Arm Ball

Who said cricket is for youth ?

Perform and keep persisting.

Age doesnt matter. Its just a number. Much for hysteria of the buffoons who know nothing on the game and for whom sustaining the limelight is the only purpose.

How does it matter if you are 25 and keep scoring 20s and 30s remain in the team but a batsman who has had just 5 bad ODIs is dropped for 2 long years. And the man who scores 10700 ODI runs, only 3rd or 4th man in the history to have 10k runs in both formats goes out just cos he is 34. Was 34.

A 40 year old man scores a 98 in the game against India and the 32 year old scores just 1 and 17 and 31 year old hits himself out. And 37 year old takes 5-for in almost every 2nd or 3rd inning and a 26 year old fails after the initial hyesteria.

The top 4 wicket takers are the ones who blossomed in the later years of their careers. The drug abused blonde star who took 40 wickets in losing cause took close to 400 wkts in 2nd part of his career. A jaw broken bowler took 350 wkts in his last 5 years of career when people had written him off.

A 36 year old batsman has scored 9 international hundreds since May 2007 and 7 90s. Out of which many were wrong decisions.

Age is just a number. Fold the number and flush it in the commode of your loo.

Lol.

That should be the end of DK for long time to come unless he doesnt get his boots going. Just like Rohit Sharma.

Alright so GOD scores 44th 100. Rahul comes at 2 and MS comes at 3. Yuvraj at 4.

India go hit 319 for 5 and win a tri0-series final in years. Last one they won………..ahem ahem ahem dont remember. Got it, CB series 2008, their best ever tri-series win after 2002 Lord’s.

Finals jinx resolved. A tight slap to those who say Sachin doesnt play in finals. Go fag yourself. A whacking fatak (Kaminey isshtyle) to those idiots who say Sachin cant score a 100 in a final.

And a note to the critics of Bhajji . He got a 5-for just for 3rd time in his career. First against other team than England and though it was tail enders whose wkts came to Bhajji, it would lessen the chances of Mishra to sneak into the team.

A final well won and a sweet revenge for the humiliating 139 run loss on Saturday. Would like to see the character of Mahela now who has now got 3 failures in the series and SJ got back to runs about whom he had talked something like pressure on him………..Only thing he would keep playing and he wont be thrown out.

And as again Mendis was neutralised and dusted.

Every series they go in they have lotsa debutants. Lot of players get axed and lot many come back. But barring ageless Jayasuriya and to an extent Sanga himself, no batsmen has been able to do well for SL in this span.

So how could this team be considered a contender for the home world cup? Of course unless they turn around the tide and play well. Another worrying aspect for them is they have not won a single bilateral series against strong team at home. 2 series loss (2-3 and 1-4) to India and 2-3 loss to England in 2007 isnt a pretty picture for a team which had a formidable record at home. The management speaks of tough decisions. If the same is being followed, then the first one to get kicked out on that terms is Mahela Jayawardhena himself out of the ODi team. Hell he had 3 ducks in row against ZIM in the tri-series last year.

He doesnt play well against Pakistan. And besides in current season out of 16 games he has made 212 runs at an average of 14. Last 3 seasons he averages 14.13, 36.2 and 25.15. Pretty low for a man who speaks so loud on consistency and team building ethics. So when there are so many talented youngsters knocking the SL ODi team, why doesnt this man gets dumped unless he scores substantial in whatever domestic cricket SL has ?

2 and half sessions on day 5 SL need another 1o9 runs to win with 6 wickets in hand. In the day so far SL has scored just over 200 runs for a single wicket loss. Proves that they didnt want to go for the target, set the world record and win the series 3-0.

Negative cricket all round. In first hour of last session Younis Khan kept bowling himself and fawad Alam when he should have bowled his 2 best spinners. Pitch looked flat, yet Younis should have on his 2 best bowlers of the Test match. The players had lost the shoulders, they were lethargic and usual bugsy Akamal wasnt even chirping.

16 overs on and 106 runs to win. The equation was 133 runs in 36 overs which is quite gettable this days on final day of the Test match. Run rate just little under 4. Achievable given captain is on the crease. When the captain himself is content in playing negative cricket, there is hardly anything the team can do or the fans can expect to see the test cricket being kept alive.

Such Tests are disgrace for the health of longest format. It takes us back to the days of India Pakistan cricket when either team didnt want to lose just for saving the heads being rolled and saving the careers. Lose pathetic cricket.

Pak bowlers are not even trying something different. No banter, no sledging (very unusual for a Pak team) and no lifting up the spirits.

Rather than Pak, it would be SL who would need to be blamed for this boring Test match — the dead rubber, who bothers about the victory right now. Series already in pocket, man of the series and man of the match awards would come this team’s way and the averages would have been bulged up too. Whats the use of this century of Sangakara when its not even attempting to scare Pakistan that they are going to lose 0-3.

I remember Nagpur Test match of 2006 series between India and England when in last innings India needed 300 odd to win and batsmen knew it wasnt possible to win, yet Tendulkar and Pathan (I) managed to score runs at T20 pace then scaring Flintoff….Although Test was a draw, yet India attempted to make a match out of it.

Negative Test cricket has been foray of Lanka ever since they began their inception. It was at its pinnacle in 90s when Jaya was in peak of his form, yet they couldnt convert those drawn Tests to victories. Remember 1997 series when India and SL played out 5 boring draws. Every time India would score fast on day 2 losing wkts and scoring 500 odd runs. And then SL would carry on batting for the rest 3 days. Remember 952 ? Even today’s retiree Vaas scored a 50 and debutant Mahela scored a 80 odd runs after 576 runathon by SJ and RM.

Unless SL dont give away this tendency to play negative Test cricket, they wont be counted in top test teams of the world, no matter how many batsmen they have over 50+ or bowlers over 700+ or how many clean sweeps they achieve over BD or Zim or SA or Eng at home.

I must say I hated him whenever he hit those nasty hundreds and triple hundreds against us. I overjoyed whenever he went out quickly most notably during the 1996 Semi final. Generations of captains went in. Azhar, Ganguly, Tendulkar, Dravid and Kumble. Now MS. This man still there.

Take a bow. Take a bow. He along with the GOD are the only links now from the 1980s. Hail them as long as they are around.

Meanwhile SL look good to go to semis at least way they have played. Look good today to win as well since no Gayle today and without him WI just seem a touch better than Holland or Ireland.