Book review: Beyond the Blues

For a few weeks I have working furiously on a personal deadline of writing a book before Christmas rolled around.  Now that the deadline has been done and dusted with I can get back to more important things like living my life again.  (Some will snicker that the deadline was less about Christmas and more about Boxing Day.  Oh, how well they know me!).

Anyway, thinking about books took me back a couple of years to a book that I had read, liked, promised to review but had never gotten around to doing.  So, here it is - my review of Beyond the Blues by Aakash Chopra.  Better late than never.

From September 9th, 2007 to June 5th 2008, Aakash Chopra kept notes of his actions and thoughts in the form of a diary.  Eventually, to the happiness of many of his fans, including me, he went ahead and published them.

The book is filled with an insider's perspective of Indian cricket, from the behind-the-scenes shenanigans in the backrooms of selectorial meetings to the on-field skullduggery that the viewer is unable to pick up on from 90 (or in these days 60) yards away.

It is a compelling book, written from the heart.  The best way to appreciate the book is to read it in its entirety.  Here are some of the nuggets that caught my fancy and should serve to whet your appetite for when you read the book.

On Sachin Tendulkar (p48):

Aakash Chopra had a very pivotal hand in Sachin's classic exercise in self-denial, that face-saving 241* at Sydney in Steve Waugh's final Test in 2004.  In fact, it is safe to say, that Aakash saved SRT's life that day.  He did something that made him "... one of the few people in the world who has given something to the Little Master without taking anything material from him in return."

On a fellow team-mate (p60):

He has definitely mastered the way to score at this level consistently and I wouldn't be surprised if, one day, if he plays enough domestic cricket (given his India commitments), he goes on to break every batting record on the domestic circuit.

The real Little Master

In 1981, I was at school when India was playing Australia at Melbourne. India was batting and it was not going well. While batsmen came and went, one man held on, gracefully stroking runs even as Lillee and Pascoe ran amok. I did not hear a single word of this innings (this was in the pre-TV broadcast days of cricket in India) and as soon as I walked in the gate my brother excitedly yelled out the score. By the time I ran upstairs, Gundappa Rangnath Viswanath was out, 9th out for 114 in a total score of 237. To this date, my brother holds me responsible for that dismissal, but my love for Vishy's game was cemented from his vivid description of the entire innings.

Over the years I had heard tales of this diminutive Indian's batting from my grandfather, father and brother, but until I saw his 222 at Madras the next year I was not entirely convinced. Since then, I have watched a lot of cricket but I have not seen a batsman who gave me more pleasure, and whose tales give me more goosebumps, than Vishy, the original Little Master.

Vishy's career was brought to an abrupt halt by Imran Khan a year later. I've mentioned this before, but it bears repeating that I have never seen a bowler who put more fear in me than Imran Khan (and Malcolm Marshall a year later) in that '83 series. (Click on this link to watch some of his bowling here). There was very little outcry when Vishy was dropped, and though he harbored hopes of a recall for the next couple of years, he quietly faded away, much like his personality. He resurfaced later as a mild-mannered (big surprise there!) Match Referee and these days is hardly heard from, unlike his more visible brother-in-law.

On February 12th, Vishy turned 60, and the tributes flowed in, as they tend to do when some momentous occasion is upon us. I present below some of the more interesting (and heart-felt) ones:

To open proceedings: Rahul Dravid took over the mantle of the talisman of the Indian team from Vishy. India NEVER lost a Test match when Viswanath made a century, such was his influence on the proceedings. Rahul Dravid was at the batting forefront of every major Indian Test victory for more than a decade, until a recent fallow run that has rubbed some of the sheen off of that reputation. He has many memories of the man.

It was Vishy, as chairman of selectors, who picked me to play the Ranji Trophy from the under-19s and presented me my cap in Pune. At that time he was also travelling with the team as manager and this resulted in some of my fondest memories. We used to take a lot of long train journeys and as the night wore down Vishy would be enjoying his favourite tipple and the hours flew by as he and the likes of Kirmani talked cricket.

Rubbing shoulders with them and listening to those conversations left a lasting impression. It's no coincidence that a batch of us who grew up under Vishy's tutelage went on to play regularly for Karnataka, win the Ranji Trophy and then some onto higher honours as well.

The other Karnataka giant who conjured up almost as many important wins for India with his bowling, Anil Kumble, is no less effusive in his praise.

Vishy was a legend that every young cricketer looked up to, particularly those who grew up in Karnataka. I first met him when he was a Karnataka selector, and he used to frequently visit the nets, offering valuable advice to youngsters. One moment that I will never forget was when I had the opportunity to bowl to Vishy in the nets, which I cherish till this very day.

KC Vijaya Kumar of The Hindu provides some more specific details about Vishy.

The man, diminutive in physical traits but a giant in his batting stature, has donned several hats in a life’s journey that commenced on February 12, 1949. Ask him which was his favourite role and the reply is quick. “Among all the roles I have played — player, selector, administrator, coach — I enjoyed my playing days the most and all other roles were a spin-off from my cricketing days,” said Viswanath.

Finally, and fittingly, here is Vishy on himself, in a very revealing interview with Suresh Menon in CricInfo. Some nuggets:

My personal favourite century is the 139 I made in the 1974-75 Calcutta Test against West Indies. Their bowling overall in that innings was superior to that in the next Test, in which I made 97 not out - which most people regard as my best innings.

Polly Umrigar advised me to roll my eyeballs when I was preparing to go in to bat. These are small things, but they make a great difference.

Let there be no confusion about this: I worked for my innings. Nothing came easily.

I wouldn't change anything if I had to live my life over again. Except for one-day cricket; I would have tried harder there.

To round it off, he has advice that any player (of any sport, for that matter) will be better off heeding.

Experience is not just about playing 40 Tests but about learning from each of them.

Cricket, cricket, cricket....

This post shall cover some last thoughts on India's historic 2-0 win over Australia, and other articles found while trolling through the web. After this, I shall blog on topics other than cricket (until the next Test series against England next month), I promise.

1) After India drew the first Test match, I was mad at the defensive mindset of the Indians. Back then I had written:

India are the home team, with 5 batsmen who have scored about 40,000 Test runs, with two spinners who have taken more than 900 Test wickets, and three fielders who have collectively taken over 370 catches. The Aussies have one batsman who has scored more than 10,000 runs, another great who has over 6,000 runs. One bowler who has taken more than 100 wickets (Lee has 291), and their lone spinner making his debut. And we are celebrating the fact that we drew the first Test? Seriously, those that are afraid to win are indeed condemned to repeatedly fai

It took a change in captaincy (forced by injury to Kumble) to inject some sense into the team. The Australian team that dominated the world for almost two decades is NOT this motley collection of individuals who came to India. Once the Indians figured this out, they took on a new persona and charged to a series victory. The Fab Four have lots of "experience" but that experience comes with a price - they have tasted lots of defeats, too. When things start to go wrong, they seem to remember those bad days and forget to play their normal, natural, wonderful game. The worst offender, by a country mile, is Sachin Tendulkar. For a batsman who has played so long, he has the deer in the headlights look way too many times. The sad part is that he drags the rest of the team down with him. Luckily, the new breed (dare I say New Age cricketer?) is immune to Tendulkar's fraidy-cat routine. MS Dhoni made a 50+ score in the 4 innings of the two Tests he captained, leading from the front. His attitude rubbed off onto the rest and India won a Test series that, in hindsight, was theirs to win all along. A 2-0 result should not surprise you. The Australians did not take 20 Indian wickets until the last Test, and even when they did, the Indians put on 736 total runs. Pshaw! If the Aussies did not have Michael Hussey in the middle order, they'd have caved to a worse fate than they did. The real test for the Indians will be when they are favored to win, as will be the case henceforth.

2) A couple of post-series analyses from CricInfo:
First up, the Australians are found wanting in most categories.

Secondly, most of the Indians come out well, except for some surprising names at the bottom of the list.

Sambit Bal sums up the series and its implications, rightly contending that India won more because the Australian standards have dipped and not so much because the Indian standards have gone up.

The battle between two Test giants was played in front of empty stands and the BCCI has to shoulder a large part of the blame. In their haste to make money they ignore the most basic needs - that of the spectators. Chasing after the T20 golden goose has seriously compromised their stance on promoting cricket.

3) The first great to retire was Kumble. Ganguly announced his retirement earlier, but did not retire till later. A week into the retirement, Sharda Ugra found Anil to be at peace with the decision and in a happy frame of mind. A few days later, in Nagpur, he gave a really wonderful speech, thanking his teammates individually, that must be read in its entirety.

4) Sourav Ganguly left on a high, captaining the Indian side for a few overs thanks to a wonderful gesture by MS Dhoni. Along the way, he had the satisfaction of helping beat the Aussies in the very city where the first seeds of discontent with his captaincy were sown. A full circle provided proper closure to his career - one in which he underachieved in the Test arena, made his mark in the ODI stage, and brilliantly overachieved in the captaincy stakes (more for the attitude he brought than just the wins). The tributes have been pouring in and CricInfo does a good job of rounding up some of them here, saving me some time.

Some others that deserve a separate mention are:

Peter Roebuck takes his time and tries to decipher what made him so revered in India.

Sachin Tendulkar talks in depth about his feelings for Ganguly and Kumble.

VVS Laxman talks about Ganguly in an older interview.

Finally, Harsha Bhogle comes out with his assessment of Ganguly's contributions to Indian cricket.

5) At the end of the Nagpur Test, Ricky Ponting came under heavy fire from the media for his seemingly inexplicable decision to let India off the hook on Day 4. Rather than accept that he may have erred in judgment, he has taken the moral high ground and is being supported by his coach. I guess if you repeat something often enough, people will think it is the truth. Finding articles that slam his captaincy are dime a dozen these days, so I;ll let you troll through the web for those on your own. Instead, I shall direct your attention to this nicely written piece by Gideon Haigh where he believes that Ponting deserves a modicum of sympathy from us.

The Nagpur Test was also MS Dhoni's first Test as a full-time captain and he led from the front, and impressed everyone with his acumen. Chloe Saltu admires MS Dhoni for having the guts to be his own man and not back down from criticism for a defensive 8-1 field placement.

Suresh Menon is a lot more effusive in his praises and reaches into the past to find comparisons.

Not surprisingly, some reporter tracked down Dhoni's childhood friends and found out that he has not changed much since then. The article is nice as it provides a lot of insight and background to the BMOC of Indian cricket.

Peter Roebuck is at the top of his game, a fine return to form after a few insipid articles, with this extended description of MS Dhoni.

6) Considering how cliched and, even worse, how predictable the cricket commentary on TV was, re-reading Amit Verma's observations made me realize that I am not alone in my low regard for some of them.

7) And if you are still reading this, here's a treat for VVS Laxman fans:
a) An interview with the Times of India on the eve of his 100th Test match, one that was doubly special because India beat the Aussies in it.

b) Rajan Bala goes back in time and compares Laxman to ML Jaisimha and MA Azharuddin.

c) VVS Laxman lists his top 6 innings. Note how three of them are 50's, and are integral to an Indian victory.

d) Finally, Gautam Gambhir looks to VVS Laxman for a final seal of approval.

"VVS Laxman told me in Sri Lanka that my biggest challenge will be playing against Australia and I need to pass that test. I met him in Nagpur and asked him if did clear that test, he told me, 'you have not only passed the test but passed it with a distinction.' I don't think I need any more approvals from anyone."

The goose and the gander

After watching the end of an absorbing (and sometimes engrossing) series between a surging India and a crumbling Australia, here are some of the thoughts that went through my head while the post-game festivities were going on.

1) MS Dhoni has that important ingredient that a successful captain needs - luck. Winning the toss was important and he has done it in all three Tests that he has captained (and won). Sourav Ganguly supposedly said something along those lines, too. But there is a lot of truth in the adage that winners make their own luck. Dhoni is a shrewd judge of situations and scenarios. He adopted the go-slow tactic on Day 3 and the Australians could not think of another way of scoring (a point brought out by CSD in a comment on one of my earlier posts) when confronted with this challenge. Dhoni's greatness is not that he thought of this plan, but that he convinced his bowlers to keep at it, ball after ball, over after over, half hour after half hour. Like a predator that sits patiently by a watering hole, he bid his time, knowing that the Aussies would come. They took a long time coming and when they did, they meekly accepted their fate. Not what I expected from the #1 ranked team in the world (note that I did not say they were the best team in the world. For my money, that is Sri Lanka). John Buchanan was a better coach than the current one and his tactical acumen must be greatly missed by Ricky Ponting, who does not think well on his feet.

2) Ricky Ponting is pretty frank in his post-game interviews (he freely admitted that India had outplayed them in the series and deserved to win) but gets prickly when the questions become directed to him as an individual. When asked about the bizarre decision to bowl part-timers on day 4 after the tea break, he brought out his "spirit of the game" defense. Sad. Instead of addressing the question he treats it as an affront to his dignity and tries to divert the attention to something else. When you are winning, it is easy to appear magnanimous. When you are losing, your man-management skills get tested. Considering how thoughtful and gracious Ponting was in the prize ceremony interview, it is odd that he regressed when questioned about a decision that may well have cost the trophy.

3) MS Dhoni made two brilliant moves yesterday, and neither of them got the Indians a single wicket. First, after 9 wickets were down, he walked up to Ganguly, took him aside, and was seen talking earnestly to him. Ganguly demurred, but Dhoni gave him a big hug, and Ganguly led the side for the next few overs. In his last Test match, Dhoni gave Ganguly a taste of what he said he'd give his right hand for - captaincy. Dhoni's second move was to insist that Anil Kumble step up to the podium to accept the Border-Gavaskar Trophy. When the last wicket fell, Dhoni ran to the wicket, but only to pick up two wickets - one of them was a souvenir for Ganguly (he also kept one for himself...methinks he then gave it to Kumble, but I have no way of knowing). Rapturous celebrations by him are usually reserved for big wickets, not for the grand finish. I am reminded of Rudyard Kipling, "If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs..."

4) I am as big a fan of Dhoni's captaincy as you can find, but I HATE the 8-1 field that he adopts, and the slowing down of the over-rate. While it was happening I could see why he was doing it and I admired his guts for taking the unpopular road to keep the bigger target in sight, but I hope he does not make it his typical modus operandi. It may be the best tactic, for now, against extremely aggressive and dominant batsmen; however, there's just a handful of those in Test cricket, and many of them are on the Indian team. I fear that other captains will see this tactic and start applying it willy-nilly. Test cricket will get bogged down into a game of pseudo-attrition and that will take away some of it's charm. Dhoni, you also need to keep the over-rate going. You are at the forefront of a new wave of Indian cricketers and I'd rather see more of that aggressive, innovative captaincy, than a paint by the numbers go-slow tactic.

5) By dropping a couple of sitters, Rahul Dravid lost a golden chance to equal Mark Waugh on the all-time list of catches by a fielder. He is a 179, while Waugh is at 181. Ironically, his being so close may have delayed the stay of execution on him. Had he succeeded in reaching or crossing Waugh, the selectors (ever mindful of milestones and public perception) would have felt that there was no reason to keep him going. I foresee Dravid scoring some runs in the next month in the Ranji Trohpy, making his way back to the Test team against England, and if unable to rediscover the touch that made him India's best match-winning batsman ever (yes, ever) retiring quietly. Simply playing two Tests will be enough to cross Waugh (he does average more catches per innings than Mark Waugh did, actually!).

6) India is on the verge of becoming the next great team. It has the players and the skill set to be so, led by an admirable captain. I hope they learn the good things - aggressive mentality, positive outlook, sharp fielding, good running between the wickets, incisive bowling, and patience - and not the bad things - sledging, whining to umpires, slow over-rate - from the Australians. The Indians drop too many catches, and misfield too many balls to be considered the best. Hopefully, with the new blood that is coming in, the fielding levels will increase, and that that gap will be bridged, too.

Trolling the web

While taking a break from preparing lectures, I wandered around the web and these are the articles that caught my eye:

a) When cricketers retire and go to the commentary booth, I expect their analysis to consist of more than the banal "What India needs right now is a couple of quick wickets." or "A good over or two will change the complexion of the game." D-uh! What I am looking for is an insight into the game that someone looking on from outside may not readily pick up on. Here's a perfect example and it comes from someone who is still playing the game at a very high level. Aakash Chopra tells us why the type of ball used in matches makes a huge difference. That's insight, dear analysts.

The SG Test ball that is used in first-class and Test cricket in India is relatively soft (made with a soft cork inside and a finer quality of leather) with a very pronounced seam. The ball doesn't move too much, but once it gets a little old, if maintained properly, it swings throughout the day. The ball comes a bit slower off the surface unless it's been made to pitch on the seam. The only way to succeed with an SG Test ball is to land it on the seam, for otherwise you're doomed. On the contrary, the SG Tournament ball has a lot more glaze on it, and is made with hard cork and not-so-fine leather. The ball does a lot when it's new, and travels much quicker after pitching even when it is not pitched on the seam.

The figures we see at the end of the game could be quite misleading. You can't pick a fast bowler just because he wreaked havoc with that ball in the winters in north India. Spinners get less purchase, and hence shouldn't be condemned, and poor openers might not get big scores.

b) Just a day or two after blasting Anil Kumble, Dilip Vengsarkar lets bygones be bygones upon hearing about the leg-spinner's retirement. The article itself is very bland and poorly written, but there is a nugget that was very interesting to read about.

However, DDCA’s curator was quoted as saying that the grass was cut without his knowledge on the eve of the match, making it a lifeless wicket that invariably produces dull cricket, and leaving the curator furious.

c) Rick Reilly used to write the last page article for Sports Illustrated for years. Often it was the best thing in the whole magazine. Now he works for ESPN and, occasionally, still produces brilliantly written pieces, such as this one about John Wooden, the celebrated coach of the UCLA men's basketball team of the 60's and 70's. A must-read from start to finish.

d) One of the people who caught my eye in the early part of this millennium on a cricket field was Shane Bond. He had an injury-ravaged career in which he showed what could have been. When fit, he was the best FAST bowler in the world, better than the Lee's and Akhtar's of the world. Way better. Here, he reminisces about his achievements and his role in the ICL.

e) Harsha Bhogle waxes eloquently about Laxman. I may have already linked to this earlier, but I don't care. Read it again, if you already have. Or read it for the first time and enjoy a writer describing a batsman, with both at the top of their game.

This will be one of Laxman's more satisfying moments. He was treated very shabbily during the IPL, was prevented, in a most bizarre episode, from playing for a month in England and had to witness the swords being sharpened for his execution. Don't forget this is a man who gave up a million dollars a year so the Deccan Chargers could get better players and help develop cricket in his state. In England they are going crazy over a million dollars per player. Laxman gave up a million a year for three years! At the end of the first season in the IPL, he was sacked when he had been captain for six games and the job was given to a man who had led in the other eight!! And not a thank you for the extra three million!!

f) Finally, the folks at CricInfo try to describe VVS Laxman in a elegantly written article. Wonderful writing. One for the archives.

When VVS Laxman plays like he did today, there isn't a worry in the world. For 470 minutes over the last two days even the Feroz Shah Kotla's garish stand at the Tata End didn't look ugly. For 470 minutes, Laxman disguised violence with grace and left Australia hopelessly spellbound.

When Laxman plays like he did today...

Remembering the titan

Anil Kumble announced his retirement (from Test cricket, mind you, not all cricket) with minimal fanfare, and a lap of honor around the Kotla. Compliments have been pouring in from all quarters since then. All of them justified and apt.

Some words are common to almost all of them - dignity, respect, hard-working, gentle, giant, leg-spinner who did not turn the ball, broken jaw, Brian Lara, match-winner, greatest, timely retirement, captain, quiet, unassuming.....

But the word that comes up in all of them, either overtly or covertly, is underrated. If everyone thinks someone is underrated, then is that person really underrated? I don't know. I always thought that opposing teams respected Kumble's presence in the team more than any other Indian bowler's. (There were periods here and there where someone like Harbhajan broke through, but not in a sustained way). How does that make him underrated? Methinks that may have been the case in the early 90's, but not any more. Give the man his due. He was India's greatest and most reliable match-winner. Bar none.

Anyway, as previously promised, here are some of the better written tributes to Kumble. For each one I shall highlight the points in the article that stood out for me. (Click on the author's name to access the article).

1) First and foremost, the person who has probably spent the most time with him on a cricket field - Rahul Dravid. (This is an older, very well-written article, pubished soon after Kumble crossed Kapil Dev's mark of 434 wickets in Tests):

Anil is tough and I like that about him. He is the essential 100-per-cent cricketer, every day, every over, every ball, bringing great energy to the contest, facing every challenge with his jaw sternly set - or even broken for that matter!

2) Next up, Sanjay Manjrekar:

Recently I had the opportunity to attend a seminar on management issues connected with cricket; we were about four or five speakers there, and one of them was Kumble. His preparations were so hectic; he was working hard on his speech that he was going to give to the corporates next morning. I could see the same kind of effort and discipline going into his preparations for his speech that he would put into his preparations for a Test.

3) A statistical break down of Kumble's career by CricInfo's S. Rajesh and Matthew Verghese:

Where Kumble stands head and shoulders above the other Indian bowlers is in his contribution to team wins. He took 288 wickets in the 43 Tests India won - an average of 6.70 wickets per Test. The average was a remarkable 18.75, at a strike rate of 44.4 deliveries per wicket.

4) A sampling of former players and selectors by Nagraj Gollapudi of CrinInfo:

Vijay Bharadwaj , former Karnataka and India team-mate:
It was my first day as Karnataka coach back in the 2006-07 season and we were playing Mumbai at the Wankhede stadium. Both Anil and Rahul [Dravid] were available for the first couple of games. They were pulling my leg saying, "Vijay has already retired, Venky [Venkatesh Prasad] has already retired, and both of them are coaches now but we are still playing." On our return to Bangalore, before our second game, Anil called up to check if it was fine to get a 16-year-old legspinner as a net bowler. I just laughed. I told him he didn't need to call me to get permission. But he knew the coach was important and didn't want to break protocol, so he wanted to check. He could've straightaway taken the decision himself because of his stature. He is a guy who gave importance to each and every detail.

5) The CricInfo staff puts in another high-quality effort:

Bowden went up to him, handed him his cap and shook his hand again. Ditto Hayden. Amit Mishra came up to hug him; the baton was perhaps being passed. And then he was swarmed by his team-mates. Rahul Dravid and Zaheer Khan lifted him and after a while it was clear he was not comfortable with all that. Dravid and VVS Laxman tried it again before Mahendra Singh Dhoni, the strongest man in the team, took over the job alone and lifted Kumble on his shoulders. But Kumble was not happy; he wanted to walk on his favourite turf, soak it in one last time.

Not a person in the ground could stay seated through the farewell; they could sense a very important part of their lives going away. Kumble would have felt the same but, save a few emotional moments, he handled it with dignity and with equanimity. It was so like Anil Kumble.

6) Dileep Premachandran calls him one of the two pillars of Indian cricket:

As he walked off the square for the final time, Anil Kumble got a pat on the back from the only man who has been playing international cricket even longer than he has. Kumble's first Test, at Old Trafford in August 1990, was Sachin Tendulkar's ninth, and in the decade that followed they would be the twin pillars of a team that sought to establish itself as a big player on the world stage. Over time, they would be joined by other great players, a nucleus that would allow India to challenge Australia on a consistent basis, but the mind-boggling durability of the two main men remained a source of wonder.
(...)
After all was said and done and the match called off, he came back out to be chaired around the ground, part of the way on the shoulders of the man who will succeed him as captain. For someone who scaled the greatest heights, it was one of the very few occasions during the 18 years when his feet actually left the ground.

7) Suresh Menon uses that word in the title:

He played 41 Tests fewer than Kapil Dev to go past Kapil's Indian record of 434 wickets; he bowled India to more victories than the entire spin quartet of the 1970s, yet he was condemned to being defined by negatives. The pundits told us he did not spin the ball, that he did not have the classic legspinner's loop, that he did not bowl slowly enough to get the ball to bite. Kumble was described by what he did not do rather than by what he did.

8) Snippets from the press conference where he made his formal announcement:

"Thank you all for all the support I have received right through my career. I've built some great friendships and met some fantastic people along the way. You'll probably start calling me from tomorrow for quotes about somebody else. Give me a break for a couple of days and I'll certainly take all your calls." Like he has unfailingly answered the Indian team's calls for the last 18 years.

9) The scene in the Indian dressing room was how we'd imagine it to be, knowing what we have been told about the man:

In between, there was time for some humour as well. A player turned to Mahendra Singh Dhoni and quipped: “You have two empty seats now” (the Nagpur Test will be Sourav Ganguly’s last). But for those who are familiar with Dhoni’s style, the gist of his instantaneous reply did not come as a surprise: “Nobody can replace those two”.

10) Ian Chappell thinks the timing of the decision was right:

The defining moment for me and it encapsulated the career of Anil Kumble was his last wicket in Tests. He had been angered by the young legspinner, misjudging a catch in the outfield and the very next ball he took off after a skied catch off his own bowling, charged back even with his bad hand, took the catch and turned around and fired the ball back at the stumps as if to say to the young man, who will take over his role as a legspinner in the Indian team, that is the sort of the effort that you've got to put in every day if you want to be at the top of the game.

11) Rob Smyth of the Guardian talks about some of the high notes of Kumble's career:

Rarely has there been a sportsman who has combined flintiness and dignity so adeptly. He was hard, really hard, but utterly fair. Kumble forever walked the line, but rarely if ever crossed it. This was a fiercely proud man.

12) Peter Roebuck chips in from Australia:

He never gave up, and with unyielding will and high intelligence, made the most of his abilities. He scored a Test hundred and never let his side down. A thousand pities the Australians did not speak to him in Sydney. Throughout he has retained his dignity, it has been an immense contribution, and he did not outstay his welcome by a single day. Even in his retirement he served the side and Indian cricket.

13) Prem Panicker says goodbye:

And so he went. Not at the end of the series, or the end of the year, but now, when the arguments for his going were only as strong as, not stronger than, those for his continuing—and that, perhaps more than anything he has done on the field in course of an extraordinarily distinguished 19-year career, sums up all there is to know about Kumble the human being.

The more long-lived of Indian cricketers have invariably been players of extraordinary skills. They have had one other thing in common: they have all, without exception, undersold themselves; their accomplishments have been less than their promise.

Anil alone has been the converse: man who consistently rose above the sum of his own parts; almost, you could call him the Glenn McGrath of spin bowlers.

14) G. Rajaraman pays tribute to the Smiling Assasin:

A couple of years ago he joined world billiards champion Geet Sethi, former Test cricketer Sanjay Manjrekar and Olympian sprinter Ashwini Nachappa in conducting a management workshop for corporates. And I had the opportunity of watching him prepare his presentation on resilience. He spoke at length about developing the ability to bounce back – citing examples from his own career – but more than his oration, the quality of his preparation left me stunned and gave me an insight into how seriously he took any task.

15) Kadambari Murali has some inside stuff on the man:

Eight months ago, sitting under a lovely afternoon sun outside Kreeda, his elegant Bangalore bungalow, Anil Kumble casually said he didn’t think he would last out the year, career wise. “I’m hoping to make it to the Australian series this October,” he added, equally casually, “but it depends on my body”.
(...)
That Bangalore day, he grinned as wife Chethana disapprovingly commented, “He needs to think about himself”. “She’s being a wife,” he quipped, smiling at the woman he dubbed his “support system” and “partner in everything”. And then the smile became more wry. “What do I do?” he asked. “I’m exhausted. The last tour was very tough, mentally and physically and though I desperately want to play, I have to see how much I can take. I’ll know when it’s time to say goodbye.”

16) From the archives, an article by Anand Vasu, written soon after Kumble had crossed the 600 wicket mark in Tests:

Anil will not like this piece on him, though it is meant to be a tribute. He does not let his personal life become public and he would probably have preferred that what happened to him in England stayed private. He will be irritated that this mentions the time in 2004 when the Supreme Court of India granted sole custody of a child from an earlier marriage to the woman who is his wife, and was carrying his child at the time. “The Supreme Court cannot trace any deception in Kumble,” screamed the headlines. Justices Shivraj V. Patil and DM Adhikari never faced Kumble’s bowling, clearly.

17) To round it off, Harsha Bhogle uses almost all the words I mentioned above, and more:

The announcement itself was typical of the man: no grandstanding, no ostentation, no farewell tour. Anything else would have jarred, it wouldn’t have been Kumble. One of the greatest team-men the game has known did his job and said good-bye. In his last Test match, he had eleven stitches and was under general anesthesia for half a day. When the numbness vanished, when the body was over-ruled once more, he returned to take three more wickets.

Home stretch

The third Test did not produce the result that was expected when the Australians began their first innings trailing by 613 runs. The Indians got a get-out-of-jail card to explain their inability to prise out the Aussies when they lost Anil Kumble for most of the third day to a finger injury. But even a "healthy" Kumble, bowling the way he has been of late, would not have been able to do much more. A wise man is one who can feel the wind change direction, a wiser man is one who can see the change and adjust his sails accordingly. Anil Kumble showed that he belonged to the latter group by announcing his retirement.

Kumble waited until a draw had been ensured before making the announcement public and it injected some vigor into the proceedings that owed VVS Laxman a favor for what little life there was at that point. Serenely motoring along in the second innings, Laxman did not even remotely look like getting out and was prevented from padding his stats when Kumble declared with about 24 overs to go. I did not realize how dense the TV commentators were until they started talking about India declaring in order to try to get a psychological advantage by prising out an Australian wicket or two before the Test was done. Didn't they understand that Kumble was being given his moment to say goodbye? While I am not privy to any private conversation or to having any knowledge of the man, I am pretty sure that the decision to declare, so he could have a few overs to himself on the field, was a team one. (Anil Kumble has toiled away for almost two decades, always looking out for the team's interests. An hour's worth of self-indulgence to end his career appeared out of line, given his nature).

But, either way, come out he did, to open the bowling attack and send down a few overs that had enough nostalgic appeal to remind us of what was going away for good. When he bowled his last ball, I was more emotionally affected than I would have thought I'd be. After taking his presence in the team for granted all these years, it felt strange to bid him adieu.

Compliments and salutations have poured in from all over and I shall devote another post to just that.

For now, the lines have been drawn and India will go into Nagpur looking to seal a series victory. I hope they go in trying to win. Three of the 4 possible results - win, draw or tie - will get them the trophy. If they eliminate a win from the equation, then they will be playing into the hands of the Aussies. When your opponent is staggering, it is best to deliver a knockout punch. Jabbing away at their body in order to win by a decision only invites trouble.

Only five more days of Test cricket remain in this absorbing match-up. Don't you wish it could have been a 5 Test series?

Blessing in disguise

Australia scored 288 runs and lost 4 wickets in 90 overs. Remarkable, really, that at the end of the day, they are still looking down some serious gun barrels. Australia trail by 275 runs on a pitch that is getting better for bowling by the session.

The umpires appear more in tune with things other than adjudging batsmen out. Matthew Hayden was given out to one that would not have raised eyebrows if the opposite decision had been given, while Shane Watson was as plumb as a batsman can be in Amit Mishra's last over of the day, but that was denied.

The day's play was, however, defined by one glorious session just before the new ball was taken. With a ball about 70 overs old, conventional wisdom (i.e. talking heads on TV) suggested that the spinners continue for another 10 overs before relinquishing to the pace bowlers. But at that time, it was clear that Mishra and Sehwag needed a break. Anil Kumble had hurt himself earlier in the day and in his absence MS Dhoni took over reins. For a while Dhoni continued with Kumble's policies but as the shadows lengthened, the real Dhoni began to emerge. In Kumble's absence, Sehwag bowled 22 brilliant overs, and at the stage mentioned at the start of this paragraph Dhoni gave the ball to Isant Sharma and Zaheer Khan. Facing them were Ricky Ponting and Michael Hussey. Every ball looked like it could get a wicket. Ponting will have nightmares about Ishant Sharma for a long time, and yesterday just added to the drama. Sharma hurried Ponting, beat his bat, cut him in half, and did everything excpet get the captain out. Zaheer Khan was no less impressive. This was Test cricket at its very best.

This breathtaking stuff went on for almost an hour and Ponting and Hussey survived undefeated, but definitely not unscathed. The two balls that Sehwag bowled to dismiss the duo a little later were ones that Harbhajan Singh would willingly wash his mouth with soap a 100 times in order to be able to duplicate.

The 4th day's play should be riveting. Can the Aussies whittle the lead to less than 100 or even surpass India's total? Based upon how the innings has been going, I think that a lead between 150 to 200 will be obtained by India and then the commentators can indulge in their second favorite exercise - trying to predict when the batting team captain will declare. And no matter when he declares, it is always "half an hour too late".

Coming back to the big event of the day - if Anil Kumble had not injured himself, Sehwag would not have bowled more than 5 or 6 overs and a trick would have been missed. I hope Kumble was watching the proceedings on a TV somewhere.

I do not believe in telling people to retire. It is not my place to do so. People can retire as and when they want. They have earned that privilege. However, I do reserve the right to demand that a player be dropped from a team if he is underachieving. Kumble does not remotely look like he will run through the batting order. It is time for him to rest his shoulder, let it heal completely, and then make a return to the side. However, I fear this will never be possible in the current climate of distrust between selectors, players, and the media.

Indeed, uneasy rests the head that wears the crown.

The set up

Reports of the demise of the Australian juggernaut are premature. Extremely premature. Ricky Ponting has won 33 of the 46 Tests he has helmed. Think about that again. Only Steve Waugh with 41 wins (57 Tests) and Clive Lloyd with 36 wins (74 Tests) have been more successful in the entire history of Test cricket.

True, this Indian team does not seem to be as intimated by the Aussies as some of the other squads are, but it would be foolish to suggest that the Aussies are done. Peter Roebuck writes that the Indians have passed the Aussies, and there is some truth to his arguments.

India are better balanced and stronger at the top of the order and from seven to 11. The great players are the weak point. It is quite a thought.

The problem with historic wins (of the 320-run kind) is that they distort one's perspective. Let's not forget that just 6 Test-playing days ago, the question on everyone's lips was whether India could survive the last day of the Bengaluru Test without collapsing to another defeat. Five days of domination should not swing the balance in the other direction.

Here's a sobering thought. Dhoni felt that he needed more than 500 runs to feel safe that the Aussies would not chase it down. Targets in excess of 400 runs have been chased successfully only 3 times in almost 1900 Tests. Surely, 500 runs were an excessive luxury (I am repeating myself for emphasis). I suspect that the Indian team knows best how strong the Australian team, sans all those greats (McGrath, Warne, Gilchrist, Langer, Martyn, etc.) still is. As long as Hayden, Ponting, Hussey and Clarke put on their pads, the batting is still strong.

It is the bowling that is weaker. Brett Lee does not even seem like swinging the ball except for a ball or two to start the innings. What happened to that brilliant out-swinger that surprised everyone, including me, when he threw it down at such a blistering pace? Mitchell Johnson is consistently bowling faster than Lee. There is something wrong about that. They lack that brilliant spinner, but then so does every other team except Sri Lanka and India. (With due apologies, Vettori and Panesar are more restrictive, than incisive, spinners).

Yes, the Aussies are down, but they are certainly not out of it. The Indian team was in a similar predicament before it went to Perth earlier this year. Australia had just won it's 16th Test in a row, and all signs pointed to an annihilation of India on the bounciest wicket in the world. Cast your mind back to that Test. India went in with a bowling attack that read - RP Singh, Irfan Pathan, Ishant Sharma (playing in his 4th Test) and Kumble. The fast bowlers took 14 of the 20 wickets to fall, and out-bowled the Aussies on their turf (Shaun Tait was so demoralized he even left the game briefly). Unheralded players can produce results given the right set of circumstances. Remember Shaun Udal?

Underestimate the heart of a champion at your own peril. I am sure that Australia will lose the series - India is, pound for pound, a far superior side - but I don't think it is a done deal as some people believe it is. I just hope that the members of the Indian team (yes, Harbhajan, especially you) do not start believing tales of their own superiority.

Luckily, India has two captains - Kumble and Dhoni - who are pragmatic and sensible. That, in the end, will determine the course of this series.

(Harsha Bhogle chimes in with a similar thesis in his column).

Cometh the hour, cometh the man

MS Dhoni's ascendancy to the top of Indian cricket's totem pole is as surprising as it is uplifting. All kinds of articles have been written about the boy from the backwaters of Jharkhand making it to the Indian team and it is not going to abate any time soon. When he first came on the scene the long, streaked hair put me off and I dismissed him as a senseless slogger (so much for never judging a book by it's cover).

Then he scored 183, always referred to as the highest score made by a wicket-keeper batsman in an ODI. I remember it for something even more significant, but under-appreciated - it is the highest score ever made by a batsman while chasing a target in an ODI. However, I began to sit up and take notice when, in the very next match, he showed me that he was more than just a slam-bang type of player. He scored 45 not out in 43 balls with 1 four and 2 sixes, taking India to an easy victory over the Sri Lankans. But the numbers lie. Take a look at the way he scored the runs in the innings. The last two balls were hit for a six, with 12 runs required to win. Until then, he was patient, farming the strike and ensuring that there was no collapse. A thinking batsman hid behind the flashy exterior.

After that innings, I started keeping track of his batting, especially during chases. (I have previously blogged about it here and, in an earlier post, here). He has gone from strength to strength and is, currently, the #1 ranked batsmen in ODI's. I was surprised at his failures in Test matches and was hoping that he played them the way he played ODI's - looking to farm the strike and then opening up once the bowlers had lost some confidence. Based on the way he batted (and then later spoke about it) in the second Test, I believe he has come to the same realization. Bowlers everywhere - beware!

The CricInfo staff wrote a drool-worthy piece (especially for Dhoni fans) about the OCD of Indian cricket.

Anand Vasu, a fine writer who, in my opinion, does not write often enough, puts forth his views on the two Indian Test captains - Kumble and Dhoni.

On a similar note, Peter Roebuck chimes in, determined not to be left behind in the Dhoni bandwagon stakes, with a nicely written piece (no surprise there) comparing the Aussie skipper to the stop-gap Indian captain.

Continuing on this theme, Prem Panicker takes the CricInfo article referred to above, and continues on with his impressions of Dhoni.

This, too, is a personality trait that is yet to be tested under real fire—but this other thing? A calm, collected public demeanor? That’s for real, and that’s likely in the long run to prove to be his single biggest asset. Consider these two clips from the Cricinfo piece:

His 100% win record is safe but Dhoni isn’t shouting triumphantly from the rooftops just yet. “Playing [just] one Test and hitting a half century, you get an average of 50. So is the case if you hit a 100,” Dhoni said, moments after securing India’s biggest victory in terms of runs. “Your performance is counted over a longer duration of the game. I got my chance here but it was a team effort.”

Dhoni, however, has the Midas touch and it was summed up best when he asked the debutant Amit Mishra to go round the stumps in the last over of the second day. Mishra bowled an accurate wrong’un to trap Michael Clarke in front and one was reminded of the ploy to give Joginder Sharma the final over of the World Twenty20 final. But Dhoni, to the amusement of all present, only said, “Fluke tha yaar [It was a fluke].”

An ability to take the game seriously without taking himself seriously is invaluable.

On a final note, I just love this ad featuring Dhoni and Shah Rukh Khan!

Salutations

When Sachin Tendulkar crossed Brian Lara, a whole nation (and more) heaved a sigh of relief. Many articles written about the latest Little Master were dusted off and printed.

Here's Sunil Gavaskar's thoughts on the boy he called Tendlya. Of particular interest to me is the last sentence in the article.

And don't you dare call it quits until you have the World Cup for India in 2011.

Anil Kumble discusses the man behind the runs, ending with this thought about Tendulkar that does not surprise me one bit, especially considering some of the personal anecdotes I have heard about the person from people who have met him.

On a final note, while Sachin and I haven't had too many conversations over anything else but cricket, I've always admired him greatly.

Language barrier

MS Dhoni tilted the balance of the second Test match towards India's favor with an inspired bit of captaincy, capping a brilliant day at the office.

The day began with a total of 450-plus beckoning. Anything less and the Aussies would feel they had been let off the hook. Ganguly played within himself, essaying the role that Dravid has played so many times. However, just after he got to his 100 he threw it away, needlessly throwing caution to the winds. MS Dhoni was blazing away at the other end, taking on the Aussies as they tried to bounce him out. Four fours and a six in the backward of square-leg region showed the Aussies that Dhoni was willing to take them on. In the company of the tail-enders Dhoni took the score to 469 before Rudi Koertzen got him out with a horrible decision that looked not out even as the Aussies were appealing for an LBW.

Anyway, Zaheer Khan and Ishant Sharma took out Hayden and Ponting, beautifully setting it up for Harbhajan Sigh and Amit Sharma to attack. Amit Mishra got a foruitous bounce to clean bowl Katich and the cat was among the pigeons. However, for India, there is a steel pigeon in the middle of the Aussie line-up - Michael Hussey. He survived two reprieves to steady the nerves in the Aussie dressing room along with Michael Clarke, who was playing an un-Clarke-like innings. The balance seemed to be tilting (not shifting just yet, but tilting nevertheless) towards the Aussies when Dhoni's captaincy broke through Clarke's resistance. More on that in a second.

I like Anil Kumble. I even like some aspects of his captaincy. But MS Dhoni is the better captain. More decisive, pro-active, aggressive, and constantly thinking ahead. Losing Kumble the bowler has been offset by gaining Dhoni the captain. When Katich and Hussey were at the crease he kept a leg gully for the former and a leg slip for the latter, effectively cutting off their favorite shot - the pressure-relieving single to fine-leg after walking across the stumps. He kept a short cover and a short midwicket in Ponting's eyeline, preventing him from thrusting his pad all the way down the wicket to negate the in-cutters of Sharma. With Dhoni captaining, there appears to be a spring in the step of everyone. Also, it is no coincidence that the over rate of the Indians in this Test is better than the over-rates of either team so far in the series.

But Dhoni's masterstroke was reserved for the last over of the day. Amit Mishra bowled three balls from over the wicket to Clarke. At which point Dhoni said, "Pair se dalna hai to is taraf se dal" (If you want to bowl on the legs, bowl from this side), gesturing round the wicket. Amit bowled another ball, a googly wide of the stumps from over the wicket. As soon as he collected the ball, Dhoni flung his left hand out and said, "Is taraf se dal" (bowl from this side, i.e. round the wicket). Dhoni then theatrically moved a fielder to leg gully as if to emphasize that the line was going to be outside the leg-stump. On TV, the commentators picked up on it, but Shastri was talking about bowling into the rough, a la Shane Warne. Mishra and Dhoni, while on a different plane of thought, luckily were on the same page - Mishra bowled a googly on the middle stump. Clarke had thrust his pad forward expecting a ball to pitch in the rough outside the leg-stump, and could not bring his bat down in time, and Asad Rauf had no problems adjudging him LBW. With that blow, the scales shifted firmly in India's favor. Maybe if Brett Lee, with his rapidly improving command of Hindi, was at the crease he may have been able to warn Clarke of the trap!

Australia still have a few batsmen left but I cannot see them surpassing 469 in this innings - India has 4 good bowlers to attack with. Even if India gets them all out before the follow-on is averted, I want (and I suspect Dhoni feels this way, too) India to bat again and put up a total beyond the reach of the Australians. Give them two days to bat out for a draw and keep a suffocating ring of fielders around the bat. Let's see how the Aussies respond when the shoe is on the other foot.

Dhoni is captaining his second Test and has shown no signs of a sophomoric slump so far. The future of Indian cricket is in great hands.

Ticking odometer

It's the mileage, not the years.
Dr. Indiana Jones, Raiders of the Lost Ark

From the far flung corners of the Indian cricketing empire comes the same cry of anguish - the Indian team is full of old people. Well, how true is it really? The numbers actually tell a slightly different tale. The two teams - Australia and India - are remarkably similar in age profile (see chart below).Additionally, what is striking is that the Indians have an enormous advantage in terms of experience. On paper, this should be a mismatch, right? Then why is India the team playing catch-up in the first Test after just two days? The reality is not quite so straightforward.

a) Look at the Australian side. Of the 11 in the team, only Stuart Clark can be considered to be a liability in the field. If Clark was in the Indian side, he'd probably be one of the shining lights! Ponting, Clarke, Watson, Lee, and White are world-class fielders. Matthew Hayden is as good a slip fielder as any in the game today, and the remaining players are no slouches in the field, either, who need to be "hidden". Contrast that with the Indians. Gautam Gambhir is the only one who even remotely resembles a spring chicken that can field. Dravid and Laxman are brilliant slip fielders, Tendulkar is a safe fielder especially in the outfield, but the rest are nothing to write home about. Forget the Aussies, I'd fancy my chances of pinching runs if I had to bat to this Indian fielding line-up.

b) "Experience" is a much-bandied about world, but over the first two days, the team that looked like it knew what it was doing was the Australian one. The Indians were in a safety-first mode. Aggression was non-existent. Singles were on offer throughout the day. The spin bowlers, the supposed aces in the pack, were supposed to be the overwhelming factor that tipped the scales India's way. There is plenty of time left in the Test to redress this balance, but with experience comes another baggage - the fear of failure. And the Indians have too many players under the gun to play with Sehwagian abandon. I hope I am proved wrong by them.

c) The first innings is already done, but I shall wager anyway that Cameron White, on debut no less, will have better bowling analyses than Kumble and Harbhajan (with over 900 wickets between them) put together.

Think of it this way, how many of you can say with 100% conviction that Kumble-Singh will outbowl White in this Test match? Can you? I cannot and that thought is putting the fear of all things holy and unholy into me.

Visible from afar

Ricky Ponting begins another series with a century. The newspapers are full of reports of how he has conquered his demons and has solved the Indian mystery. Sleep-inducing, really. I had predicted this a few weeks ago and watching him put together another century did not surprise me one bit.

Ponting is in that stage of his career where he is almost completely in control of what he wants to do. The only bowler to trouble him was Ishant Sharma. Ishant has come a long way, and hopefully, he will continue to keep going further. Do not get fooled by Ishant's career stats, his bowling is a lot more penetrative than that. Once Ponting survived Ishant (and yes, Ponting survived Ishant) the century was his for the taking.

For a few years, while Shane Warne prowled the scenes, the umpires began adjudging LBW's when the batsman was on the front foot, too. It appears that they have gone back to the old days again. There were at least two good shouts by Kumble that would have gone Warne's way. Sometimes, I wish Kumble would be more theatrical, like Warne was, full of oohs and aahs, and anguished looks at the umpire who had the temerity to refuse an appeal of his.

But I digress. The day belonged, front and center, to Ponting. I think it helped that he had to play 12 overs of fast bowling before the spinners came on. It settled him down. When Harbhajan's first ball was bowled down the leg-side, Ponting flicked him for a boundary and did not look back after that. He'll be disappointed at having gotten out as the Australians are not out of the woods yet. 254 runs in 90 overs is slow going, and they do not have enough runs on the board (yet) to make the Indians sweat.

As of now, odd as it sounds, the advantage is India's. But until they come back on the field for the second day's action, think about Ponting, and the fact that he is now within breathing distance of Tendulkar on the centuries list. A brilliant batsman at the peak of his powers. Australia's fate in this series rests on his shoulders. Beware Kumble!

Vigorously stirring the tecup

Twisting the utterances of someone to create a scandal is nothing new. In this day and age, when there are so many channels battling for ratings points, any hint of a "scoop" is whipped up into a frenzy.

Gary Kirsten got the full blast of one such storm in the past few days. First up, this is what he actually said:

He (Dhoni) is ready for it (Test captaincy) but there is no need to rush as of now. Anil (Kumble) has done an exceptional job; he is a great leader and he is toiling in many overs for India.

No sooner than he had said it, the headline blared, "Dhoni ready for Test captaincy: Kirsten". Still fair enough. But TV channels picked up on the first sentence of that piece and ran with it! Soon, all the channels were debating whether Kirsten was right in suggesting that Kumble should be removed and Dhoni made the captain.

The BCCI, in its peculiarly inept way, fanned the flames by then " admonishing" and "slamming" the coach for speaking out on the topic. By the now the flames had well and truly spread and the talking heads had another thesis ready for delivery to the public, namely, that Kumble still had a lot left to offer Indian cricket and Dhoni, that upstart, should wait his turn. Sadly, writers with a fairly large following such as Suresh Menon (link here) and R. Mohan (link here) succumbed to this tactic.

About the only person with a rational analysis of the whole episode appears to be Prem Panicker. Read what he had to say about it on his blog. As he so succinctly states:

All the signs of a needless controversy over what seem to be innocent comments warped by our own innate prickliness.

Trivial pursuit

From the "Ask Steven" column in CricInfo, comes this nugget...

Is "c Marsh b Lillee" still the most frequent scorecard entry in Tests? asked Mitchell Brooks from Brisbane

That particular dismissal occurred 95 times in Test matches, which remains the record for a bowler-fielder combination. Next come "c Gilchrist b McGrath" [90] and "c Gilchrist b Lee" [81], just ahead of the first non-Australian pairing, "c Boucher b Pollock" [79]. The leading double act that doesn't involve a wicketkeeper is "c Mahela Jayawardene b Muralitharan", of which there have been 66 instances in Tests to date. For a full list, click here. The most-common Test dismissal is actually "bowled Muralitharan" (158), closely followed by "lbw b Kumble" (152).

Trifecta

Today is my friend, RP's, birthday. Not even she would have imagined that the week culminating in her birthday would witness so many cricketing feats worthy of books by themselves. Murali crossed 600, Kumble crossed 500, and my favourite pacer who is also the fastest bowler in the world - Shane Bond - is back!! (Yes, I know Lee and Akhtar are faster but I hope you get my point).

All three of them are men of a different breed. Murali has been abused and vilified for his bowling action and yet the man keeps chugging away. He bowls an inordinately large number of overs almost as if he is hell-bent on bowling his arm out before bowing down to the naysayers.

Kumble went through a phase where he was not the first choice of the former captain and even now, in a perverse way, Dravid ensures that Bajji gets the ball first, almost as if to prove to his detractors that he is not partial to his fellow Kannadiga. In spite of all that the leg-spinner, whose bowling arm injury was the catalyst that paved the way for player contracts from the BCCI, keeps attacking only as he knows best. He is still fit enough to play for a few years, and judging from the way he batted yesterday, his resolve to put up his hand when the team is in trouble has not left him.

Shane Bond is a rarity - a fast bowler that Australian batsmen fear. In the 2003 World Cup he produced spell after spell of devastating fast bowling, almost single-handedly leading New Zealand onwards. If a 10 over restriction had not existed in ODI's I believe that he would have blown away India in the Super Six encounter where he ripped through our batting order. By his own admission he is one more injury away from quitting cricket. His remodeled action looks quite good and, hopefully, those stress fractures of the back are a thing of the past for the Kiwi cop.

But all of their feats paled in front of an event that I did not even watch (more on that in another post).

The hungry Hyderabadi

VVS Laxman played an innings yesterday that would have made Rahul Dravid proud. The general impression about Laxman is that of a wristy player who is always looking to score runs in boundaries (almost 60% of his Test runs have come in boundaries). But like Scottie Pippen of the Chicago Bulls, his true worth may only be realized after his playing days are over.

Sanjay Manjrekar once described him as "an attacking batsman with the temperament of a defensive player." How true. Many an opposition captain believes that if you dry out the boundaries Laxman will perish. This is far from the truth. The man has played some monumental innings and you cannot do that by simply bashing every 5th ball to the fence. And if you do not believe me, compare his numbers with other contemporaries - only Hayden and Lara have a higher career best score in first class cricket. Laxman is the only person to score two triple centuries in the Ranji Trophy. (A certain recently-deposed former captain would do well to learn from Laxman's purple patch in domestic cricket which paved the way for his comeback to the Indian team).

And as the Tests pile up his list of important contributions to the fortunes of the Indian cricket team keep increasing. And yet people cannot look beyond that 281, expecting him to match it every time he wields the willow. It is time we did so. Here is one such effort to do just that.

At the end of the day Anil Kumble, he of the 100 Tests, discussed the days proceedings and other issues quite eloquently.

Good guys do finish first

Anil Kumble will play his 100th Test match a few hours from now. For most of the '90's, having left the shores of India, I followed the Indian cricket team via the Internet. Only in the past few years, with the help of live video feed on the Internet and cable TV, I have been able to follow the progress of the Indian team once again, here in the US.

I have been fortunate (and privileged) enough to have watched the resurgence of the man since the Adelaide Test in 2003. I still haven't fathomed how he did not play in the World Cup final against the Aussies. (Dinesh Mongia over Kumble?? Would we have had to chase 360? Maybe, maybe not, but Kumble would certainly have made some difference. I also believe VVS Laxman at that stage was a better option than Mongia. But enough digressing). I shall stay up tonight and watch him take the stage. And applaud him with all my heart. For his accomplishment is a victory for all those people who persevere without sacrificing their ideals or their morals.

The essence of the man is captured well in this piece in Cricinfo, where you can also watch this photo-feature on the man's major accomplishments. His teammate, and fellow great-guy Rahul Dravid, pays tribute to the man who showed that spinning a ball 3 inches is all you really need. Sometimes, simplicity is the most destructive option.