What a year it has been!

The year began with a family feud that threatened to tear apart our tiny community. It ended with two events of utter warmth, of romance and brotherhood.

In between, a child attained adulthood and some elders saw it as a threat, a mystery spinner enriched the sport and sadly the spectre of violence engulfed cricket. And yes, just to remind people of the treasure we possess, Sachin Tendulkar began and ended the year with a century! We were not short of action!

The events at the Sydney Cricket Ground were immensely forgettable. Teams raged against each other, supporters seemed to take up arms and allegations of racism were in the air. It seemed, on the surface at least, that it was a cricketing issue, umpires might have got it wrong and the definition of the spirit of the game grew increasingly far-fetched, but it soon grew into a much bigger problem. The match referee was a fine cricketer but not very well versed with the law and it needed an excellent piece of judgement from a New Zealand judge to resolve matters.

India threatened to pull-out, a stupid story of a plane being on stand-by did the rounds and none of us really knew what to expect next. It was a grievous wound for it struck at the heart of the only real link between two countries. Hopefully Australia will sell uranium and India will provide fine software engineers, but until that happens regularly, cricket will continue to be the only real bond between our nations. Sydney must never happen again; a blot on the game associated with one of its most beautiful cities. We are too small for a schism.

But the game is such a beautiful healer. Just over three months later Andrew Symonds, at the centre of the whole affair, was being welcomed with Hyderabadi biryani, Mathew Hayden and Michael Hussey were being cheered in Chennai and Shane Warne could have won an election in Jaipur! The IPL was the marketing and cricketing event of the year; both are important for one cannot survive without the other. Clearly T20 will be the new missionary of the game, spreading it to lands where traditional Test cricket, or even one-day internationals, cannot enter. It needs to be looked upon as an opportunity, but the ICC responded by looking upon it as a threat to Test cricket. It is inexplicable. We step on our own toes sometimes.

The last fortnight of the year was proof of the fact that in our effort to protect Test cricket, we underestimate its potency. We look upon every new trend like a commercial liner would a boat in Somalia - we assume there are pirates everywhere. I watch a children's talent show on TV every week and am stunned by how nine and twelve year olds sing classical based songs and old melodies. Surely they should have known only remixes or computer generated sounds! So too with Test cricket which grew, and became stronger, in 2008. It will hold its own in the new world unless we obsess over it. But if we shut our windows and keep the fresh air out, we will grow weak.

Virender Sehwag is an example of how one form of the game needn't cannibalise another. Seemingly made for T20, he led one of the finest run-chases in the history of Test cricket. And Sachin Tendulkar provided the game one of its warmest, most beautiful moments by scoring a fine hundred and then putting the innings, and indeed cricket, in perspective by speaking eloquently of the atmosphere in which it was played. It was a series that may not, need not, have been played but England showed a largeness of heart that cricket must never forget. What a lovely change from England teams of my growing up years that moaned, complained and spoke condescendingly about the people that were hosting them. In one gesture, England made more friends than they could have imagined.

And a week later the second highest run chase was achieved. At the end a wonderfully gifted white man had produced a fine century and a shy, inexperienced black man had played with great maturity. As AB de Villiers and JP Duminy embraced, the power and magnificence of sport blossomed again. Don't forget the new South Africa is only fifteen years old and it isn't yet fifty years since Martin Luther King's rousing cry at the Lincoln Memorial for equality of black and white.It was as beautiful an end to the year as we could have hoped for.

The Parallels between Chennai and Perth

For those wondering about the future of Test cricket, the last two matches we have witnessed should clear all doubts. First the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai and then the WACA in Perth provided ten fascinating days of cricket. What's just as remarkable are the similarities between India's run-chase and that of South Africa. So we decided to take a closer look at the numbers and more, to see how alike these two innings' were.

The Plot
1 Both matches were the first game of the series, with teams looking to take an early upper hand.

2)The side that batted first (England in Chennai and Australia in Perth) took a decent first innings lead on the back of some good bowling. England had a 75 run lead while Australia's lead was 94 runs.

3)In the third innings, the teams had similar scores (England 311/9 declared, Australia 319); leaving their opposition a record score to chase- in both cases the highest fourth innings score required to win a match in the host country.

The Characters
1) The Ballistic Batter- In order to chase a big total, you need a great start. India got that from Virender Sehwag, with his squash-buckling innings of 83 which included 15 boundaries (sixes included). South Africa had Graeme Smith, who was not as aggressive but just as effective with a match-winning 108 that included 13 boundaries. In fact, both these men have been the stars with the bat for their sides through 2008. Smith is the highest run-getter this year with 1519 runs while Sehwag is second with 1445 runs.

2) The Able Ally- Sehwag and Smith both needed a calm, sedate partner at the other end. And Gautam Gambhir for India, and Hashim Amla for South Africa played that part to perfection. Both got useful fifties at similar strike-rates, 47.5 for Gambhir and 47.3 for Amla! And really, both have played the ideal supporting role all year long. Amla is South Africa's second highest run-getter with 1112 runs. Gambhir is only fourth for India, but only because he has played fewer Test matches (8) than Laxman (15) and Tendulkar (13). His average, though, is better than the rest.

3) Three down- Both teams had one failure amongst the top three, Neil McKenzie for the Proteas and Rahul Dravid for India. India lost their third wicket with 183 runs on the board, South Africa had scored 179.

4) Elegant Cameo- Truth be told, Jacques Kallis contributed more with the bat than VVS Laxman. But again, both scored fluently and helped stitch a useful partnership when the pressure was on. Kallis' flurry towards the end of Day Four was one of the unnoticed turning points in the match, which gave the visitors the momentum they carried forward to the final day.

5) The Stylish Southpaw- Yuvraj Singh has been around a while, but still had to establish himself in the Test arena. Jean-Paul Duminy was on debut. Both left-handers, with plenty to prove, stuck till the end, scoring unbeaten half centuries to take their sides home. And both delivered the knockout punch. The point one felt sure India would win was when Yuvraj hit that six of Panesar. At the WACA, Duminy's six of Krejza sent similar signals.

6) The Battered Bowlers- Only Andrew Flitnoff and Graeme Swann (three of the four wickets between them) posed any kind of threat to the Indian batsmen. The rest of the lot looked lacklustre and insipid on a fifth day pitch that offered some help to the bowlers. Likewise, Johnson and Lee (all four second innings wickets between them) were the only ones who looked like taking a wicket for the Aussies. Everyone else was easy pickings.7)The Classic Century- A match-winning 103 not out by Sachin Tendulkar, of 196 deliveries with 9 boundaries. A match-winning 106 not out by AB de Villiers, of 186 deliveries with 9 boundaries. Innings for innings, these two knocks were just as good. AB de Villiers is no Sachin Tendulkar, but his innings on Sunday could be start of him going from good to great.

The Result
1) Chases make for great viewing, right from movies to cartoons (remember the Road Runner!) to cricket. And in the end, both chases were successful, India and South Africa won by 6 wickets.
2) Both games were a fantastic advertisement for Test Cricket. Forget the fast-food version, this is what cricket is all about.

Cricket has to face reality

Thursday 27th November 2008

England are right to go back. Cricket has to bow to reality. Anybody far away from home, however hospitable the conditions, needs to feel happy and wanted. You cannot live in an atmosphere of helplessness. If I was in a country where armed terrorists were searching for people who carry the same passport I do, I would be on the next flight home. Similarly India must not go to Pakistan and I say so aware of how wonderfully hospitable the people of Pakistan have been in the past. But this is not about you and me, our views, our relationships. It is about sinister people.

It has been said that boycotting tours would play into the hands of those that seek to disrupt; that playing on would be akin to thumbing our nose at them. But sportsmen have bats and hockey sticks, and sometimes just a quick pair of legs. They are entertainers. And even in our part of the world, cricket must grow insignificant at times. It is a game that brings a lot of joy and cheer and optimism but it is just a game. It cannot compete with war. If you can, do tell me this is different; that this isnʼt war by another name.

What a pity though. Sport is one of the very very few things that can still unite people and bring a smile to the lips; that can help some of us forget reality, that can make us children again. Delightfully impish and irrational. Maybe art can do that; and literature. And certainly music. But sport goes beyond. It invokes competition, it reminds us of who we are. We grow passionate and we compete and imagine we are sportsmen too. We score every run they do and take every wicket they do and smile sheepishly at our wives when we return the remote some hours later.
But in the end players go home, spectators do too and we switch off our tv sets and go to bed; upset sometimes, disillusioned briefly too but we go home and we rise another day and we wait for the next game. Without sport we would be poorer, woefully poor but in the hierarchy of needs it must cede place to safety, to comfort, to relief; to the thought that you will see your child the next morning. It must never be different for some others are not so lucky. One day we may not be too but till then our priorities must be in the right order. Sport should be played in an atmosphere of joy. You cannot make a painter paint with a gun to his head.

Our reputation has been dented. Visitors to our shores have been shot brazenly and our people too in trying to defend them. Sadly we are creatures of the environment we live in. If there is a drought in the jungle even the lion must leave. So too must we accept the times and the doctrines that surround us. As we benefit so must we pay.

What a pity because we are largely a hospitable people. We support our team and occasionally scream at the opposition; we challenge their way of living sometimes but we bestow great love and sometimes great luxury on them. Hopefully this too shall pass.

And as England head back they will be relieved and contemplative. They didnʼt play great cricket, certainly not as good as they can. If they look back dispassionately, they will realize they were outplayed in the big moments. They did threaten occasionally but seemed to accept too quickly that the going would be tough. They did themselves injustice. That is why I am so keen to see them play in the tests. Hopefully things would have changed by then; the sea-breeze would have taken this stench away and the Brabourne Stadium, such a wonderful home for cricket, will be packed and cheering.

This morning, being with the family was comforting. Popping by to the other bedroom and seeing the boys sleeping calmly suddenly seemed so much more beautiful. It must be the same with everybody. That is why England had the right to make the decision they did. We must welcome them again; give them no quarter on the field, try to beat them but welcome them to our land.

Harsha Bhogle
ESPNstar.com

The World XI: Picking the "Best ODI side" in the game

Imagine having the world's best one-day team at your disposal. No restrictions- no picking players of just one nationality, no salary caps. Plain and simple unconstrained optimization. We've all done it over friendly (and often heated) conversations- picking who we think are the best eleven players at the time. And after Yuvraj Singh's scintillating performances, I was intrigued to see if he would make the cut in this fantasy champion side.

First, a clarification of the team we are trying to pick- the best playing eleven in one-day internationals as of today. This is not an all-time best list. Three major factors have been considered in making the selection- a player's form over the past twelve months, a player's career numbers since they indicate overall class and finally a bit of subjectivity in choosing the right mix of the side and looking at quality of oppositions faced. Equal weights have been given to career and form numbers, since we are picking a side for today.

A brief explanation of the rating system- batting points are measured as Effective Average * (Effective Strike Rate + 40), the effective numbers being a combination of career and form numbers. The "+ 40" factor to the strike-rate is done to adjust for the fact that averages and strike-rates are measured on different scales (a decent average is usually about 40, where as a decent strike-rate is about 80). A similar calculation is done for bowlers, with economy rate substituting for strike-rate. This means a bowler with as "low" a score would do well, so we've taken the reciprocal of this number with a suitable constant factor adjustment to make "higher" scores better.

All that said, here is the World XI of One-Day Cricket, before we jump into a brief explanation of their selection.

1. Virender Sehwag 2. Sachin Tendulkar3. Shivnarine Chanderpaul4. Kevin Pietersen5. Michael Hussey6. Mahendra Singh Dhoni (c & wk)7. Andrew Flintoff8. Brett Lee9. Nathan Bracken10. Zaheer Khan11. Muttiah Muralitharan

The Openers
This was the hardest area to choose in given there's a lot of quality opening bats around, all in good form. Based on the numbers Chris Gayle had a score of 599.8, Virender Sehwag 582.3 and Sachin Tendulkar at 555.8. Graeme Smith, Gautam Gambhir, Salman Butt and Shoaib Malik all had scores between 530 and 550. Gayle's numbers are spiked by a form average of 55.6 at a strike-rate of close to 90. However, that includes four matches against Zimbabwe and Canada where he averaged close to 90. If you take those matches out, Gayle's batting score drops to 543.6. So Tendulkar gets preference over Gayle. Virender Sehwag's pick was a no-brainer given his recent form and his ability to tear any attack apart.

The Middle-Order
Two guys who pick themselves with really strong numbers are Michael Hussey (656.9) and Shivnarine Chanderpaul (650.5). Chanderpaul, unlike team-mate Gayle, did not play those Canada matches. And he's been in great form against everyone, averaging 74.4 in the last twelve months, better than anyone else in this squad. Kevin Pietersen (558.5) was a fair bit behind the two left-handers on points, but fared better than the others in contention- Yuvraj Singh (508.3) and Ricky Ponting (505.1). Jacques Kallis brings in the all-rounder option, but his strike-rate makes him a bit of a liability (plus Chanderpaul plays the similar role of sheet-anchor).

The All-Rounders
Jacques Kallis versus Andrew Flintoff was the only real debate, but given the composition of the side so far, a hard-hitting Flintoff who you can bank on for ten overs is clearly a better fit. Add to that, he's been in sensational form since coming back to the game, averaging 19 with the ball at an economy rate of 4.6.Mahendra Singh Dhoni was the easiest to pick. He's the best keeper-batsmen in the world yes, but even better, he's the best batsmen in the world with a score of 675.5. And given his Midas touch, why wouldn't you want him as your captain!

The Bowlers
This was also a hard area to choose, but unlike the openers debate where there seemed to be a lot of quality, with the bowlers there is a dearth of talent. Sure, it takes time to develop a Pollock or a McGrath, but no one today seems capable of getting there! Nathan Bracken is the stand-out bowler with a score of 583.7. He has gone at just over 4 an over at an average of 20.4 in the last twelve months. The numbers reveal that he is without a doubt the best ODI bowler in the world today.The spinner was an easy pick, Muttiah Muralitharan. But his score is just 473.0, due to some mediocre ODI form. He still makes the cut, ahead to Vettori, because of his sheer class but also because there really isn't anyone else who's done enough to stake a claim in this side. Zaheer Khan (545.9), Mitchell Johnson (529.9) and Brett Lee (503.4) are the bowlers left to pick from. Zaheer has only been back a short while, but has impressed and gets the nod ahead of Johnson. Lee is the quick right-hander bowler who adds another dimension to this attack. Other guys who just missed out are Kyle Mills, Jerome Taylor, Sohail Tanvir and Stuart Broad. See what I mean about the lack of quality bowlers in the world today!I'm surprised Dale Steyn hasn't yet made his mark in the fifty over game. And I'm sure a couple of Pakistan bowlers must be kicking themselves right now, if Mohammad Asif and Shoaib Akhtar had stayed out of trouble there's no reason they wouldn't be the best in the world today.

Overall, I think this is a pretty solid World XI. Lethal Lee is the break through man who bowls flat-out fast, with Zaheer Khan his new ball partner. Andrew Flintoff then keeps it tight in the middle, leaving it to Murali to work his magic. And Nathan Bracken does his thing at the death. With the bat, Sehwag gives you that attacking start. Tendulkar, well, is Tendulkar. Chanderpaul is the sheet anchor, around whom Pietersen and Hussey play their shots. And then there's Flintoff and Dhoni to push the rate at the end. I like this side's chances!
Liked this article. Would you pick someone else in your World XI? Do write in with your thoughts to varun.mind@gmail.com

LETTER TO PRIME MINISTER

Dear Mr. Prime minister
I am a typical mouse from Mumbai. In the local train compartment which has capacity of 100 persons, I travel with 500 more mouse. Mouse at least squeak but we don't even do that.

Today I heard your speech. In which you said 'NO BODY WOULD BE SPARED'. I would like to remind you that fourteen years has passed since serial bomb blast in Mumbai took place. Dawood was the main conspirator. Till today he is not caught. All our bolywood actors, our builders, our Gutka king meets him but your Government can not catch him. Reason is simple; all your ministers are hand in glove with him. If any attempt is made to catch him everybody will be exposed. Your statement 'NOBODY WOULD BE SPARED' is nothing but a cruel joke on this unfortunate people of India.

Enough is enough. As such after seeing terrorist attack carried out by about a dozen young boys I realize that if same thing continues days are not away when terrorist will attack by air, destroy our nuclear reactor and there will be one more Hiroshima.

We the people are left with only one mantra. Womb to Bomb to Tomb. You promised Mumbaikar Shanghai what you have given us is Jalianwala Baug.

Today only your home minister resigned. What took you so long to kick out this joker? Only reason was that he was loyal to Gandhi family. Loyalty to Gandhi family is more important than blood of innocent people, isn't it?

I am born and bought up in Mumbai for last fifty eight years. Believe me corruption in Maharashtra is worse than that in Bihar. Look at all the politician, Sharad Pawar, Chagan Bhujbal, Narayan Rane, Bal Thackray , Gopinath Munde, Raj Thackray, Vilasrao Deshmukh all are rolling in money. Vilasrao Deshmukh is one of the worst Chief minister I have seen. His only business is to increase the FSI every other day, make money and send it to Delhi so Congress can fight next election. Now the clown has found new way and will increase FSI for fisherman so they can build concrete house right on sea shore. Next time terrorist can comfortably live in those house , enjoy the beauty of sea and then attack the Mumbai at their will.

Recently I had to purchase house in Mumbai. I met about two dozen builders. Everybody wanted about 30% in black. A common person like me knows this and with all your intelligent agency & CBI you and your finance minister are not aware of it. Where all the black money goes? To the underworld isn't it? Our politicians take help of these goondas to vacate people by force. I myself was victim of it. If you have time please come to me, I will tell you everything.

If this has been land of fools, idiots then I would not have ever cared to write you this letter. Just see the tragedy, on one side we are reaching moon, people are so intelligent and on other side you politician has converted nectar into deadly poison. I am everything Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Schedule caste, OBC, Muslim OBC, Christian Schedule caste, Creamy Schedule caste only what I am not is INDIAN. You politician have raped every part of mother India by your policy of divide and rule.

Take example of former president Abdul Kalam. Such a intelligent person, such a fine human being. You politician didn't even spare him. Your party along with opposition joined the hands, because politician feels they are supreme and there is no place for good person.

Dear Mr Prime minister you are one of the most intelligent person, most learned person. Just wake up, be a real SARDAR. First and foremost expose all selfish politician. Ask Swiss bank to give name of all Indian account holder. Give reins of CBI to independent agency. Let them find wolf among us. There will be political upheaval but that will better than dance of death which we are witnessing every day. Just give us ambient where we can work honestly and without fear. Let there be rule of law. Everything else will be taken care of.

Choice is yours Mr. Prime Minister. Do you want to be lead by one person or you want to lead the nation of 100 Crore people?

Prakash B. Bajaj
Editor
Times Of India
Mumbai