If you thought Bangalore Royal Challengers had been poor so far in this tournament, today's performance can only be classified thus. What was Praveen Kumar up to ? First he does this, then he follows it up by standing as stationary as the pole star on the field, when an effort at a catch was the minimum that was expected, and then he tries to smash the greatest leg-spinner of all time out of the park the first ball he faces, to be promptly caught on the boundary like.
Despite all this, his bowling remained decent. I sympathize with Praveen Kumar. It must be difficult to play in a team that is losing consistently and miserably especially for a young talented lad full of attitude and a taste for success, as he has clearly had in Australia. Still, this is no way to behave on and off the field.
Dravid's frustration was evident. Clearly he would have felt like pulling his hair off and giving Praveen Kumar a sound telling off but being the gentleman he is and a losing general at that, all he could do was make a mild protest. The whole team today played as if it completely lacked interest, again with the notable exceptions of Dravid, Kumble and Zaheer Khan.
It was soothing to see Dravid's innings though - especially the fight he showed. Not just hitting those sixes, which we know he is well capable of, but first, refusing to take the fielder's word for the catch, and then holding on to the strike in the last over to score as many runs as possible. There was a message there, to the cricket world, but much more so, to his own teammates that said - "You bunch of no-hopers may be going through the motions, but I shall fight out till the end and never give up".
Other than this saving grace, the Bangalore performance was such that they deserve every bit of thrashing that critics, or Mallya might heap upon them.
Rajasthan put in another superb performance. After the heroics of Pollock and Jayasuriya last week, for the Mumbai Indians, another 38-year old, perhaps the greatest of them all produced a truly grand (citi ?) moment of success with a mind-boggling return catch of Zaheer Khan, to become the highest wicket-taker. This after Sohail Tanvir and the other seamers had done a wonderful in job in shattering the top order yet again.
It was indeed a bit of a surprise that despite losing only one wicket, the Royals managed to put up only 197 on the board. In the end, a 65 run defeat was a flattering margin for the royally challenged.
By the way, Asnodkar in the limited overs team for India any one ?
Revenge Battles Results
Dravid v Watson - Draw
Kallis v Watson - Draw
Kohli v Patel - Draw
Boucher v Warne - No show
Praveen v Warne - Warne wins ! REVENGE !
Praveen v Rawat - No show
Zaheer v Pathan - No show
Praveen v Watson - Draw
Despite all this, his bowling remained decent. I sympathize with Praveen Kumar. It must be difficult to play in a team that is losing consistently and miserably especially for a young talented lad full of attitude and a taste for success, as he has clearly had in Australia. Still, this is no way to behave on and off the field.
Dravid's frustration was evident. Clearly he would have felt like pulling his hair off and giving Praveen Kumar a sound telling off but being the gentleman he is and a losing general at that, all he could do was make a mild protest. The whole team today played as if it completely lacked interest, again with the notable exceptions of Dravid, Kumble and Zaheer Khan.
It was soothing to see Dravid's innings though - especially the fight he showed. Not just hitting those sixes, which we know he is well capable of, but first, refusing to take the fielder's word for the catch, and then holding on to the strike in the last over to score as many runs as possible. There was a message there, to the cricket world, but much more so, to his own teammates that said - "You bunch of no-hopers may be going through the motions, but I shall fight out till the end and never give up".
Other than this saving grace, the Bangalore performance was such that they deserve every bit of thrashing that critics, or Mallya might heap upon them.
Rajasthan put in another superb performance. After the heroics of Pollock and Jayasuriya last week, for the Mumbai Indians, another 38-year old, perhaps the greatest of them all produced a truly grand (citi ?) moment of success with a mind-boggling return catch of Zaheer Khan, to become the highest wicket-taker. This after Sohail Tanvir and the other seamers had done a wonderful in job in shattering the top order yet again.
It was indeed a bit of a surprise that despite losing only one wicket, the Royals managed to put up only 197 on the board. In the end, a 65 run defeat was a flattering margin for the royally challenged.
By the way, Asnodkar in the limited overs team for India any one ?
Revenge Battles Results
Dravid v Watson - Draw
Kallis v Watson - Draw
Kohli v Patel - Draw
Boucher v Warne - No show
Praveen v Warne - Warne wins ! REVENGE !
Praveen v Rawat - No show
Zaheer v Pathan - No show
Praveen v Watson - Draw
1 comment:
Well, its really sad for youngsters like Virat Kohli and Praveen Kumar to have been made part of this side, but at least the constant losses will give a good dose of reality to Rahul Dravid (and for that matter, to all those who think that T20s are just about slogging and playing stupid shots) that T20s requires a seperate set of skills and that it isn't as easy as they think it is.
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