Originators of game and inheritance of attitude
I was very excited and I woke up at 2:00 AM to see the second day of India Vs England day 2 of the test. It was nice to see the wall back in action along with the new sensational opener (not sure if you agree with me :-) ) . India were 437/8 with 17 overs remaining. England made a great comeback with 7 wickets and brought some life into the game. But..... Slowly after that I started dozing. Reason ?? Not that I got up early but the way cricket was being played.
As a fielding team trying to level series, one would expect a team to play hard or at the least wage a tough battle. One would obviously expect to finish of the tail as soon as possible. But Kevin Peterson, the so called man of aggression had his best spinner of the match bowling with a 6-3 field. There was no first slip, neither there was a short leg nor a silly point. I doubt if Ishant would have had such a relaxing net practice. He was predetermined not to waste too much of effort to defend and went on to do that. There were ten fielders, a bowling machine, handful of spectators and a juricator to watch his net practice which was broadcast ed live across globe. Not to forget the fools (as termed by Bernard Shaw) across the globe following it (includes me :) ). As a distant spectator, I could see him placing his pad way outside off stump even before the ball crossed half way distance of pitch (It reminded me the memory of Jimmy Padams (Adams!) who padded continuously 130 overs to avoid defeat against India). The amazing thing was, this happened all the six balls for couple of overs from Swan. I guess Ishant was himself bored of mundane bowling and entertained himself by having a good chat with keeper and other English players at the back in time interval between deliveries. India were in no mood to declare, nor England wanted the Innings to end. A reverse deadlock indeed. Andrew Strauss was in no mood to bat.
Commentators termed it as mystery of Cricket, which I can claim isn't mystery but pure complacency and laziness. One would expect few lbw shouts just for the sake but I guess it never happened. The Umpires were researching the light meter (Video game) as they did not have anything interesting going on. The best possible simile I can draw is the way we while away time with our mobiles in Airport or long queues. True, how long can one stand just staring at virtually nothing. Finally India were all out, and so I hoped that there would be something interesting in the remaining ten overs. The fielders walked in, the umpires walked in followed by English batsmen. Umpire Rauf picked up his video game to check the light and English player were seen moving towards dressing room to give a notion that they were in no mood to play and the umpires accepted their urgency with out even bowling a single delivery.
Let's substitute England with Australia. Frankly we got to accept, they add some passion, play hard game image to cricket. Though Indian team is having a dream run, Indian team in the past is known for its complacency. I felt the complacency was inherited from the originators of the game in India and was very obvious.
Adios,
I was very excited and I woke up at 2:00 AM to see the second day of India Vs England day 2 of the test. It was nice to see the wall back in action along with the new sensational opener (not sure if you agree with me :-) ) . India were 437/8 with 17 overs remaining. England made a great comeback with 7 wickets and brought some life into the game. But..... Slowly after that I started dozing. Reason ?? Not that I got up early but the way cricket was being played.
As a fielding team trying to level series, one would expect a team to play hard or at the least wage a tough battle. One would obviously expect to finish of the tail as soon as possible. But Kevin Peterson, the so called man of aggression had his best spinner of the match bowling with a 6-3 field. There was no first slip, neither there was a short leg nor a silly point. I doubt if Ishant would have had such a relaxing net practice. He was predetermined not to waste too much of effort to defend and went on to do that. There were ten fielders, a bowling machine, handful of spectators and a juricator to watch his net practice which was broadcast ed live across globe. Not to forget the fools (as termed by Bernard Shaw) across the globe following it (includes me :) ). As a distant spectator, I could see him placing his pad way outside off stump even before the ball crossed half way distance of pitch (It reminded me the memory of Jimmy Padams (Adams!) who padded continuously 130 overs to avoid defeat against India). The amazing thing was, this happened all the six balls for couple of overs from Swan. I guess Ishant was himself bored of mundane bowling and entertained himself by having a good chat with keeper and other English players at the back in time interval between deliveries. India were in no mood to declare, nor England wanted the Innings to end. A reverse deadlock indeed. Andrew Strauss was in no mood to bat.
Commentators termed it as mystery of Cricket, which I can claim isn't mystery but pure complacency and laziness. One would expect few lbw shouts just for the sake but I guess it never happened. The Umpires were researching the light meter (Video game) as they did not have anything interesting going on. The best possible simile I can draw is the way we while away time with our mobiles in Airport or long queues. True, how long can one stand just staring at virtually nothing. Finally India were all out, and so I hoped that there would be something interesting in the remaining ten overs. The fielders walked in, the umpires walked in followed by English batsmen. Umpire Rauf picked up his video game to check the light and English player were seen moving towards dressing room to give a notion that they were in no mood to play and the umpires accepted their urgency with out even bowling a single delivery.
Let's substitute England with Australia. Frankly we got to accept, they add some passion, play hard game image to cricket. Though Indian team is having a dream run, Indian team in the past is known for its complacency. I felt the complacency was inherited from the originators of the game in India and was very obvious.
Adios,
