Nooooooooooooo!

First it was the dodo...

Then it was the Titanic...

(Photo from http://www.nordikfolk.com-a.googlepages.com/atitanicstorybymike&ernstulrikpersson)


And now it is Shane Bond's turn to be felled in full flight. Say it ain't so!  I just lost one of the big reasons I had for watching Test cricket.

(Rediff.com)

Eyes wide shut

Knowing that I will be up most of the night watching India play Sri Lanka, I thought I would catch a few hours of sleep but there are two other Test matches going on at the same time. Ricky Ponting and the Aussies are wading into the overmatched West Indians while New Zealand are "visiting" Pakistan in New Zealand.

I watched Ponting bat till lunch and then switched to the New Zealand match. And a good thing I did. My favorite and the world's fastest bowler, Shane Bond, has come on to bowl and is as fast and as menacing as ever. He just bowled a ball at 151kmph. Oooh! This is Test cricket at its best - a bowler thundering in, the batsmen jumping around.

Dean Kozanic/The Press

Bond is back! Thank goodness that ridiculous ICL-related ban is done and dusted with.

Relief for sore eyes

One of my favorite players is back...and how!  Fiery as ever and with that old control still intact, Shane Bond has come back from an unjust hiatus and world cricket is all the better for it.  As I type this he is bowling as if on a different wicket from the rest of the New Zealand bowlers in the semi-finals against Pakistan.

Imran Nazir is still flinching in the dressing room every time he replays in his mind the bouncer he barely fended off to first slip.

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...

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).