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.

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Here we are. The most exciting summer of cricket in a long while is almost over, with one last flourish still left. India and England are going to fight out at Lord’s for the final one-dayer in this long and grueling tour. Just a week ago, India were staring at defeat with the series slipping out. They were 1-3 down and had to win all their matches. So far they have done exactly that with one final hurdle left.

This will, for a few Indians, be the last time they ever play in England. The Big 3 - Sachin Tendulkar, Saurav Ganguly, Rahul Dravid - have done their country proud over the years. They have helped in laying the foundation for the next generation, they have provided role models for aspiring cricketers. They have gained respect in the eyes of the entire cricket fraternity. This will be their final hurrah in England and nothing better than to win the match and the series will do.

The momentum is surely with India at the moment, however, in the past we have seen how India have failed to carry on the momentum. But this time it ought to be different. These three have had a wonderful summer so far. Sachin and Saurav have smashed the bowling to all parts. Dravid has been having a much better time as a skipper, seeing his team perform to its potential. No coach, no problemo. I have to give credit to the way the Indian team has got the job done without a head coach. A lot of people ask if they need a coach. The answer is simple, a big fat Yes. Sure the team is on the verge of winning an ODI series. Sure they have won the test series. But this can’t keep up for too long. It is too much to ask the captain to strategize everything all by himself. The Indians have handled themselves admirably both on and off the field.

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Down but not out. After the 4th ODI, India were looking down the barrel. England had a comfortable 3-1 lead and India had to win all the remaining matches to win this ODI series. They have started on the right path and cannot afford any hiccups along the way.

Today however belonged to Sachin, Saurav, Yuvraj and Gambhir. The top 4 Indian batsmen crossed their 50s in their own unique style. Although none went on to score a century, each milestone laid the foundation for the massive total that India set for England to chase.

Lets start with the toss that Paul Collingwood won for the first time in this series and he decided to field first. The overcast conditions and overnight rain made the decision easier for him as he thought that his opening bowlers would be able to pick up a couple of early wickets. Tendulkar and Ganguly, on the other hand, had other ideas. They were rock solid in defence and after scoring 7 runs from the first 5 overs, the carnage began from Lewis’s third over. Tendulkar smashed 3 boundaries in consecutive balls to pick up 16 runs in that one over and since then the floodgates opened up.

James Anderson, Stuart Broad, Jon Lewis, Monty Panesar - none were spared from the Indian batsmen. Tendulkar in particular has looked the Tendulkar that we all know throughout this one day series. He was at his attacking best picking up fours all round the park. Ganguly may have started slow, but the south paw hammered a couple of big hits in vintage Ganguly style and holed to deep-midwicket off Panesar in his first over.

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Well so much for the closely contested battle, this match was one-way traffic from beginning till the end. An emphatic win by England was just the tonic the side needed in their quest to restore some respect after their test series loss. So much for the Big 3 and their over 30000 runs in international cricket. And to hell with Zaheer Khan’s series winning performance in the recently concluded test matches.

Cricket is a funny game, and ODI cricket is so funny that its almost cruel. It took just one day of play to bring the Indians to their knees. And it wasn’t just a big defeat, it was humiliation at its very best. Rahul Dravid won the toss, yet again, but that was the only thing that went India’s way. The decision to field first miserable back-fired as England posted a massive 288/2.

Alastair Cook and Matt Prior opened for England and started at a steady pace. Before the beginning of the match, Dravid had mentioned that he did not have too many bowling options. Now what exactly did he mean by that with Zaheer Khan, Ajit Agarkar, Munaf Patel, RP Singh, Piyush Chawla and Ramesh Powar in the Indian squad. I can count 6 bowlers here. Plus there were the part-timers in Yuvraj Singh, Sachin Tendulkar and Saurav Ganguly.

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Well here we go again. After a stupendous test series, the One day version is upon us and it promises to be a cracker. Two evenly matched teams battling it out for pride. For England, its about saving face after losing a closely contested test series at home, the first time since 2001. For India, this is about the last hurrah from the Fab 4 (not 5 as Laxman is not in the ODI squad).

They would love to cap this tour with a ODI series win as well. The firstv match will be played today at Southampton. The teams are going to be selected from the following:

England (likely) 1 Matt Prior (wk), 2 Ian Bell, 3 Owais Shah, 4 Kevin Pietersen, 5 Paul Collingwood (capt), 6 Andrew Flintoff, 7 Ravi Bopara, 8 Stuart Broad, 9 Monty Panesar, 10 James Anderson, 11 Chris Tremlett

India (likely) 1 Sachin Tendulkar, 2 Sourav Ganguly, 3 Gautam Gambhir, 4 Yuvraj Singh, 5 Rahul Dravid (capt), 6 Dinesh Karthik, 7 Mahendra Singh Dhoni (wk), 8 Piyush Chawla, 9 Ajit Agarkar, 10 Zaheer Khan, 11 RP Singh
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