Why is Ponting not concerned about tests?

The Australian captain Ricky Ponting is always found to be in the news for some or the other reasons. This might be for suggesting something new that sometimes might favor the cricketing world and at most of the times definitely favors the Australian cricket. It was Ponting who has a share in the worry that was found to haunt the ICC which feared that the advent of the T20 cricket may be the end of the road as far as the one dayers are considered. The other side of the coin also suggests that the T20 format of the game of cricket is not Australia's cup of tea.

Relax! This might not be the reason for Ricky Ponting to throw out such a comment. However, now Ponting has come out saying that "It is the number of one day games being played that is responsible for reduced crowd strength in Australian stadiums." Australia were found playing 10 one day internationals against Pakistan and West Indies in the past couple of months or so. Added to these were 6 test matches, with three games each against Pakistan and West Indies respectively. These 6 test matches took as much as 30 days compared to the 10 days taken away by ODIs.

Moreover, be it anywhere in the world, test cricket has hardly been able to draw people to the stadiums and Ponting is not found commenting on the issue. Ricky Ponting wants the number of one dayers to be reduced from 10 to 5 in the Australian summer. So, does Ponting insists that one series has 3 one day internationals and the other series has just 2 games? If one has to go by Ponting's words, there should have been 3 ODIs played against Pakistan and 2 ODIs against West Indies this summer. And it is not a big issue if test cricket is not able to draw crowds to the stadiums according to Ponting.

Next interesting fact is that Australia have been playing 10 one day internationals every summer. Like, there were 10 ODIs involving Australia with New Zealand and South Africa last year. And prior to that, there was the Commonwealth Bank series that hosted 14 ODIs minimum. This was the case even prior to that as well. And no one was found taking to the issue then. But, now Ponting comes out saying that the number of ODIs be reduced. Ponting suggests that due to the end of the summer vacations after which kids will have to return back to school, the number of spectators have reduced.

So, if Ponting's words are to be followed, ODIs have to be held only during vacations and nowhere in Australia otherwise.

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.

No one can be a threat to Aussies from WI

Well I wonder as to whether one has to cite so specially that medium pacers from the West Indies can never trouble Australia in the on going 5 match one day series between the two countries? All that the West Indian pace attack at present in the series could boast about was the presence of Darren Sammy and Dwayne Smith, both of whom stand nowhere when it comes to the recent list of all time fast bowling greats. Now, the lone addition to the armory of the West Indian fast bowling line up is Kemar Roach who is thought to be available for the series decider at Gabba.

Even Kemar Roach is yet to make a name for himself in the list of fast bowlers. May be that at present, in this series or even worse, only in the upcoming 4^th one day scheduled at Gabba, Kemar Roach can consider himself to be ahead of all other fast bowlers of his team. However, the lone fast bowler who could have been of a little bit of trouble for the Australian team would have been Dwayne Bravo, who is found battling injuries off late and has been replaced by a batsman in Wavell Hinds. This has been the strength of the West Indies fast bowling line up.

Forget about winning a series match against Australia, the West Indies team at present can't even think of losing after giving a tough fight to the hosts. And all that the West Indian fast bowling line up is found to have medium pace bowlers and no fast bowlers of the caliber of say Ambrose or Bishop. The lone bowler who could and up with a 4 wicket haul until now has been Ravi Rampaul who ended up with figures of 4/61 from his 10 overs giving away runs at the rate of 6.1 an over as compared to the below 5 an over run rate that Australia maintained in that game.

On the otherhand, Australia have more batsmen than the bowlers that the West Indies team can boast. West Indies bowling line up at present also includes the likes of Chris Gayle and Wavell Hinds who are rather considered as batsmen than bowlers. Australia have in them batsmen of the caliber of Shane Watson, Mike Hussey, Brad Haddin and Michael Clarke who can rip out any opposition let alone West Indies. By the way, the West Indies bowling line up can, with good fortune rock only non test playing nations with a doubt whether they can do the same regarding even Zimbabwe and Bangladesh.

Whom did rain rescue?

Well leading cricket websites suggest that rain spoils West Indies' fortune when the 3rd one day international was called off due to rain at Sydney. Is it that rain played a spoilsport when West Indies were above to lose the third one day match also against Australia? West Indies, in the past two one dayers have not even managed to cross the 200 run mark and suffered humiliating defeats like never before. It is a pity that West Indies are playing Australia, when in case their caliber is taken into consideration have to play some non test playing nation or atleast Bangladesh.

Australia no doubt put up a modest of totals when they were restricted to just 225 on board by the West Indies' bowlers (which may be the case, no guarantee). The story could also be that the Australian batsmen might have taken the West Indian bowlers lightly and as a result paid a partly price by scoring the lowest total in the tournament against the West Indies. It was only Ravi Rampaul who could be the highlight of the day when he returned with figures of 4/61 from his quota of 10 overs. The other side of the coin also suggesting that Ravi went in for over 6.0 runs an over compared to the overall run rate of just above 4.0 an over.

On the other hand, it would be worth highlighting the bowling performance of Dwayne Smith who returned with figures of 3/45 from 10 overs at a run rate of 4.5 an over. May be that his experience also counted to his performance to some extent. As batsmen kept on collapsing on one side the incoming batsmen were more cautious and were found playing their innings more seriously compared to their batting counterparts. It was the tail end batsman in Ryan Harris who hit the lone six of the Australian innings and returned with a strike rate of 233 which was more than 2 runs a ball.

And when it comes to the West Indies batting, it was fascinating to see the entire 6 runs that was on the board towards the West Indies side was scored by extras alone. West Indies, moreover were set a target of 151 runs from 24 overs which was more than 6 runs an over as compared to the run rate of just above 4 an over had the match not been interrupted. West Indies had faced Australia some three years back in the then VB series which was a tri series involving Pakistan as the third team. West Indies had reduced Australia to 41/5 in the league match which was abandoned due to rain. But, this time rain ruined Australia's chances of whitewashing the West Indies.

Bangladesh better than West Indies

Well as the series between New Zealand and Bangladesh is found to progress, Bangladesh looks like putting a step forward towards a better performance which is actually not the case. For the first time in the series, Bangladesh posted a total in excess of 200 when they score 241 runs in the 3^rd and final one dayer against New Zealand. This was also the 2^nd time that they played their complete quota of 50 overs that they were scheduled to play. Previously, Bangladesh came back from nowhere in the 2^nd one dayer and went on to play 50 overs at Dunedin.

Bangladesh were at one stage 46 runs for the loss of 6 wickets and went on to put up 183 runs on the board which would have raised a lot of eye brows when no one would have expected them to bat till the 300^th legal delivery was bowled and more than 175 runs scored. Of course, there were extras also that contributed to Bangladesh's success. The Kiwi captain- Daniel Vettori bought in 7 of his bowlers to set things right which would no doubt be just to give his bowlers some bowling practice with the match result right in front of him.

Surprisingly, there was a Bangladeshi batsman in Imrul Kayes who notched up a century which is a celebration as far as cricket in Bangladesh is considered. For, if the entire history of Bangladesh cricket is considered, they have just a handful of players who have centuries against their names in international cricket. On the other hand, there was also a Bangladeshi bowler in Shakib Al Hasan who could pick up 4 New Zealand batsman returning with figures of 4/33 from the ten overs that were allotted to him. However the remaining Bangladeshi bowlers could not scalp more than one New Zealand batsman which is a different issue.

Though New Zealand eventually eventually won the match and with it the series as well, Bangladesh need not have had to consider themselves to be dejected whatsoever. New Zealand lost 7 wickets en-route to their successful chase of 242 which should have been 4 wickets at the most if at all critics is anywhere to go by. If the performance of the Bangladesh team is considered, they have fared better than the West Indies team who are in tour of Australia and have failed to get past the 200 run mark or even play their complete quota of 50 overs with three games being passed by.

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.

West Indies show their caliber in the inconsequential game

Well hardly anyone would have thought that the Chris Gayle led West Indies team would thrash the Mathew Hayden led PM's XI and that too by a huge margin of 90 runs. But, this did happen at Canberra which has rarely made news when it comes to hosting international cricket matches and is found making one when it hosted the one stated above. Anyways, coming to the game, what a fabulous performance it was by the West Indies team and Chris Gayle especially who belted 146 runs with a strike rate of 150+? This could not be even dreamed by anyone I suppose.

Needless to be said, the pitch did favor the batsman which is evident when even the opposition was also able to put up a score in excess of 300+ on the board. West Indies fell just 1 run short of putting up a score of 400+ on board when they had to bat for just 45 overs as against the stipulated 50 overs a side owing to bad weather. It would not be a unique say that the total of the West Indies team total would have well passed 400 had they played the stipulated 50 overs a side. But, it would be surely a good feeling for the West Indies captain that he need not go home empty handed at the end of the tour.

With the result of the ODI series between Australia and Pakistan well in front of us, nothing is needed to be said specially regarding the ODI series between Australia and the West Indies that is bound to start in the coming week or so. Finally, at the end of the match, the man of the match had to be shared between Chris Gayle and Tom Cooper from the PM's XI side for his 160 runs. This I guess is the second time in the recent past that there have been batsmen from both the sides put together top scoring with 146 and 160 respectively.

It was in the first one dayer between India and Sri Lanka where Virender Sehwag from India scored 146 and Tilekeratne Dilshan from Sri Lanka scored 160 runs at Rajkot. Here as well, it was from the team that atted first that recorded a score of 146 and a batsman from the team that batted second returned with a score of 160. However, unlike in the match between WI and PM's XI, the man of the match was not shared between Virender Sehwag and Tilekaratne Dilshan despite deserving to. And, one has to finally applaud the Duckworth-Lewis method which could set a target of 403 for the PM's XI team to chase down with both teams batting for 45 overs.

Darren Sammy must stop speaking nonsense

These days, the players from thee Caribbean have started speaking meaningless, which was evident when the West Indian captain Chris Gayle predicted a 4-1 victory for his team a couple of days back. And now, Darren Sammy has followed suit. This I guess that the only thing that the West Indian players can do. Darren Sammy expects his team to continue the good work his team was found doing. One has to go through all leading cricket sites to see what good West Indies team has been upto since a decade. If the recent past is considered, West Indies have lost the 3 match test series to Australia 2-0.

West Indies were even worse than the Pakistan team which lost all three test matches against Australia in the latter part of the series. Pakistan was able to bowl the Aussies for a score of 127 in the first innings of the second test at Sydney. But, it was the batting that never went along with their bowling which saw them lose the match by 36 runs. In the entire year of 2009, West Indies were able to win just one test match against which fortunately happened to be their only test series win. They have been whitewashed by Bangladesh for reasons which are not that important.

All that the West Indies could afford in the year 2009 was beating Australia in the T20 world cup and then enter the semi finals of the same. Then, in the ICC Champions' trophy they could not even win a single match when they faced Pakistan, Australia and finally India. Prior to that West Indies lost a home series to India 1-2 when India was fresh from the whitewash they suffered in the T20 world cup played at England. All that the West Indies could afford in the entire 2009 was one victory against India as mentioned, 2 ODI victory against England not without losing 3 other games to lose the series 2-3 to England.

Then comes the only victory against New Zealand when West Indies toured the same in the 5 match ODI series by a margin of 1-2. Then, Sammy speaks about the achievements of his batsmen citing the number of centuries each one has in international cricket. Sammy's statement in regard was

"I think most of the batsmen have been scoring runs, [Denesh] Ramdin has two hundreds Narsingh [Deonarine] one, [Brendan] Nash has some good scores and everybody should be happy with their game," Sammy said. "But like we know, Australia are always tough to beat but we just have to go out there and believe and execute properly. I love that word, I think execution will be our most important word there in Australia."

As a matter of fact, Ponting has 28 hundreds against his name. And batsmen like Shane Watson, Clarke and others have more number of hundreds compared to the entire West Indies' batsmen put together minus Gayle.