It was kinda funny to see Jonathan Agnew writing in his article about India's negative tactics in the 2nd innings and all that kind of nonsense! And something which is really getting on my nerves is people talking about the demise of test cricket coz of the way India played today. Complete bollocks!! If you love your cricket, you aren't gonna stop watching test cricket despite however many 20-20 competitions are available out there. I thought the 1st test was one of the best ones in recent memory for any Indian, English or neutral fan alike. People were praising the way India won it and how it revived the buzz about test cricket again...forward the clocks and probably the same people have taken a complete u-turn after just one game - this is completely beyond me!! I totally agree we could have declared earlier today rather than waiting for the individual centuries but there is no way any sensible cricketing nation would have gone out all guns blazing earlier yesterday if they were in India's position. I think that was probably the best England bowled during the whole tour and it would have been complete madness to start going for the big shots and risk getting bowled out for a modest total. Declaring yesterday was also not an option...Lead of 280 odd runs is not enough when there are potential 90 overs in hand the next day, especially after what happened in the last game!! India had to wait to gauge the no. of overs available today and they rightly did so. Both teams lost a lot of playing time due to fog and it's just one of those unfortunate things, which you have to get on with. I don't think you would find more positive and counter-attacking captains than Pietersen and Dhoni in the modern form of cricket and it's utterly wrong to blame the latter for how he directed his team in the second test. Pietersen gave up on a win himself on the 3rd day and you shouldn't expect Dhoni to go out there with a nice big platter and gift the game to the opposition.
Anyway, full marks to both teams...I loved the way both captains approached the games throughout the series. Well done to India for winning both the series the way they did and kudos to England for returning to India after what happened in Bombay and playing their part in keeping the cricket spirit going!
Some memorable contributions from the Indians:
- Sehwag's quickfire half century (Well his innings was one of the main reasons why this series saw a result after all. He's re-discovered his touch recently and when he plays like he did against England, there's not much the opposition can do really).
- Zaheer Khan (people laughed at me when I was routing for him in a charity match few yrs ago. The performances he has produced recently just proves again why I always rated him alongwith pacers like mcgrath, vaas and co. He has now started to swing the ball consistently both ways and is that 2 consecutive man of the series awards he has won?? Can't remember!)
- Ofcourse the support from Ishant Sharma can't go un-noticed...Yuvi is scoring in tests now and Gambhir has finally provided a solution for that ever lasting opening pair problem. Looking towards England - ofcourse the name of Pietersen jumps up immediately. It's really astonishing how a batsman can toil with the opposition the way he does when in top gear and that reverse sweep - well you know all about it).
- And finally Sachin's century...and I'm sure Nivas would agree (Rather than getting all emotional about it, I'll keep it short. This is a genius who's been scoring runs for India day in day out for the past 2 decades and broken every god damn record there is around. He's made the best bowlers look ordinary AND most importantly he's somebody who's won LOTS of games for India single-handedly! I personally don't think there would be another player like him ever again. He's special, he's deadly, he's GOD - take a bow plz!)
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