Australia whitewashed

Very rarely does a team like Australia get whitewashed despite Australia losing their days of glory. There have been several teams like India, South Africa and England who have inflicted a defeat on Australia in all three formats of the game. But, one has to bring it to his notice that all those nations have not been able to whitewash Australia. Last year and in 2008, India was successful in defeating Australia 2-0 in the Border-Gavaskar trophy where Australia lost both the games which they played. If not for these, there have been many situations where Australia have lost one off T20 or an ODI to India.

But, England had a 3-1 win over Australia in Ashes 2010 which was not a whitewash. However, coming to yesterday's game between Australia and Sri Lanka at Pallekele, Sri Lanka had a run for their money against Australia when they had a run for their money. If not for Jayawardane's 86 runs at the top of the Sri Lankan innings, no other batsman from Sri Lanka ever stood up to the challenge. Jayawardane was there in the crease until the 7^th wicket from Sri Lanka fell. In between, Sangakkara gave Jayawardane some support when there was a 46 run partnership between the two.

Looking at the Aussie bowling, it may well be said that the pitch was tough for the batsmen and Mahela Jayawardane's 86 should definitely take the focus more than anybody else. Of course, anybody looking at the scorecard would be convinced seeing Ajantha Mendis' haul of 6/16 from his four overs that included an over maiden. But, with that sort of a pitch staying at the crease when 7 wickets fell from the other end deserves more than what Mendis took home. In my view, it should have been Mahela Jayawardane who should have walked away with the honor and not Ajanta Mendis.

In most of the case regarding T20 games, the man of the match is given to the wrong person and to a wrong department. Batsmen are given the award for the stylish hitting when the pitch favors them and like it happened yesterday, bowlers are applauded with the award when there was enough turn and bounce in the pitch. There were two bowlers from Australia as well who returned with 3 wicket hauls when Brett Lee and Hastings were the lucky guys. Another player who lonely handed the Sri Lankan bowling was Shane Watson who scored a quickfire 57 runs from 24 balls.

Shane Watt-son Mega Watt performance

Well one sight on yesterday's match between Mumbai Indians and Rajasthan Royals suggests that the Rajasthan Royals would have an easy won the match. But, I wonder how many of them would have thought the Rajasthan Royals would have won the match without losing even a single wicket and Shane Watson belting a 47 ball 89 run. The moment the Mumbai Indians ended their innings for 133 on the board, it was more or less understood that they would end up losing. But, something which was not thought about was the even with Lasith Malinga they couldn't grab a single wicket.

There were two Mumbaikars in Rohith Sharma and Sachin Tendulkar who did something for the Mumbai Indians' side by emerging as the top batsmen of the game scoring 31 and 58 respectively. But, as it already evident by now, that was of no use to the team. All that those scores could do was to save the face for the Mumbai Indians without which the total would not have even crossed 100. One has to wonder why the Mumbai Indians preserved 5 wickets when no one had the guts to belt the bowling of the opposition. Why was Franklin sent ahead of Symonds?

Symonds was a bigger hitter than Franklin and Harbhajan. One has to applaud the Rajasthan Royals' captain for experimenting with his bowlers and at the same time criticize him for failing in his experiment. There were four bowlers from the Rajasthan Royals' side who bowled their complete quota of 4 overs and much to anyone's surprise, they all ended up successful. But, the ones who didn't get to complete their full quota of 4 overs, namely Siddhart Trivedi, Maneria and Amit Singh bowled the costliest of over giving away runs at the rate of 9.00, 10.00 and 12.00 runs respectively.

However, there is not much that can be written about the batting performance of the Rajasthan Royals which was finished by just two batsmen - Dravid and Watson. Watson's 47 ball 89 might not be of that great interest but, his combo of 3 wickets and 89 runs definitely falls into the best of all-round performances. There were 7 over to spare for the Rajasthan Royals which could have been compensated in case of a rain affected match. With this, Shane Warne could be last match in the IPL and he has outplayed his famous rival-Sachin Tendulkar. Just a gr8 way to finish a splendid career.

Not a fair play from RR

Well if it is only the result of the match that matters, then, there might have not been so many cricket crazy fans out there cheering for every shot that goes out of the ground and every ball that breaks the stumps no matter which player from which team is responsible in doing it so as long as there is entertainment on the field. But, that was no way the case in yesterday's game between the Rajasthan Royals and Mumbai Indians. A score of 94 from 20 overs should either deserve a better response from the opposition or else the track should be fit for a test match.

In the first innings which was played by the Mumbai Indians (as far as the batting team goes), they as mentioned neither lose all their ten wickets nor did they do a big hitting despite the likes of Sachin Tendulkar being there. Other names that promise good run include Andrew Symonds, Rohith Sharma and Kieron Pollard. Of course, other batsmen too have their names felt but, not yesterday. Even Harbhajan Singh might have added to the delight with the bat. But, there was no batsman in the Mumbai Indians' side who could get a score past 20 runs with the highest being Symonds' 17.

Should one come to the conclusion that the Rajasthan Royals were on the top of their bowling with the army consisting of Shane Warne including Ashok Menaria, Shane Watson and Johan Botha? If that was so, then one should think for a reason for the Rajasthan Royals not to have grabbed all ten wickets from the Mumbai side which saw them play until the 120^th legal delivery may be no avail which forms a different issue. Another point to ponder over is that the Rajasthan Royals' batsmen came until the last two overs to reach the target which was achieved in the 19^th over.

A tough opponent would have chased down the target in just 15 overs with just over run a ball which also happens to be much. An ideal approach would be 11 overs at 9.0 runs an over. One aspect that needs to be digested is that despite grabbing 3 wickets at a rate of 3.0 runs an over, Johan Botha was given only two overs to bowl when he could have been given two more overs. On the other hand, Shane Watson was allowed to complete his full quota of 4 overs despite being the 2^nd costliest bowler after Siddharth Trivedi who was restricted to juts 2 overs.

Why should Oram be a replacement?

Well recent news has its say that the England all-rounder Paul Collingwood has been replaced by the New Zealand hard hitting batsman cum bowler Jacob Oram. One has to decide as to what on earth makes anybody go in for a replacement for Paul Collingwood who is not that gifted with hard hitting abilities. No matter that Paul Collingwood has had a lot of contribution to English side especially in the Ashes. Jacob Oram himself is a star player and having him replace someone else should not go down as a decent move whatsoever. In my sence, Oram is better than Collingwood.

I can remember Jacob Oram belting the Aussie bowlers in the Commonwealth Bank series 2006/07 when he scored an unbeaten 101 off just 71 balls chasing a mammoth total of 344 and falling short of the total by 8 runs when they finished at 335 on board. If the teams they played for are given a closer look at, then Jacob Oram comes from New Zealand which is a better outfit compared to England. Jacob Oram was instrumental in the victory over the Proteas in the quarter-finals of the 2011 world cup concluded last week. Justifying Oram makes no sense when things are so evident.

If at all Paul Collingwood is to be given a preference, then it would be in his fielding when videos suggest the spectacular catches he has taken. I can recall the catch of Mathew Hayden taken by Paul Collingwood in the Natwest trophy 2006 which was similar to the one taken against West Indies in the 2007 world cup in the super eights. That catch was one among the five best dismissals of that year collected by ESPN. In the year next to that as well, Collingwood's spectacular catch in the slips against Pakistan was recorded as the fourth best dismissal of that year.

With players recently auctioned, one has to nothing but wait to see who would be taking sides in the Rajasthan Royals' side. Of course, the team will be captained by Shane Warne. If the squad is considered, the big hitters include Ross Taylor, Shaun Tait, Rahul Dravid, Johan Botha and Swapnil Asnbodkar. Having someone like Jacob Oram is a must with Rahul Dravid, and Asnodkar not being upto the mark in a T20 tournament. Of course, Shane Watson can fill in the blocks in case he is available after the series against Bangladesh gets over. That would be a day after the 1^st IPL match would have got over.

Australia to stay back

Well the winners of the world cup-India and the runners-up Sri Lanka left Bangladesh long back but, the loser in the quarter-finals will continue to stay in Bangladesh for their upcoming three match one day series starting this week. Sri Lanka last played in Bangladesh in the quarter-finals against England and India against Bangladesh in the very first encounter of the tournament. It is ironical to see the team that quit last in the tournament to have played in Bangladesh first and the team that quit second quit Bangladesh second. But, the team that lost in the quarter-finals will remain in Bangladesh.

In just a week after the world cup got over, Australia are scheduled to play Bangladesh for a three match one day series. There are no test matches coming up between the teams mentioned and neither a T20 game. One has to think of the reasons for having such a bilateral series so soon and involving Bangladesh and Australia. The reason can well be thought of to be that all (including the ICC) expected Australia to win the world cup this time as well and with Bangladesh hosting the trophy, a small bilateral series can be held mid-way for a week's time.

Australia's bilateral series against Bangladesh will end just a day after the fourth edition of the Indian Premier League would have begun. This means that only the players who have retired from playing international cricket for Australia will be seen making it big (may be) in this year's IPL. The list includes Adam Gilchrist, Shane Warne, Shaun Marsh etc to mention a few. With that being a long way to go about, the talks can be restricted to Australia's tour of Bangladesh or Australia's continuance of the world cup. I just can't guess what would be going on in the minds of Aussies.

Aussies unexpectedly lost to India in the quarter-finals of the world cup and their zest for a thrash can well be understood. Though their days of glory have passed away, players like Shane Watson, Brad Haddin, Mike Hussey etc all continue to dominate with the bat with Mitchell Johnson ding it with the ball. And, with all anger against the sub-continent nations put together by the Aussies, one has to nothing but pity the Bangladeshis. Bangladesh are the only nation from the sub-continent not to have faced Australia in the world cup. Australia will definitely avenge their loss to India, Pakistan and Sri lanka against Bangladesh.

Aussies still on top

One has to decide himself whether it is the bad timing of the games or is it the wrong schedule of the tournament or finally is it luck that is seeing Australia victorious throughout even in this world cup despite them not being at their very best. Yesterday, as expected Australia won their pool A match against Canada by 7 wickets. Of course, one might not have been shocked for Australia winning the game but, they are yet to get into games involving decent teams like Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Unfortunately, the game against Sri Lanka got washed out in Colombo.

The three teams that would have given Australia a tough time were Sri Lanka, Pakistan and New Zealand. With New Zealand being a team that Australia would be most fascinated facing, the remaining two teams are indeed a threat to Australia for reasons too many. First, they are the co-hosts of the world cup and second, they have a spin bowling squad facing whom is the last thing the Aussies would ever want. Though Muralitharan is not at his bowling best, Aussies no doubt fear him the most. Muralitharan has made the Aussie batsmen concentrate like never before and never again.

However, a hint of an Aussie collapse is evident from the earlier games they have played in this tournament. They no doubt crashed New Zealand by finishing the game in just 34 overs and thrashing being handed out to Zimbabwe, Kenya and Canada. Against Canada, Aussies take the blame for allowing the minnow nation to cross the 200 run mark and they had to bowl 45 overs. Well, that is not a big issue but, having the same Shane Watson and Brad Haddin do the job for Australia needs a reconsideration. Ricky Ponting like Graeme Smith has been a total failure.

The Canadian batsmen were able to maintain a run-rate of 5.0 an over and end the innings at over 4.62 runs an over. Well, with the wait game seeming to come to an end, Australia will be facing Pakistan in their next encounter scheduled after finishing with all the minnows, New Zealand and escaping partly against Sri Lanka when rain played a spoilsport (though an Aussie victory cannot be ruled out completely). Had the Aussies been teamed in group B, they might have had a tough time with the Proteas and India still with England and the West Indies being an easy prey. But, it is not the time for ifs and buts.

India breakdown into peices against Australia

Anyone who would have watched yesterday's match between India and Australia would have just declared Australia as the winners of the world T20 even before the semi-finals of the tournament is decided. India was the only opposition that had a chance to beat Australia with the West Indies and Sri Lanka being underdogs in the tournament. The moment Australia secured a win against India, all would have just crossed their fingers. India was one of the teams to have won both their league stage games. of course, even Australia have won both their league stage games against Pakistan and Bangladesh.

The only difference between the Indian fielders and the ball boys was that the fielders were inside the boundary while the ball boys were outside it. There were more instances where the ball boys collected the ball and handed it over to the fielders than the fielders themselves stopping. The ball full-tossed itself 13 times in the duration when Shane Watson and David Warner were at the crease. The Aussies had more number of sixes than the number of fours which happens rarely and the case stands even more rare with India being the opposition. Putting it simple, Indian bowlers were tired of trying too many things.

Despite the score being too high, Harbhajan Singh could manage one over maiden which is definitely a feather in his cap. Though Harbhajan Singh went wicketless, he was the pick of the bowlers when he gave away runs at a rate of 3.75 runs an over. It was evident that Australia are poor players of spin bowling when a part time spinner like Yuvraj Singh scalped two wickets though he gave away runs at a rate of 10.00 runs an over. But, the frontline bowlers like Ashish Nehra and Zaheer Khan were completely failures with the ball who were among the major run donors.

If that was what happened when the Aussies were batting, here comes Indian batting which saw only one face that was Rohith Sharma. One can go through the scorecard to see only Rohith Sharma scoring 79 runs which was the only score more than 20. There were the likes of Murali Vijay, Gambhir, Dhoni and Yuvraj Singh but could only walk back disappointed. Harbhajan Singh was found to score 13 runs which was more than any other batsman barring Rohith Sharma. One has to thank God for the Aussie bowlers finishing the match in 17.4 overs which saved the viewers 10 minutes.

Back to the pavilion

Well this happens every year after the Indian Premier League gets over. The duration of close to two months which hosted the Indian Premier League not only was successful in showing a spectacular cricketing action on the field but was also responsible in showing the Indian sub continent as a world rather than as a country like it is after the IPL got over. In these two months of cricket's calender, most of the international players played just for one country nevermind that they played for different Indian cities but as a country it was India for which everyone was found playing.

Now, three days after the finals of the tournament which happened to be between the Mumbai Indians and the Chennai Superkings the players will have to go back to their respective teams to serve their international duties. Players like Mathew Hayden and Adam Gilchrist who were seen picking up the willow even after their retirement from international cricket a couple of years back will now have to either play for their domestic team or else get back to some stuff like commentating or coaching young legs but would rarely be seen playing for any team or coming in front of the world for what they are known and have been known in their playing days.

The Mumbai crowd who would have cheered Sachin Tendulkar for his mind blowing batting will now have to dream "had Sachin Tendulkar been around in the upcoming T20 world cup" and worse come be contented with that. So would be the fans of Sourav Ganguly and Anil Kumble. And, players like Robin Uttappa, Virender Sehwag and Ambati Rayudu will have to be seen next year only with the selection committee picking Piyush Chawla for reason not evident to common man and is restricted only to the BCCI. In a way, players will also be losing a lot as said above.

And, finally the Chennai crowd who would have in the two months cheered the Sri Lankan off spinner - Muttiah Muralitharan will now have to make up their mind that he gets belted by some Yuvraj Singh or Rohit Sharma when India play Sri Lanka. So would be the case regarding Australia's Shane Watson, whom the Rajasthan Royals would now want to go back without scoring when he picks up his bat against India. Other such players who'd be rejoiced after being done so for their good performance until now will be New Zealand's Brendon McCullum, Shane Bond to name a few.

One has to really pity Gayle

It is just not understandable whether it is curse for Chris Gayle to captain a West Indies team that has nothing but scrap in it. The eleven players who faced Australia in yesterday's first T20 match against Australia had just four names that were making rounds in the West Indies team namely Gayle himself, Morton, Smith and Sammy compared to the rest of the players. The rest of the 7 players were there only to fill the vacant positions in the playing XI. This was more or less the squad that faced Bangladesh almost a year ago and gifted Bangladesh their first test series victory.

This was needless to be said that Bangladesh tasted their first ever test series victory against the West Indies and that too was fortunate enough for them to have it outside home. Anyways, coming to the 1st T20 game between West Indies and Australia, scoreboard suggests that Australia is just wasting its resources by going in for players like Shane Watson, Shaun Tait and others when lesser known players who are still going through a rotational basis in Australian domestic cricket. The first 40+ individual score from a West Indian batsman with a strike rate of 100+ happened to be Dinesh Ramdin whose batting position was 8^th.

The entire West Indian innings contained no sixes absolutely. Anyway, it might not be the number of sixes that matter in a game. And not even the presence of experienced lads who can turn around the game. But, the situation with the West Indies is nothing but pathetic. All that the West Indies could manage to do was not to lose all the 10 wickets that they had. They lost 8 wickets, which was equal to the number of wickets lost by the Australians as well. One has to wonder as to how come West Indies could make it to the semis of the T20 world cup in England last year?

West Indies beat India and England in the super eights of the world T20, after they beat Australia to enter the super eights. Since then, they have never been able to win even a single T20 game whatsoever. Of course, the presence of Shivnarine Chanderapaul and Ramnaresh Sarwan will make a lot of difference to the West Indies team. For, they can atleast add few more runs to the West Indies' total that is otherwise miser. A part time bowler in Chris Gayle had to use his experience to grab two Aussie wickets which were price worthy ones namely Shane Watson and David Hussey. In fact, it was Gayle who provided his team with a breakthrough by dismissing Watson.

With so much responsibility and always the need being for Gayle to fight a losing battle, one has to really pity Gayle.

What could Gayle alone do?

Well in the beginning of the 5^th one day match between West Indies and Australia, it was as though Chris Gayle was going to win the game single handed for his team only to be out a couple of balls later owing to a bad shot selection when Gayle hit the ball towards shot cover only to see the safe hands of Clarke after striking two sixes from the first two balls off Bollinger he faced. The only satisfaction for Gayle was that he could take home a strike rate of 200+. And, one cannot blame Gayle for such lackluster performance and a kid's take on the ball, when the entire West Indies team has totally forgotten what winning in cricket is all about.

Australia needed just half of their side to put up a score of 324 on the board and the entire West Indies team put together in addition to the extras could not see them cross the 200 run mark. And this is not the first time that this has been the fate of West Indies cricket. Australia were just wasting their energy by scoring runs and running between wickets and putting up a mammoth total of 324 on board when West Indies could not even think of scoring half the score had there been no extras, powerplays and free hits.

What Australia did was as good as displaying a diamond necklace in front of a beggar thinking he would buy it. There was no need to have someone like James Hopes, Shane Watson, Clarke and others to have taken the ground when lesser known ones like Daniel Christian who could have had a match practice. Or else, it would have been a good chance for the Australian captain Ricky Ponting to have had tail end batsmen like McKay, Bollinger etc who could have done a nightwatchman in one day cricket. It was Ponting who set up a record when he sent in Gillispie as a nightwatchman in a test against Bangladesh who in turn hit a double hundred.

Similarly, one could have seen McKay notching up a hundred and had Ponting himself bowled, he could have had a dream run when he could have had five West Indian batsmen out against his name. Just Kidding! But, one thing that could be seen and is worth highlighting would be the number of fours hit by the Australian batsmen from the top. The series is 1-3-0-3-1-3-10, that contains nothing but ones, threes and zeros which can rarely happen. But, the West Indies' run rate happened to be five all because they restricted themselves only to above 36 overs. This was all that was possible from the West Indies' side.

Gayle-An immature captain

A couple of days ago, the West Indian skipper-Chris Gayle was found predicting a 4-1 series win for his team, despite having the fact that Australia had defeated Pakistan in all formats of the game just last week. Anyways, Chris Gayle is also a human being to make such statements though such statements carry hardly any weight. If the first one dayer between the West Indies and Australia is considered, it was exactly opposite of what happened at Melbourne. Or, did Gayle make that statement after his team blasted the PM's XI at Canberra by 90 runs? That was the game solely for Gayle.

Anyways, coming to the first ODI between West Indies and Australia at Melbourne, the man who blasted 146 runs at a strike rate of more than 150 could score just 7 runs. Chasing a target of 257, West Indies could not even reach 150 runs. Entitled to play 50 overs, the West Indies could not even play 35 overs properly. Nor was there any sort of effort by the West Indian batsmen to chase down the target of 257 imposed by the Aussies. The top scorer for the West Indies team happened to be Kieron Pollard, who is just 16 one dayers old.

Only two of the eleven West Indian batsmen could score more than the extras that constituted for 22 runs. On the otherhand, even the total imposed by Australia was not a decent one if today's one day cricket is considered where chasing a 300+ target is not considered an issue at all. But, the Aussies did the better of the bowling part by bowling the West Indian batsmen for 143 runs. Is it the lack of fellow batsmen in Shivnarine Chanderapaul and Ramnaresh Sarwan that is responsible for the debacle of the West Indian team facing Australia? May be, because, without the presence of these players, the West Indies couldn't even win a single match against Bangladesh in 2009.

And if a close look at the West Indies team is given, barring the captain Chris Gayle, no other player in the squad that faced Australia in Melbourne had played even 50 one day matches on an average. It is not be disputed that in the presence of the experienced players, the performance of the West Indies team could have been any better. But, in the absence of these players, it is sure that the team's performance will get even worse. The presence of Wavell Hinds-who was in for the injured Bravo, could have solved matters for his experience in international since almost a decade. But, Gayle found lacking even a little bit of common sense and makes irrelevant statements.