We need to close channels such as Star News who claim to know everything and give their cheap opinion.

Because they can only sell their news using harsh words, they are using it on players and breaking their confidence.

If India wins, they still paint Chappell as bad and if India loose because of bad batting, they still paint everyone bad.

Star News seems like does not digest India's victory, they have to find fault from Sachin's 76 ball 100 runs innings. It was chancy/shakey but give a guy a break, man.

Star News and some other media sucks.

Yes, Manish..totally agree with you.

it is disgusting to watch these channels, they spread the wrong message. In any competitive sport u win some and lose some. The team can not win all the time... i know that after reading this people will start chanting "aussie ..aussie ..aussie"

but analyse this...before aussies ...west indies were the champions.. and even england were a champion team once upon a time. At the moment indians are not playing as well as they can, some may say that they have always underachieved and that would not be entirely false. But, they surely dont deserve the treatment that they get from a section of media, whose only objective seems to be bashing the team/players/coach, in order to sell their content to "fair-weather fans". The unfortunate thing is that people, who do not know their cricket, might not always understand that things like loss of form are inevitable (especially in cricket) and they become easy targets for these channels.

I am not saying that the people can not criticise a player, or that the team should not strive to win everything ( On the contrary, i believe that if a team doesnt have that attitude, it wont win much ). All i am hoping for is "constructive critism" from the media as well as people.

Congrats to your son for being an Arsenal supporter. Go Gunners go! And as far as Indian cricket is concerned, don't worry. Cricket deserves it. Who's got time for that old hag of a game anyway? Its a game for lazy people (read gentlemen) who after having a nice Sunday lunch, with their tummies full would go out and stand in the winter sun for a leisurely afternoon (Look at all the old videos, you'll have 6-7 players in the slip cordon). Its not a team game. Its basically a selfish game, and if you see any kids' game, you will see everyone waiting for batting, and once its over, they have got loads of work to do and they escape to their homes. Have you seen TaxiNumber9211? In that Nana Patekar says to his child, "bat kiska hai (mera), ball kiska hai (mera), to fir fielding kyun kar raha hai?" This is the typical attitude of all the parents, and anyway, as I said, cricket only inculcates selfishness and nothing else. very few of the developed countries play cricket seriously. Its a colossal waste of time. Now even cricket people have understood that. That's why they have started Twenty20. Indians love cricket only because that is where they have heroes. And because heroes of other hard-working games have been chucked off...Take Dhyanchand, for example. Because of cricket, all other sports in the country have come to a stop. A country of 100 crore cannot send 100 quality people to the Olympics. Stop crying about Indian cricket. Kerry Packer had firmly glued Indians to their Tv sets with their stupid game. Its time we packed him back home.

Mukul-Your piece on strange death of Indian cricket is very perceptive and insightful as usual. I read one other article you wrote for 'The Hindu' on the West Indian masters and why we so adored them. I jumped for joy reading that article since it so beautifully captured all the feelings/emotions of Indian Cricket fans and their penchant to be identified with them even more than Indian team itself. I've started watching/following cricket from 1982-83 Pakistan(Imran) series quickly followed by the tour of West Indies culminating in World Cup Triumph! Oh those were the days of waiting with excitement where one could build his sense of wonderment/dejection without too much help from in-your face TV experts.
It will be very hard to shake-off the enchanting, intense memories of Lloyds all-conquering(truly)languid predatgors. Four true-blue strike bowlers when having one was itself a fortune for most teams. Malcolm was the ultimate destructive strike bowler who ended many careers while Holding was piece of art.....very truly poetry in a very fast motion! Roberts and Garner no less menacing and effective. Who could forget the ferocious spell by Macko in Kanpur(1983)....stumps cartwheeling, bat flying off from none other than Sunny's hand and oh so many heart-in mouth moments! For a longtime i thought it a insult to the magnificient four-pronged pace attack of Windies to call anyone else a fastbowler. Now everyone is called a fastbowler....what pity!

So in the absence of truly majestic, authentic heroes Cricket loses not only in India but in Rest of the World too. With super saturation coverage where every moment is stereotyped into a format for the sake of sponsors(delayed decisions was utter farce in the recent India-South Africa series). Cricket fans currently cannot identify passionately with players like they used to do.....so King Richards shall remain a King, Lloyd remains the quiet emperor, the pace-quartet shall still send shivers, Greenidge will be next only to Viv in utter destruction, Haynes super solid against super-skillful bowlers! Where do we find equivalents today to salivate?!

The other day at the India-WI ODI there was Lara batting at his sublime best - and parts of the crowd began to troop off! Another manifestation of the end!

You have to work on your cricket Mr. Kesavan. A top score of 14 in neightbourhood cricket calls for measures quite drastic - how about football this weekend? :)

I am in total agreement that we are wasting time with our addiction to Cricket. It is a sport designed for the idle rich aristocrats of England. They have to keep themselves occupied during 5 week days, resting during the week end. Why on earth are we getting all worked up over it?

Is sport merely about winning or is it a tad more than winning? Entertainment was the first purpose for which sport was played for. Don't you believe a watching a consistenly winning team like Australia gets a bit boring sometimes.

Hi everyone

I really think that Indian middle order is not very strong. Even though Dhoni and Karthik are competent batsmen, both are not no.6 players. We need an additional batsman in the middle order. Plus Irfan Pathan needs to be played during the sri lanka series and should be made to bowl 2nd change. My lineup for the world cup would be:

Saurav Ganguly
Virender Sehwag
Sachin Tendulkar
Mohd Kaif/Robin Uthapa
Rahul Dravid
Yuvraj Singh
MS Dhoni
Irfan Pathan/Ramesh Powar/Joginder Sharma
Ajit Agarkar
Zaheer Khan
Anil Kumble

For any ODI match we need very good combination of opening batsmen who will perform like a scoring machine (fast scoring). victory of the match depends on the initial scoring rate. Uthappa can do this in a better way & I believe he is a good opener with Ganguli.

If the top batsmen are successful to do the following definetely, the team can achieve a victory over the opponent team. I believe this.
a) All the top batsmen of the team have to try to make atleast one boundary from each six ball.
b) Each batsmen have to play minimum 8 overs.
c) Opening batsmen have to score a minimum of 100 runs from the initial 15 overs without fail.

I believe this team can win the match.

Thanks & regards,

For a match to be played of 50 players, we need to have solid openers with good middle order batsman. Ganguly and Uttapa are doing a fair good job in their slots. Ganguly should play as an opener with either Uttapa/Sehwag. There is no need that u have both Uttapa and Sehwag in a team. My middle order batsmal who can do a fair job for world cup are Tendular at No.3, followed by Dravid, Yujraj, Kaif, Dhoni, Pathan, Agarkar, Harbajan, and Zaheer. Since Westindies have fast bowling track, so there is no need that u have to both both kumble as well as Harbajan in the 11 playing side. I dont know why kaif has been sidelined. He was our BEST BATSMAN in the last Westindies tour. I would like to have him in the ahead of Raina or anyone else.

MY TEAM THAT CAN REALLY BRING CUP TO HOME

1. Ganguly.
2. Uthappa/Sehwag.
3. Tendular.
4. Dravid.
5. Yuvraj.
6. Kaif.
7. Dhoni.
8. Irfan.
9. Agarkar.
10. Harbajan.
11. Zaheer.

PLEASE INCLUDE KAIF AS HE IS CAPABLE OF WINNING MATCHES.

This is about TV commentary and News paper coverage of Cricket matches.
1. TV commentary: While listening to a Radio commentary of a match, be it one day or Test, the listener will get almost all the details of the match till that moment; eg: no. of overs bowled, bowling figures of the bowlers, details abt the batsmen out..no. of runs scored, how they were out, scores of the not out batsmen with the no. of balls faced, etc. Along with the running commentary (which will be so nice, as if we are watching the match) the commentators will give lots of information, records etc. At the end of each over we will know the total score, individual scores of not out batsmen, bowling figures of bowler etc. But in TV coverage, one has to wait for a long time (15-20mts) to know about the scores of batsmen already out, composition of the team, winner of the toss and the decision made by the toss winner. Most of the times the TV commentator will be telling about in which direction the ball is hit by the batsmen and how it is fielded, which all the viewers can know without the commentary. I always enjoy listening the radio commentary while I watch TV with sound muted. But once in a while there will not be co-ordination between the two. My suggestion is: give as much details of the match as possible, either orally or through news bar (at the bottom the screen).TV is a much powerful media than Radio and hence make use of both audio and visual facility.

Coming to News paper coverages: Cricket lovers are interested in individual scores with details of no. of balls faced, no. of 4s and 6s hit in case of ODIs and no. of minutes he stayed in crease in case of Test matches. But unfortunately almost all the news papers will give only the runs scored by individual batsman in ODIs and Balls faced and no. of 4s and 6s in Test matches! I really dont understand the logic behind this.

raghu
BANGALORE.

The Indian team for the world cup is to be announced today and seems to have caught the whole nations imagination if not for anything else but to see where the 'colonel' is going to unearth a team that has a realistic chance of geting close to winning the tournament.
Most people, almost a dozen pick themselves and the few borderline cases dont matter much in the real sense since they would end up warming the benches anyways.
The best bet will be to put our best batsmen upfront, namely on current form The Prince and The Master !!! What a turn around for Saurav from the wilderness to being put up as first choice opener...so true when people say form is temporary but class is permanent. One drop will have to be the Skipper followed by Yuvraj and Sehwag. The Najafgarh bomber has to picked for his sheer ability to crack open a game on his stroke producing abilities where ever in the order he is played. The wickets in the west indies are no longer what they used to be and surely will not threaten him in the mid innings stage where we face a problem currently.
Its strange that we think Dinesh Karthick can be played as a batsman because its hard to convince me that there is no other player in india who can bat at no. 6 who has better credentials as a pure batsman. With Dhoni staking his complete claim as a wicket keeper that slot is his for the taking so a person like Kaif , with his proven record in the Carribean and his superior fielding abilities should make the 6 spot with Dhoni taking 7. As far as the bowlers go Munaf and Zaheer taking the new ball and Agarkar at first change will be best suited.. Harbajan should be the first choice spinner with Powar and Anil as standby in case of drop in form or pitch considerations in a long tournament like this. That accounts for 13 members already. In case a seconmd wicket keeper is to be carried along then and only then hsould Dinesh Karthick be chosen but in a tournament like this its always a safer option. That leaves one slot of grabs and that has to be a 4th fast bowler and on current form its a toss up between Irfan and Sreeshanth but with tested superior batting abilities Irfan should get the nod.
All said and done these are players who havent set the world on fire in the recent past so we indians will be better served by being practical and hopeing that team does reasonably and not with hopes that thge cup will come back to indian shores after 24 long years , i think that would be wishful thinking but hey what the hell why not dream along till the bubbles bursts !!!

we need to have solid openers with good middle order batsman. Ganguly and Uttapa are doing a fair good job in their slots. Ganguly should play as an opener with either Sehwag. There is no need that u have both Uttapa and Sehwag in a team. My middle order batsmal who can do a fair job for world cup are Tendular at No.3, followed by Dravid, Yujraj, Kaif, Dhoni, Pathan, Agarkar, Harbajan, and Zaheer. Since Westindies have fast bowling track, so there is no need that u have to both both kumble as well as Harbajan in the 11 playing side. I dont know why kaif has been sidelined. He was our BEST BATSMAN in the last Westindies tour. I would like to have him in the ahead of Raina or anyone else.

really think that Indian middle order is not very strong. Even though Dhoni and Karthik are competent batsmen, both are not no.6 players. We need an additional batsman in the middle order Kaif/Raina. Plus Irfan Pathan needs to be played during the sri lanka series and should be made to bowl 2nd change. My lineup for the world cup would be.
Indrajeet Sonker

I think the Australian camp feel that there are unbeatable and the comment made by Lou Vincent.I think the entire Australian thinks they are bigger that the game, you can see that from the way Ricky Ponting addressed the press in response to Lou's comments.

2 readers mentioned the name KAIf!!.Let the ignorant readers know justification for including him at NO 6.He has been given so many chances. A good fielder yes, but thats all. Somebody ought to buy him pads that fit. That unshaven face and always fidgetting makes him look anything but a cricker.

I am really amused by the selection of PCB for the worlcup. What makes me really surprised is the selection of just two openers, and those are Imran Nazir and Mohammad Hafiz, I am amused that they trained Salman Butt from the last three year and know in the main event they exclude him for the team, another thing which i want to state is that role of Bob Woolmer in the team is now very negative, i dont know what happened to him, why his approach is so much negative to the Paksitani players.
I just request to Bob Woolmer that please be positive, if you hear about the coaching of England team, so it is OK, but first you have to be sinceare with your present job.
Thanks

Is there a connection between
Selection and sponsorship eg Viru and Irfan
&
Rejection and lack of sponsors eg VVSLaxman & Powar
the former two despite being out of form/unfit whilst the latter two talented and proven match winners out in the cold-how about Media Hype for the former and the lack of it for the latter
I really do hope NOT!