SubscribeA dull series and a South African mauling
Posted on Apr 14, 2008 under Cricket views |
The last test ended with India quite easily romping home after their spinners predictably did what was expected on a dirt track which would easily qualify for Pro-racing or inspire the game developers for Motocross madness. The only positive in that pitch was that a result was definitely on the cards and it would never go on for 5 days.
The South Africans can be proud, as they pretty much mauled India during the series. Even though the score line reads 1-1, we can always consider this as a South African victory similar to India’s series against the Aussies where on paper they went down but the cold reality was it could have been a series victory for them.
The South Africans left me a bit disappointed in the last test. No matter how bad the pitch was, it actually had a lot for all the bowlers. Their fast bowlers could have wreaked havoc on that pitch but they didn’t. It was nice to see Ishanth back and there was a huge difference to the depth and penetration of the attack. He still is a bit rusty and should be well and truly back with some more match practice.
Harbhajan Singh should not have got the man of the series award. Dale Steyn deserved it better, as he toiled, made the Indians jump around and picked up as many wickets as Harby, that too on conditions not conducive to fast bowlers. Steyn now takes the number 1 bowler rank on the charts and he has had a fairy tale career so far. It is hard to get excited when he generally comes on to bowl, watching him spray the ball around. In a flash, he comes up with a couple of great deliveries that sends all the stumps flying. Nevertheless, he has claimed the throne for the best fast bowler in the world and maybe now it will be within him and Brett Lee. Personally Lee is a far better bowler than Steyn but somehow Steyn is delivering results that matter.
On a general note on Harbhajan, he is definitely bowling a lot better and is almost back to his prime. The Indian fans can thank the Australian team, their media and fans for getting this dude back on track, considering for close to 4 years, he has not done much. However he only seems to get wickets when there is significant purchase from the pitch… but he is getting back slowly and is improving back to the good old days. The Indian batting was sad and their fielding was atrocious. I’m seriously wondering if Robin Singh is doing any work at all.
The South African batting was flawless and perhaps Prince was the only note of disappointment for them. The last time they toured, Prince had a remarkable series but not this time around. Paul Harris is an excuse for a spinner…. Period. Boje was way better than him and Boje was not great. Hopefully, he would have learnt many things on this tour. Morkel has to add more variety to his arsenal especially reverse swing.
Dhoni showed yet again that he is an interesting captain and looks ready for the job. However, we cannot say the same about his batting. Can this guy be expected to bat for days, perhaps score double hundreds? Nope… at the moment, his batting at the test level is at rock bottom. Yuvraj failed again and will continue to be treated as a smaller format player or the official drinks carrier. Jaffer has to be now given the boot and Gambhir or Akash Chopra be given a shot. The rest of the team have to spend time licking their wounds and patching themselves up with splinters, bandages and arthritis therapy.
A lot of people were raving about Ganguly’s innings, which I missed completely. It was also ridiculous watching the guys parade on the car. This was a disastrous home series for India and they played badly. A face saving series draw was perhaps the saving grace for the salad forks and spoons to come out.
The verdict anyway can be best summed up by Smith on how he would have been very disappointed to have not won a home series. That’s a nice parting shot to the hosts, who needed a bunch of gardeners to prepare a pitch that would so heavily stack things for the home side. Sure there is a valid point on home advantage and there is nothing wrong in preparing pitches that suit spin but this pitch was stretching it a bit too much.
So now the world turns to watch the IPL unfold in a week’s time. The buzz in India is zilch… no folks, people aren’t all that excited about it. That’s why it is funny reading all the articles across other nations on the IPL and how it is a threat and other chicken shit. The fact is they are more excited than us… but with India you never know.
by kp, on April 14 2008 @ 6:18 pm
dude…this series was extremely dull..no one wanted to play….
by straight point, on April 14 2008 @ 7:07 pm
nice round up of the series…
but, scorpy, cant say smith is right…
if he was 0-1 down and drawn the ‘home’ series he would be happy i bet…
at the same time he should be disappointed that one hour of mindless cricket from them and they lost the chance of winning series in india…
they had equal chance of winning this test match going on 3rd day morning but they simply refuse to rose to occasion by first bad bowling, bad fielding and then later with mindless batting…
by scorpicity, on April 14 2008 @ 8:17 pm
Kp… I didn’t feel like watching most of the time.
by scorpicity, on April 14 2008 @ 8:18 pm
Pan… yes but then they have never lost a test series with India in SA… So it was a smart parting shot. In reality, Smith will be kicking himself because they could have easily won the last test. The odds were equal for both teams and they choked.
by Chennai Super Kings Fan, on April 14 2008 @ 8:23 pm
Hey,
I disagree that there is no buzz for IPL in India.. Turn on any news channel.. IPL is what they talk about..
Even there is considerable buzz among people.. Chennai Super Kings orkut community boast about around 20,000 people while kolkata knight riders have around 30,000 members.. More than 1000 people read the CSK-Wikipedia page.. around 5000 read the IPL page.. [More than the number of visits that Wikipedia-cricket page is able to muster].. [This numbers are huge considering the minsicule number of Indians who use the internet for purposes other than job search, email and sending marriage proposals.. Wait until the inaugural match and then you will know how many people start talking about IPL..
- Robin
by Soulberry, on April 14 2008 @ 9:09 pm
Nice summarisation Scorpi.
I missed the match and only caught snatches of the highlights of each day.
SA couldn’t clinch the series because of Kallis and Prince, who have been the bulwarks of their subcontinental success in recent times.
The other reason is Harris, who did well in the conditions of the first two tests but couldn’t do much when the conditions were entirely in his favor in the third.
The effect of Kallis and Prince was that SA, a team at 152-1 at one stage of this match, on this pitch, ended up losing it. There was nothing drastic which happened to the pitch in those few overs….application was lacking. As events showed, application was possible.
The burden created by predetermining the pitch in one’s mind prevented their free and natural play as per the merit of the ball. Just like India did in 76 all out.
This pitch wasn’t a five day pitch but I am not too unhappy that it came about. For variety is the essence of life and come to think of it, even Motera didn’t last five days.
by scorpicity, on April 14 2008 @ 11:32 pm
Robin… first of all a very warm welcome to cricketfizz.
Wow… these are interesting numbers you have rattled out and since you specialize in the IPL, I’ll take your word.
The media, yes is excited… but a few days back there was a report on ticket sales being poor and the general lack of excitement among the locals to bring out a sense of home team bonding like how the locals in England have a bond with their respective home team football clubs like man.united etc. India in contrast have never been the so called claimed lovers of cricket…. we love the Indian cricket team and the buck stops there. That explains why you don’t find local matches filled up in spite of the tickets being free.
Of course, when the IPL starts, there will be a full house and all… but for the moment I don’t see any euphoric buzz like the one before the start of the Australian tour. Who knows when it starts, the rage may catch on.
cheers dude
by scorpicity, on April 14 2008 @ 11:35 pm
Soulberry… am also not all that unhappy with the pitch as it had something for the fast bowlers and the spinners and it was a definite result oriented pitch. The worry was it was overdone a bit and it would not have lasted 5 days in case of some great batting display and that would be sad for Indian cricket and reputation.
Bang on prefixed notions on the pitch which India paid the price in the previous test and South Africa in this one. As for South Africa, they actually could have easily won this one but they choked! I love it when they choke!
by Chennai Super Kings Fan, on April 15 2008 @ 12:16 am
@ scorpicity,
I accept that ticket sales are not that great for kolkata knight riders.. But remember they have to fill 1,00,000 seats… (So SRK has a good reason for his jitters) But for chennai super kings, season ticket sales has been good.. Even the official website of CSK has that data.. [And i dont know about other franchises]
Sources for my earlier mumbers.. Orkut from Orkut
for wikipedia page views.. http://www.stats.grok.se - which gives page views for a particular article in wikipedia for each day…
by Chennai Super Kings Fan, on April 15 2008 @ 12:21 am
Also i do visit Ottayan’s blog.. and have already given a link to his blog in my list of comrades.. added yours too since you have stated that your are a CSK fan..
- Robin
by Ottayan, on April 15 2008 @ 5:35 am
Scorpi/Robin,
I just realised that this is a dog eat dog world. The last couple of days I was busy and unable to check on you guys frequently and what do I see, a mutual admiration society, with each one of claiming to be the official CSK fan.
What the hell!I am the (un) official CSK fan dammit!Don’t you conspire to tske it from me!
by scorpicity, on April 15 2008 @ 9:03 am
Robin… the tickets will get filled up by significant numbers on the day the tourno starts… no worry on that as Indian & intl.stars are playing. My reason for ticket sales being poor so far has been the lack of euphoria and excitement. It might all change on the day of the tournament … anyway dudes, let’s see how this important tournament shapes up.
by scorpicity, on April 15 2008 @ 9:07 am
Ottayan… I’m conspiring now because you refuse to hand me the mascot leach (with nayantara) on the other end! Been asking this for months now! Even Robin refused to part with the leach… aaarghu grumble mumble :).
by scorpicity, on April 15 2008 @ 9:08 am
@Robin… thxs, have added you to my roll too
by Cricket Guru, on April 15 2008 @ 12:12 pm
(However, we cannot say the same about his batting. Can this guy be expected to bat for days, perhaps score double hundreds? Nope… at the moment, his batting at the test level is at rock bottom)
How many wicket keepers have scored double hundreds so far?
If Dhoni averages in high 30s or the low 40s by the end of his career, I will be happy. Remember he is a wicket keeper first (or should we say a captain first?)
But I agree it was a dull series. Much of it was due to the fact that my cable operator had blanked the entire series!
by scorpicity, on April 15 2008 @ 4:27 pm
CG… been a long time… how are things with you.
On Dhoni… fortunately, a wicketkeeper is someone who bats and keeps well…. gilchrist, Kumar, Akmal, Boucher have all played really long innings… all of them here may or may not have scored doubles but Dhoni has to show more application when he is batting at the test level.
by Uncle J Rod, on April 16 2008 @ 12:10 pm
I wonder how many man of the series awards Harbhajan gets outside of india in the near future.
by straight point, on April 16 2008 @ 5:03 pm
UJ
how many spinners have won man of the series in recent past outside india i.e.
by Naked Cricket, on April 16 2008 @ 11:32 pm
could’ve given steyn a tata nano at least.
by scorpicity, on April 17 2008 @ 10:23 am
UJ/SP… what SP says is pretty valid… there are not many or hardly any touring spinner that actually wins a man of the series in India forget about spinners on seaming tracks. To me Steyn deserved the man of the series.
by scorpicity, on April 17 2008 @ 10:26 am
Gaurav… ha ha… good one… yes at least a nano. What was sick is an almost full page advertisement in the hindu paper from Tata… with that picture of the Indian team on that car and congratulations on a good performance it seems… I think people are living in a book… it was one of the worst outings by India in some time.
And what totally disgusts me is Dhoni handing out 10k to the curator and Harby praising him for a sporting pitch… having a good turner is fine… this pitch was a bit over the top and the rest that followed on the adulation was plain dumb.
by Naked Cricket, on April 17 2008 @ 5:39 pm
scorpy, i was shocked at the paltry prize to the curator. should’ve been hush hush, off the record and 10 times more.
by scorpicity, on April 17 2008 @ 6:53 pm
Yes, should have been more and hush, hush… instead they give out such a rotten perception to the world.