Cricket Blog

What a bummer! So much expectations and so few met in the final of the one-day series. Rahul Dravid’s luck with the toss continued and yet again he read the conditions wrong. Cannot blame him really as these decisions are already made up by the team beforehand. However, with the way this series had gone, India should really have put on a more competitive total. Their lack of going past 200 is becoming a major problem now. The umpiring has been very consistent so far this series - and by that I mean the poor umpiring decisions against India. Aleem Dar the culprit this time. Yet again Sachin was the victim. Even though Dravid played down the umpiring decisions, this is getting just too much. The ICC and the world has no right to call the umpiring standards of Indian umpires low when the elite umpires of their own panel make such terrible decisions.

As for the match report, nothing much to write about, England completely dominated this one as they have whenever they have chased a total. India lacked aggression and fire when it required the most. All credit to England’s bowlers who played with passion and executed their plan perfectly.

Read the rest of this entry »

Bookmark:

What a match! Nerve-wracking right till the last over. Frustrating and joyful at the same time if you are an Indian fan. I, for one, did not believe that India would go an and win after being down 5 wickets and still requiring 83 runs from 58 balls. But the youth brigade held on to their nerves and in a cool, icy, tone won the match for India which they never should have won after conceding 30 runs off the last over with five consecutive sixes. Yes, you heard me correct, if you did not watch England’s innings you have missed out on something spectacular. Dimitry Mascerenhas smashed Yuvraj Singh for 5 straight sixes in the 50th over of the English innings. More on that later.

Paul Collingwood won the toss for the second time in a row and this time he decided to bat first on a flat surface that was going to help the spinners in the second innings. This turned out to be a blessing in disguise for Dravid and his men. Zaheer Khan was charged up and got one to move just enough for the ball to get the outside edge of Alastair Cook. England were 0-1. India could sense that if they snag a couple more wickets early on, they could put England on the backfoot.

Read the rest of this entry »

Bookmark:

Its just the usual suspects these days, and for a high profile series like this, the ICC has relied on its best test umpires: Simon Taufel, Steve Bucknor and Ian Howell. All three will be umpiring for 2 matches each. As for the one day series, it will be Billy Doctrove (first three matches) and Aleem Dar (remaining four matches). The home umpires have not yet been announced. Two Sri Lankans will be the match referees for the entire tour: Ranjan Madugalle for the tests and Roshan Mahanama for the one-dayers.

Bookmark: