Wednesday 29 April 2009

Sachin Tendulkar's On Field Influence

In the IPL match between the Kolkata Knight Riders and the Mumbai Indians, it was the Ganguly show all the way, for he was the highest run getter in the Kolkata Knight Riders' innings for his score of 34 which was followed by Brad Hodge (24) and Chris Gayle (12)-the only other two batsmen who posted scores above 10. So, there is not much for the Kolkata Knight Riders' fans to regret about for, their beloved DADA- Sourav Ganguly would no doubt make it until the ultimate game the Kolkata Knight Riders play in South Africa. Not only did Sourav become the top run getter in the match but also he was one of the two batsmen the KKR saw in that match to have cleared the ropes.

If one can manage to go all the way to the first game of the first edition of the Indian Premier League, it was the Kolkata Knight Riders at the delivering end in the match against the Royal Challengers Bangalore, after riding high on Brendon McCullum's 73 ball unbeaten 158. And this time it was the very same Kolkata Knight Riders who were at the receiving end. And Brendon McCullum's score this time was 1 run out of the 16 balls he faced at a strike rate of 16.66. Probably it was the captaincy burden that McCullum was supposed to bear this time around that his performance with the bat and behind the stumps failed so badly!!!

Frontline bowlers like Harbhajan Singh go wicketless and a part time bowler in Abhishek Nayar bags two wickets. None of the Mumbai Indians' bowlers bowled their entire quota of 4 overs. I wish Sanath Jayasuriya had been given the ball which would have made him display his all round skills. Instead Sachin Tendulkar was found displaying his off spin there. Oh! yes, Sachin Tendulkar was the front runner when in came to receiving the man of the match award after he had scored a blistering 45 ball 68 (6x4;4x6). And as a captain why would he ever want to transfer it to Sanath Jayasuriya who is even more deadly than Sachin when it comes to bowling?

Sanath Jayasuriya has a lot of T20 games under him when he would be found playing for Sri Lanka and on the other side, the BCCI have left out Sachin for the T20 matches by giving the youngsters a chance. So, it was a rather intelligent move by Sachin not to have given the ball to Jayasuriya, for transferring the ball to the hands of Sanath would also mean transferring the man of the match. However, my man of the match would be Lasith Malinga who broke the stumps on two occassions during his three wicket haul and that too bowling just 2.2 overs. But, Lasith Malinga is yet to make his name into the history books like Sachin has done. Until then, the preference obviously goes to Sachin.Ha ha ha.....

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