India won.
* Missed the entire home series against Australia when Harbhajan took 32 wickets and India won the 3 test series 2-1. Just an exception when India has won even in the absence of him. But what people don't know is that he was mentoring Turbonator on how to bowl to Ausrtalia.
* Indians are known/proved to be poor fielders, had they not dropped catches he would easily had 100 more wickets by now and won far more matches.
* His selflessness can be summed up with a picture of him bowling with a broken jaw and trapping the greatest batsmen Lara in a dead Test at Antigua.
* Warne and Murali are rated as better spinners compared to Anil but in the series between India and Australia and India and Srilanka, Kumble has always out-performed the two. Warne though is a great bowler has 2 advantages 1) He plays for Australia 2) He doesn't play against Australia.
* An interesting point of view that came in newspapers after the Delhi test was that Saurav was given the 2nd new ball and was used quite often. Although Saurav during his captaincy in ODIs has under bowled Kumble. What a forgiving man he is.
* He has been constantly criticized for not spinning the ball. Opposition batsmen have taken him lightly although it worked to his advantage. Nasser Hussain as captain of England Team used to advice his players to treat Kumble as a medium pace bowler.

We all know how greatest bowlers like Warne and McGrath retired, by sweeping series 5-0 against their arch-rival England. So I wish his team-mates bid farewell to his illustrious career by sweeping a series thereby leaving on a high.

I write this just after the First Test is over and it is too early to decide about a person after just 1 match. This series itself is far from over. Then we have a toughest tour of Australia coming up. So, one can really judge Kumble after that. But so far so good!

Korigad Trek

Date – Sunday, September 30, 2007
Place – Korigad Fort, Lonavala
Group – Shaleen, Tarun, Hunny and I (All first benchers of D-Section)
Mode of commution – Train and Local Buses
Expenditure per head – 200 /-

Korigad - Korigad is a small yet steep hill. Shivaji had built a fort on top of it. There are 2 natural lakes on the top of the hill, couple of Buddhist Caves and Ganesha Temple. Sahara’s Amby Valley is visible from the top. Walking on the path on the edge of the hill can be thrilling and frightening.

Background
Our First Tri-mister MBA Exams got over. It was quite hectic over last 2 weeks with 1 exam every day. Don’t want to comment about how I performed in them; don’t even want to think about it. Before the next tri-mister begins there is a long gap of 3 days. So it was quite appropriate to go to a natural/scenic place like Lonavala. I had gone there recently in August with my parents when they had come here. Since I was the only person in the group who had visited that place earlier, the trip planning was left to me. I had seen Bushi Dam, Tiger Waterfalls, Valvan Dam, Baaje Kaves, Lonavala Lake, Lion Point and INS Shivaji at Lonavala. We saw Rajamachi Point and Duke’s nose at Khandala. But all of those places were seen superficially without getting too involved in any particular place. This time since I was going with my class mates, I wanted it to be more adventurous so planned for some trekking. On searching in the internet, 2 options were available i.e. Kune Waterfalls and Korigad. Since this is in a rainy season, I thought it will be very slippery and dangerous to get down to waterfalls and decided to go to Korigad.

Traveling frustrations
Shaleen came to my hostel sharp at 6.15 and gave me a missed call from outside. I must really appreciate his punctuality this time as it was so early in the morning. Tarun and his roomy Hunny were to meet us at Dadar to catch 7.20 a.m. train. They too did make it before time. But Banker bhai Gandharv Kumar couldn’t make it before 7.20 and had to be left out.

Train was quite crowded and we barely managed to catch our seats. For about 2 hours of travel there was no trace of greenery, only slums, drainages, concrete structures and people everywhere. I was sitting in the Aisle seat. Meanwhile we rather they got into conversation. As always, I was listening most of the times instead of talking. I am just being euphemistic here; frankly I couldn’t understand what they were talking about ;-) My Hindi has improved a lot since coming to Mumbai but not good enough to understand when spoken fast i.e. naturally. They were also making fun of me linking with the girl that I like in the class. So, in this case at least I had to act as if I did not understand!

After that Greenery started, this time the views were blocked by other passengers who were standing. From whatever I could see, I could sense that scenery around was beautiful. Hills, forests, lakes, rivers, valleys, paddy fields, huts and everything added to beauty. I have been looking for every opportunity to visit places with natural beauty but this was unique and special. Last one hour went off so fast and suddenly train reached Khandala station. Next station is Lonavala, where we got down at 10.20. From there we had to walk for 15 minutes to State Transport Bus Stand. Buses start to Peth-Shahpur village at 9.15. When we reached the bus stand, the bus had just left at 10.30 and next bus is at 12.30. Hard luck! It is easy to look back and rue the little time wasted but it was just unfortunate. Next option is to take a private Jeap or Tempo to the village. The tempo guy doesn’t follow any timing, he goes only when he gets 20 passengers. We were the first 4 passengers ;-( Sensing that we are in a hurry, he offered us to take us right away for 200/-. We didn’t agree as we thought we could soon get required no of people, but that didn’t happen. We were left waiting and suffocating inside the tempo for 1 hour before it finally started. I was hoping against hope that some Public Bus comes there and all the passengers in the tempo just get down and board the bus.

The road to the village passed through tourist locations like Lonavala Lake, Bushi Dam, Tiger Waterfalls, and Lion View Point. Hope to see them when we come back after trekking. We reached the village at 12.30, packed some food stuff and water. Found that the bus timings to return to Lonavala are at 3 and 4 p.m.

Place and the Trek
Direction and path to go was obvious as the hill was right in front. I would expect any hill to be like a pyramid, broad at bottom and pointed at the top. But this was different; it was like a prism, same thickness both at top and bottom. At the trek’s starting point there is a bore-well, we filled our water bottles here. The path initially is flat, later there are easy steps to reach the top. Trekking was quite easy. Midway through the climb, there is Amby Valley View Point, Buddhist Cave and Ganesha Temple. There are more caves as we go along. Each of those caves has a water tank, used for rain-water harvesting by the Buddhists.

We soon reached the top and found 2 natural lakes adjacent to each other. Sat in between them and had our lunch. I sincerely didn’t want to throw the plastic covers and bottles there. I carried it with me for sometime, but the group didn’t encourage me for that. I myself found it not feasible to carry for long and had to leave it somewhere. I am feeling very guilty for having polluted the environment. I promise to take care of this from next time. Myself being a nature lover, I wouldn’t like anybody (including me) to damage the vulnerable nature. I want to educate the group especially Shaleen regarding this.

From there one could walk on the edge of the hill, there is a well defined path there and go to the corner or summit. The path as I said earlier was very scary, breeze made it worse. I made sure that I always walked with the head bending to the other side of the edge, So that I minimize the chances of falling down. Saw the surroundings around, Amby Valley, Dam, Plane Runway, paddy fields, lakes, forests, neighboring hills and so on. Would have loved to spend whole evening there, but had to reach the base village by 3 p.m. to catch the ST Bus. Tarun who was most tired while climbing now was the fastest to go down. Shaleen meanwhile got cramps in his legs and had to slowdown. I accompanied him as Hunny was with his roommate walking fast. Finally, we reached well on time to the bus stop.

Still we had some time left; it was only 3 in the afternoon. So, decided to visit some place on the way back. Shaleen suggested at the beginning of the trip itself that he wants to spend sometime playing in water. I thought Bushi Dam would be the best place, as when I went there last time with my parents. Dam was overflowing with water. That water used to flow down along the steps where people can easily approach and play. Since monsoons are not yet over, I thought it would be same again. But this time there was no water flowing down the steps. It was so dry that it looked like steps to just reach the dam. I was thoroughly disappointed considering the expectations with which I had come. As it was Sunday evening there was a huge crowd mainly from Mumbai. The place looked like a shopping complex within the city. Once could trek to the hill adjacent to the dam. But nobody had any energy or motivation left to trek again. So took reverse gear back to Mumbai. We had some hopes of looking at the sceneries outside this time at least. But the train was so crowded that we were happy to at least find a seat for ourselves in the upper berth. Reached Mumbai at 8 p.m. and headed to our respective houses.

Positives from the trip were 1) Place was fantastic and worth going. 2) Group members were like minded and there were no issues on that front. 3) Understood the travails of traveling to villages so that we can better plan next time.

Korigad - Mini Travel Guide
Lonavala is 100 kms from Mumbai and takes 3 hours by an express train. The base to start trekking is Peth-Shahpur Village, 16 kms from Lonavala on the way to Amby-Valley. State Transport Buses are available every 1 or 2 hours starting 9.15 a.m. Private Tempos are also available but they won’t ply unless they get their minimum 20 people.
One way trekking time – 45 minutes
There is a general store at the base where we get Biscuits and Cool Drinks. Nothing is available on the way and at the top. So, we got to carry food on our own. Fruits and water are quite handy.
Last bus to back to Lonavala is at 4.00 p.m.
Best Time to Visit – Path is slippery during rainy season. It would be quite hot and humid during summer. But anytime of the year should still be fine for a light trek like this.

Trend at TrentBridge

Indian win at TrentBridge, Nottingham was a watershed moment in Indian Cricket. Indian Cricket celebrated its platinum jubilee just about a month back. In all those 75 years, 14 tours and 45 matches in England, India had won just 4 tests in England. 28 out of 200 Tests abroad, quarter of them in Zimbabwe (3) and Bangladesh (4). If we consider the figure before 2001 (The golden era of Tendulkar, Dravid, Ganguly and Kumble), the number gets even lesser. So, Indians historically are poor travelers. All these factors add to the significance of this victory.

Factors responsible for this win
Luck – Rahul Dravid normally an unlucky captain with the coin won a crucial toss. He promptly elected to field first. Pitch and outfield was damp owing to heavy rains. Bowlers made good use of the conditions and bowled out England for less than 200. But when India came on to bat on the 2^nd day, sun was shining brightly. So conditions were favorable to Indians always be it while bowling or batting. Many batsmen might have posted 50 plus scores but each one of them had balls just passing outside edges and catches falling short of fielders. On any other day they would have been wickets. On 4^th evening just when the match was slipping away, Vaughan was dismissed in most uncharacteristic fashion and that was the turning point of the match and England couldn’t recover from there at all. To tell it the other way, India made the best use of luck available to them. Put the unlucky dismissals of Tendulkar and Ganguly behind them.
Fast Bowling – Fast bowling has been a revelation in this tour. We managed to take all 40 wickets in 2 tests, with only 4 bowlers, Kumble not firing, each time without letting England go on a run-feast. Tail-enders has usually been a problem but they didn’t let them loose this time. Earlier the equation used to be simple for home teams, prepare a seaming track and have 4 fast bowlers. Now with the quality of fast bowlers we have and the batsmen, that could be threat to home team too. Zaheer, Sreesanth and RP Singh are more than competent swing bowlers.
Opening Batting – This was supposed to be the weakest link in star-studded Indian batting line-up. We have not found a solid opener since Sunil Gavaskar. I personally believe in having Sehwag the team. Whatever reasons he is failing now was the reason for his success earlier. He has given us blistering starts against toughest of bowling attacks. Any way we now have Jaffer and Karthik. Jaffer is solid in technique, strong on his pads, matured now and scored a hundred in each of previous 4 series. Karthik is one hell of a character, perfect team man, young and energetic, can assume any role in the team. I best remember him for his 90 in second innings partnership with Dravid in Kolkata Test against Pakistan. Both of them have now scored 2 50s each so far in this series. Their start was instrumental in India putting up a big-score.
I have deliberately omitted the middle order batting because they are expected to perform with a combined experience of 400 plus tests. I thought Ganguly’s batting was the best I have seen from him since his 144 at Brisbane. Dravid has massively underperformed considering the standards he sets him-selves in away wins.
Opposition Experience – Only one player has an experience of playing more than 50 Tests and that is that is their captain. Their most experienced bowler is Monty Panesar who made his Debut last year. While in Indian Team we have 5 players with 90 plus test experience.

Weakness
We might have won but that doesn’t mean we don’t have weaknesses. Laxman and Sreesanth were our weakest links. Laxman might have scored 54 but he came to the crease when India had already built substantial lead. His job then would have been to score runs quickly and bat England out of the game. Scoring quickly is not asking too much from him, he is a natural stroke maker, silky gifted beautiful player. The things that I didn’t like about that innings were. One he took 150 balls to score them, way too slow. Two he didn’t protect the tail well enough by scoring singles in the first ball of the over or playing out maidens. Sreesanth was involved more in scoring a few brownie points over the opposition by shouting, pushing and bowling beamers. He did all that in Johannesburg also but he also took 8 wickets and hit a six to Andre Nel.

Where does this win rank itself?
India has proved that it is unfair to call them as poor travelers in this new millennium. With 16 wins at Adelaide, Multan, Rawalpindi, Nottingham, Leeds, Port of Spain, Jamica, Johannesburg, Harare, Bulawayo(twice), Dhaka (thrice), Chittagong and Kandy. Each one of them was extremely important barring those in Zimbabwe and Bangladesh. To me it doesn’t quite match with other 8 wins mainly considering the luck we had and the experience of opposition players.

Win one loose very next one
Winning a Test in a series is not new to us and that is exactly what we have done in the n test. But finishing the series on a winning note is. We have lost the very next Test on 6 out of 8 times we won. The win-lose pairs are Adelaide-Melbourne, Multan-Lahore, Port-of-Spain – Barbados, Johannesburg-Durban, Bulawayo-Harare, Kandy-Colombo. We didn’t loose 2 times because they were the last test of the series that we went on to win. So what this suggests is that we work hard towards a win and get complacent after winning. The opposition on the other hand pull-up their socks. Win should ideally enable us to build confidence and belief to win next one.

Hope we don’t go flat at Oval
My prediction at the beginning of the series has already gone wrong. It is already 1-0 when I was expecting a 0-2. Good, very good. Can my prediction go exactly opposite by India winning 2-0? It is possible but India must overcome complacency. Oval should be a good batting track. It should help the spinners later on. We got to be wary of Monty, use Kumble well. We got to play to win this match too, instead of playing for a draw and securing the series. In this regard, I would like to drop slow scoring Laxman and bring in additional bowler in Ramesh Powar. He is not afraid to flight the ball. We will be spending a lot of time bowling and extra bowler could come very handy. Message to batsmen would be to attack, score at more than 3.5 runs per over. I repeat “Please don’t play for a draw”.